Fire Below

by Owen McCafferty

  OWEN McCAFFERTY

  Fire Below

  a war of words

  Contents

  Title Page

  Premiere Production

  Characters

  Author’s Note

  Fire Below

  Appendix

  About the Author

  By the Same Author

  Copyright

  Fire Below, a co-production between the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, and the Lyric Theatre, Belfast, was first performed on the Danske Bank stage of the Lyric Theatre, Belfast, on 12 October 2017, and subsequently on the Peacock stage of the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, on 7 November 2017. The cast, in order of appearance, was as follows:

  Rosemary Cara Kelly

  Gerry Frankie McCafferty

  Tom Ruairi Conaghan

  Maggie Ali White

  Director Jimmy Fay

  Assistant Director Emily Foran

  Set Design Paula McCafferty

  Costume Design Úna Hickey

  Music and Sound Design Conor Mitchell

  Lighting Design Sinead McKenna

  AV Consultant Neil O’Driscoll

  Production Managers Paul Hinchcliffe, Cliff Barragry

  Casting Directors Kelly Phelan, Clare Gault

  Characters

  Rosemary

  Gerry

  Tom

  Maggie

  all mid- to late fifties

  FIRE BELOW

  A WAR OF WORDS

  Belfast. Hot summer evening.

  They all drink wine whenever they want.

  No one is at any time drunk.

  No surtitles for anything spoken in Irish.

  Rosemary and Gerry are sitting on their deck having a drink and looking out into the distance. Opera is playing in the background – it is barely audible.

  Rosemary do it

  Gerry no

  Rosemary it’s liberating

  Gerry it’s stupid

  Rosemary lifts some coins from the table and throws them into the field adjacent to the house.

  Rosemary do it

  Gerry no

  Rosemary you’re no fun – you can be funny – but you’re no fun

  Gerry i’m not silly

  Rosemary no gerry you’re not silly

  Gerry bonfire soon

  Rosemary now that’s silly

  Gerry it’s not something i’d ever do – burn stuff

  Rosemary but you’d watch others do it

  Gerry ditto

  Rosemary i’m only watching because you are

  Gerry sit on the deck – have a few drinks put the world to rights – and watch working-class protestants burn some tyres and sticks and shout some shit – if that can’t make a middle-class ex-catholic happy what can

  Rosemary when we were kids we used to collect for the bonfire – we weren’t allowed to watch it – but we collected for it – times have changed – no collecting now – but watching

  Gerry times have changed – does that bonfire offend you

  Rosemary i think it’s stupid

  Gerry does it offend you though

  Rosemary gerry i’m fifty-seven years old – some eejits burn some old wood …

  Gerry what it represents – you know – we were brought up catholics – not that now – what it represents – does it offend you

  Rosemary if i thought about it i might be – times have changed – there’s more important things in life than that – does it offend you

  Gerry don’t know – in one sense no – not at all – has nothing to do with my life – other than i sit on the deck once a year – sometimes on my own sometimes with others – have a drink and look at the bonfire at the bottom of my garden – then – maybe – i don’t know – maybe you need to think once in a while what the people round the bonfire think of you

  Rosemary do you really care

  Gerry don’t know – lived in this house for twenty odd years – that estate’s been at the bottom of our garden nearly all that time – never spoken to or met anyone from there – i’m not suggesting i wanted to i’m just saying i haven’t – they might look up here and think who lives up there

  Rosemary no might about it – if you look down there they look up here

  Gerry do you care

  Rosemary i would care if i thought they hated me – i would care if i thought they were dancing round the bonfire thinking we were fenian bastards – i’d care then – if they’re just doing what they do because they are who they are then no i don’t care

  Silence.

  He pours wine for them both.

  Gerry where’d you get this

  Rosemary shipping direct – i got a case – they were doing a deal – you like it

  Gerry new zealand – i’m more chile

  Rosemary do you like it

  Gerry i’m not classy enough to dislike it

  Rosemary no

  Gerry new zealand seems too healthy a place for wine

  Rosemary nonsense

  Gerry it wasn’t a serious comment – throw some more coins – be free

  Rosemary no

  Silence.

