REVIEW: Thurles Drama Group delivers on a powerful revival of ‘The Deep Blue Sea’

Thurles Drama Group returned to The Source Arts Centre last week with a masterful production of Terence Rattigan’s acclaimed post-war drama The Deep Blue Sea.

Under the meticulous direction of Mr Ryan, the ensemble delivered a performance of quiet intensity, their subtlety and precision bringing the emotional stakes of Rattigan’s work vividly to life.

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Audiences were treated to a profound exploration of love, despair, and resilience, executed with care, discipline, and a deep understanding of the play’s inner rhythms. 

Speaking to the Tipperary Star, Mr Ryan stated: “I first saw the play many years ago at The Gate Theatre in Dublin, and it has stayed with me ever since. I always stayed away from it because it is such a tricky play to execute.

You need a very strong female lead to play Hester, and I had my eye on Aileen for a long time to play this role. The play relies on a very strong lead; it all centres around her.”

Set in a down-at-heel London flat, the play opens with Hester Collyer’s attempted suicide, and from the very first moment we begin a slow, meticulous process of discovery, gradually uncovering the forces and emotions that drove Hester to such a desperate act. 

She is the wife of a High Court judge who has left her marriage for Freddie Page, a former RAF pilot, and as their passionate relationship begins to unravel, the audience peels back the layers of longing, regret, and despair that shape her choices.

Hester faces an agonising dilemma between the security of convention and the peril of a love that may ultimately destroy her. 

Beneath the veneer of post-war civility, Rattigan exposes a world of repressed emotion and private anguish, and over the course of a single day, the characters confront past mistakes, unspoken desires, and the limits of human endurance, their lives contained entirely within the confines of the apartment. 

The other residents of the block function much like a Greek chorus—the classical theatrical device in which onlookers comment on the action, reflect public opinion, and pass moral judgment—quietly framing and intensifying the emotional stakes of Hester’s inner turmoil.

The ensemble delivered performances of extraordinary subtlety and depth, each actor sculpting their character with a precision that made the drama both intimate and electrifying. Aileen O’Sullivan inhabited Hester Collyer with a fragile intensity that could shatter hearts—yet beneath her vulnerability burned a fierce, unyielding emotional core, every gesture and pause charged with perilous beauty.

Pat Loughnane’s Freddie Page was a study in contradictions: outwardly charming and full of wit, delivering Rattigan’s razor-sharp lines with sly humour, yet always haunted by the inner turmoil of a man whose life has effectively ended at twenty-five, a has-been clinging to fleeting passions.

Liam Ryan’s William Collyer, the High Court judge and Hester’s estranged husband, exuded stoic gravitas, capturing both the command of a man accustomed to authority and the vulnerability of someone grappling with personal betrayal and silent heartbreak.

Every measured pause, every controlled gesture revealed Ryan’s deep understanding of Collyer’s restrained grief, making his presence both authoritative and profoundly humane.

Paul Flanagan’s Mr Miller was a riveting presence, embodying a man whose compassion is tempered by lived experience and a subtle moral rigor. Far from a mere observer, Miller is a character of layered sensitivity—attuned to the emotional fragility of those around him, yet fully aware of the social codes and limitations that define his world.

Flanagan captured the delicate tension of a man who wishes to intervene but must navigate the constraints of propriety, delivering each line with a restrained authority that lent both credibility and warmth.

It is Miller who ultimately enables Hester to find a path toward self-actualisation, gently guiding her to break free from both the chains of her psyche and the suffocating strictures of societal expectation.

His every glance, pause, and inflection revealed Miller’s inner compass, providing the audience with a moral anchor and a steadying presence amid the storm of Hester’s emotional turmoil.

Mary Condron as Mrs Elton was a quietly commanding, mothering presence, looking out for Hester with genuine care and concern, her warmth and steady vigilance grounding the emotional turbulence of the flat.

Pat Nolan’s Philip Welch was portrayed as a busy-bodied, slightly nosy figure, whose curiosity and meddling lent the play  a gentle, observational humour, revealing both the comical and critical gaze of neighbours ever alert to each other’s affairs.

Patricia Kenny’s Ann Welch was luminous in her understated empathy, also slightly nosy in her curiosity, quietly observing and gently influencing the apartment’s unfolding drama.

