As Liverpool celebrates it’s 800th year, Artistic Director Gemma Bodinetz directs the first ‘Made in Liverpool’ production of the Autumn Winter 07 season with a new play set in 19th century Liverpool from exciting young talent, Lizzie Nunnery, at Everyman And Playhouse Theatres.
Intemperance is a powerful play with a poetic voice that looks at poverty, immigration, and the struggle for hope in the underclass of a city seemingly flourishing. Award-winning actress Brid Brennan (Dancing at Lughnasa) plays Irish immigrant Millie who is trying to keep her hopes and her family alive through the most challenging of circumstances. Intemperance is at the Liverpool Everyman from Friday 21 September until Saturday 13 October 2007.
“Intemperance is the epitome of every crime, the cause of every kind of misery.” Douglas William Jerrold, English journalist and writer (1803 - 1857)
It’s 1854, a time of dizzying change. Liverpool’s streets are teeming with merchants and new arrivals from all corners of the globe. Every day as the walls of St. George’s Hall grow higher above the city skyline, in the bowels of the city the poor of the cellar slums drink away their fears. It’s never their time and they know their place. But Millie has other ideas. She’s seen the light at the end of the tunnel and she’s taking her fiery family with her.
Writer Lizzie Nunnery encapsulates the theatres’ commitment to nurturing new talent. Four years ago she joined the Everyman Playhouse Young Writer’s Programme and then became one of the three Henry Cotton Writers on Attachment. Lizzie was also one of the four writers of last year’s highly acclaimed verbatim piece Unprotected (Amnesty International Freedom of Expression Award 2006).
Tony award-winning Brid Brennan takes the role of ‘Millie Sildnes’ in her Liverpool Everyman debut. This revered Irish stage actress is most recognised for her award-winning performance of Agnes in Brian Friel’s Dancing at Lughnasa both on stage (International tour – 1992 Tony Award for Best Actress) and on film (1999 IFTA Best Actress Award).
The strong Irish cast also includes Brendan Conroy as ‘Fergal Monahan’, Emily Taaffe as ‘Niamh Mcloughlin’, and Matthew Dunphy, returning to the Everyman following his performance in 2005’s Port Authority, as ‘Ruairi McLoughlin’. Kristofer Gummerus plays ‘Millie’s’ Norwegian husband ‘Brynjar Sildnes’.
Everyman and Playhouse Artistic Director Gemma Bodinetz returns to directing since last year’s riveting production of All My Sons with Dearbhla Molloy and Michael Byrne at the Playhouse. For Intemperance she has brought together a talented creative team in designer Ruairi Murchison, composer Conor Linehan, lighting designer Paul Keogan and sound design by Fergus O’Hare.
Director Gemma Bodinetz says: “It is a very beautiful play with resonances for today. Set against the Victorian principles of the ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ poor it questions our own attitudes towards the dehumanising impact of extreme poverty in an aggressively aspirational and class-bound society. In 1854 Liverpool was spending thousands of pounds on completing this glorious hall on St George’s Plateau, while in the adjoining streets thousands of people were dying from Cholera in the poor conditions of the cellar slums. Yet, who today would be without the magnificent St George’s Hall?” -- www.everymanplayhouse.com
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