  Gerry did you phone the guy about the roof

  Rosemary i did – he says he can’t do it because of the asbestos – but he gave the name of another builder – i left a message

  Gerry the ivy growing over that outhouse used to look beautiful now it’s a pain in the arse – the roof bloody cave in under the weight of it

  Rosemary i’ve left a message

  Gerry it needs a new door and windows

  Rosemary i’ll talk to him – get an estimate

  Gerry maybe we should just knock it down – have like a patio thing

  Rosemary it’s too far from the house

  Gerry cut a path down to it

  Rosemary you say that now but you wouldn’t use it – get a new roof on it – paint the walls white look like a cottage at the bottom of the garden – have flowers round it

  Gerry what’s the point in having something that looks like a cottage but isn’t a cottage – and no more flowers – i don’t want anything else that grows – they have to be looked after – and i don’t want any more of that – flame-thrower the whole lot then tarmac it – no looking after anything – maybe just one tree or something

  Rosemary you need a garden so you can potter around in it – give you something to do

  Gerry i’ve plenty to do – papers to mark – shit to make up

  Rosemary i mean in later life – keep yourself moving – what is it tom petty said – never slow down never grow old

  Gerry tom petty – in later life i’ll either be dead or sitting on this deck with a glass of something looking out over the world – and now and again watching you potter around – that’s if you’re still here

  Rosemary i’ll be here – if nothing else just out of spite

  Gerry good girl

  Silence.

  Rosemary when are they coming round

  Gerry don’t know – about now – and by the way – don’t you and tom be talking in irish half the night – it’s ignorant – feels like you’re whispering

  Rosemary nothing ignorant about it – whispering – good practice for him that’s all

  Gerry aye – good practice for him

  Rosemary you should learn – join in

  Gerry no – if i was going to learn a language it wouldn’t be irish – no use in the outside world – also too republican

  Rosemary it’s not republican for tom

  Gerry he’s a protestant – i get that – too republican for me – it would feel like a statement

  Rosemary statement – always good to have another language that’s all

  Gerry spanish – i like the idea of speaking spanish – sounds emotional �
�� irish sounds like you’re about to hack up

  Rosemary take some spanish lessons then

  Gerry move to spain – live life on a balcony overlooking the beach – be good to look out on to something that wasn’t belfast – although in saying that if you didn’t know any better you wouldn’t know this was belfast just by looking at it

  Rosemary except for the massive fire at the bottom of the garden

  Gerry except for the massive fire at the bottom of the garden

  Tom and Maggie enter carrying bottles of wine.

  more wine we need more wine – we’re new zealand this evening

  Maggie south africa

  Gerry travelling the world without leaving the deck

  They sit.

  Maggie sorry we’re late

  Gerry you’re not late – nothing burning yet

  Maggie don’t you just love the smell of napalm in the morning

  Gerry good line – great line

  Tom cáide má ‘tá tú

  Rosemary an mhaith go raibh mhaith agat – tá tú ag dul i bheabhas

  Tom go raibh maith agat – tá muinteoir maith agam

  Gerry and Maggie exchange a look.

  Maggie tom

  Tom practice – what is the distance between our two houses

  Gerry none – they’re beside each other

  Tom door to door

  Gerry twenty yards

  Tom i consider myself to be a law-abiding citizen

  Gerry you are indeed a law-abiding citizen – a pillar of society – a rock

  Tom never a truer word spoken by a finer human – well …

  Maggie within twenty yards we’ve just had a row with one of those eastern european crowd that live off church road

  Rosemary i see them passing the house sometimes – nearly always drunk

  Maggie this one was drunk – people can live where ever they want – but they can’t be drunk and look like they’re going to have a piss outside your house

  Gerry i’ve seen tom drunk trying to have a piss outside your house – in a law-abiding way

  Tom that’s different – you’re allowed to piss outside your own house

  Maggie it is different – and no you’re not allowed to do that – why do all men think it’s alright to do that

  Gerry not all men

  Rosemary no woman would do it

  Gerry they would and they do

  Rosemary no they wouldn’t and no they don’t

  Gerry if you had to you would

  Rosemary that’s different

  Maggie is it not reasonable to say to someone don’t piss outside my house – he shouted at the two of us

  Rosemary did he understand what you were saying

  Tom yes i told him to fuck off – who doesn’t understand fuck off

  Rosemary was he urinating

  Maggie he looked as if he might – he was fumbling around round his crotch

  Gerry is crotch still a word

  Maggie very funny

  Gerry you told some drunk foreign guy to fuck off and he shouted at you

  Tom correct

  Maggie he was going to take his dick out

  Gerry was he though

  Tom i didn’t see – maggie said he’s going to piss on our wall so i turned round and told him to fuck off

  Gerry protestants – what is it with you and foreigners

  Tom so because you’re a catholic you’d let him piss on your wall

  Gerry i would enquire after his well being

  Maggie he was going to get his dick out

  Tom there’s a crowd of them – all live in a house down there

  Maggie all men

  Gerry maybe they’ll be down at the bonfire later

  Tom wouldn’t think so – he was a catholic

  Gerry how do you know

  Tom smelt like one

  Rosemary na seann chinn na cinn is fearr

  Tom is fearr

  Rosemary best

  Tom best – is fearr

  Silence.