Donal Ryan’s Jackie Jackson was brimming with infectious energy, playing the part of Freddie’s sidekick. In the play’s most comedic scene, he and Pat Loughnane’s Freddie volleyed lines across the stage like a blistering tennis match, each quip and retort bouncing back and forth with sparkling precision and kinetic energy, sending the audience into rollicking laughter.

The scene reached a perfect comedic apex when Freddie delivers his parting line to Jackie: “Best not give her my love, Jackie … from all accounts it’s pretty lethal,” a razor-sharp moment of wit that captured the full mischievous chemistry between the two men.

The production’s mise-en-scène added richly to the performance, each element meticulously chosen to heighten the drama’s emotional resonance.

Joe Barry and Ethan Murphy’s set design evoked the lived-in intimacy of the modest London flat, every piece of furniture and object suggesting a life worn by time and experience.

Peter Stocksborough and Denise Hanley’s chiaroscuro lighting sculpted the space, casting shadows and highlights that mirrored the characters’ inner turbulence, while Dick Ryan and Kevin Kirwan’s sound design threaded subtle tension through every scene. 

Catherine Murphy’s costumes conveyed personality, class, and emotional nuance with unspoken eloquence, and Sinead McGettrick’s stage management, alongside Mary Slattery’s production oversight, ensured that every cue, movement, and transition operated with seamless precision. 

The cumulative effect of these design choices allowed Rattigan’s world of passion, repression, and resilience to pulse vividly, making the apartment itself a living participant in the drama.

That the entire play unfolds within this single, modest location is a testament both to Rattigan’s extraordinary writing and to the actors’ compelling craftsmanship, whose performances transmute the modest apartment into a world brimming with emotional richness and dramatic tension.

The genesis of The Deep Blue Sea is inseparable from the private turbulence of Rattigan’s own life. In March 1949, while awaiting a preview of his new play Adventure Story at the Adelphi Hotel in Liverpool, he received a note that would haunt him forever.

Kenneth Morgan, a young actor with whom Rattigan had been sexually involved, had ended their tempestuous relationship and, despairing of a love returned in equal measure, gassed himself in his London flat.

It was this tragic event—the unravelling of youthful passion, the unbearable ache of unreciprocated love—that first ignited the seed of Rattigan’s play.

Over the ensuing three years, he laboured over the drama, producing six drafts in pursuit of a delicate equilibrium: the first two acts largely retained their structure, while the final act underwent constant refinement, each revision deepening the emotional resonance, intensifying the peril of Hester’s despair, and plumping the raw edges of human vulnerability and resilience.

Hester Collyer stands as one of British theatre’s great female roles—a part Rattigan himself described as “the hardest of my plays to write.”

The character’s emotional depth, her oscillation between despair and defiance, demanded an actress capable of embodying fragility and fire in equal measure. 

In the original 1952 production at the Duchess Theatre, producer Binkie Beaumont and director Firth Banbury initially sought someone with classical experience to navigate Hester’s titanic emotions, ultimately settling on Peggy Ashcroft.

The opening night passed in near-reverent silence, the audience absorbing the intensity before erupting into cheers and applause. Critics concurred: Harold Wilson of The Sunday Times declared it “the best play Mr Rattigan has written,” while The Sketch hailed Ashcroft’s performance as “not mere impersonation. It is, and excitingly, life.”

Thurles Drama Group’s production was a faithful and brilliantly executed tribute to Rattigan’s vision. To bring such a challenging play to a local audience is no small feat: the ensemble navigated its emotional complexity with poise, vitality and a deep appreciation for the play’s hidden depths.

 In conversation with the Tipperary    Star, Mr Ryan extended a warm appeal for younger actors and actresses to join Thurles Drama Group, emphasising that fresh talent is always welcome and vital to keeping the group alive. Those interested are encouraged to reach out to join Thurles Drama Group. 

The performances attended on Thursday night of last week earned a standing ovation, and it was entirely deserving: a triumph of acting, direction, and ensemble spirit.

It reminds us why theatre is endlessly eternal. Theatre is the art of looking at ourselves and Thurles Drama Group held that mirror unflinchingly. Showing us that the stage is where human truth endures.

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