  Gerry we’re thinking of knocking down the outhouse

  Rosemary we’re not thinking of doing that

  Gerry thinking of it maybe

  Rosemary no – not thinking of it

  Gerry get a better view of the estate – if i ever want to throw anything at them i’ll get a clear shot

  Tom better with a catapult

  Gerry a hand-held one – or one of those massive ones from the middle ages

  Tom you’re always better with a massive one

  Gerry massive crotch

  Rosemary we’re going to get rid of all the ivy and get a new roof – we just discovered that one’s asbestos – got the name of a builder does that

  Maggie give me his number we’re thinking of getting a bit of work done – might open up the back room on to the patio

  Tom we want to give the burglars a better view of our stuff – all those eastern european guys – let them see in so they know what life could be like – then make it easier for them to lift it all

  Maggie isn’t the house alarmed – be lovely this time of year just to open it all up and walk out

  Rosemary we thought about that a few times – a lot of glass

  Maggie i like glass – i like the light

  Gerry yes light – if we had better weather i’d live out the back – that’s the way we’re meant to live – outside

  Maggie people in sunnier countries always seem to be happier

  Tom except the middle east

  Gerry must be a nightmare living there – too hot – sweltered

  Tom it’s where they want to be

  Maggie the med and south america – spanish-type places

  Gerry i might learn spanish

  Maggie beautiful language – it sounds very passionate

  Rosemary tá gaelige ró-dheachar dó

  Tom ró-deachar di comh maith

  Maggie i’ll take a class with you – i’d like to learn another language – other than irish – i don’t see the point to that

  Tom tá feidhm leis

  Gerry like ulster scots – that’s just country people speaking english – sucker upper and wee dafties – all that gibberish

  Tom easy to learn

  Maggie if we did spanish together gerry they could have their language and we could have ours – change the divide – spanish and irish instead of protestants and catholics

  Gerry we’re not real protestants and catholics are we

  Tom not real ones no

  Gerry we’re way beyond that – the people waiting to light that bonfire are real protestants

  Maggie and who are the real catholics

  Rosemary the ones hugging the altar rails – the blind faithers

  Gerry once you get educated there should be a natural drifting away from all that

  Tom we live in one of those black holes in space – slowly but surely dragging everything into the darkness

  Maggie it’s politicians

  Rosemary it’s always politicians – that estate was built about the same time as the good friday agreement – we sat here – it was a grubby wee patio then having a drink to celebrate it

  Tom the d’hondt system

  Gerry ofmdfm

  Maggie petitions of concern

  Rosemary it was a great night

  Gerry that’s nearly twenty years ago

  Tom jesus

  Rosemary it felt like there was genuine hope in the air – everybody saying the same thing – a new beginning – tús úr

  Tom tús úr

  Rosemary we all sat on the patio drinking wine and looking down at the building site that was going to be the estate – it represented a new beginning – i never thought there’d be as many houses – more fields then – less people

  Gerry d’hondt – god bless d’hondt

  Tom cross-border institutions – every other word was cross-border institutions – never hear of them now – that can only mean one of two things – e
ither they’re gone or they’re everywhere

  Maggie as long as they got rid of the shooting on the streets – that was the only thing that mattered – so that’s the only thing they took care of

  Tom looking back – aye

  Gerry too much given to the working class – i don’t mean that in a bad way – i just mean it needed a bit more balance

  Rosemary the middle class are always ignored when it comes to the decision end of things

  Maggie that’s right – it’s people who shout the loudest who get the most

  Gerry (half shouts in the direction of the bonfire) loudest – most

  Silence.

  Tom a patio down where the outhouse is

  Rosemary it’s not being knocked down

  Gerry a patio would be lovely – sit away from the house – on my own – no woman’s land

  Tom that’s where you want to be – no woman’s land

  Rosemary this is the way men decide things isn’t it – they just keep repeating something until it happens or people think it’s true – we’re getting a new roof not knocking it down

  Gerry no woman’s land – i could put a plaque up down there or something

  Maggie i wanted to call our house cherry hill – because of the cherry tree – and the hill

  Rosemary in irish that would be cnoc na silin

  Tom cherry hill – cnoc na silin

  Maggie it would’ve been in english

  Gerry what would it be in ulster scots – (Rural accent.) cherry hill

  Rosemary i know it would’ve been in english – cherry hill – lovely

  Maggie all the post would be addressed to cherry hill – if someone asked where you lived you’d say cherry hill

  Tom we live in belfast

  Maggie i just liked the name – he got on his high horse

  Rosemary tá cosa fada a dhith ort le ghabhal ar capall ard

  Tom i didn’t get that

  Rosemary you need long legs for a high horse

  Silence.

  i don’t know what i’d call this place if i was to give it a name

  Gerry we’d – what we’d call it