Faultline review: A heartfelt depiction of a movement gaining ground

ANU and the Gate Theatre's new immersive play is set in 1982, when hundreds of LGBTQ+ people were under investigation. Photo: Pat Redmond 

11 Parnell Square East, Dublin

★ ★ ★ ★

Inside a townhouse on Parnell Square, a 1980s gay nightclub bursts to life, its clientele voguing between catwalk poses and gestures more freighted. It’s a time of major upheaval in ANU and the Gate Theatre’s new immersive play Faultline, as hundreds of LGBTQ+ people are under investigation.

Little seems to be lost in director Louise Lowe’s departure from the mingling of past and present that became a signature in the Monto Cycle. The building in Faultline, transformed by Owen Boss and Maree Kearns’s exquisite design, is sealed with traces of only a previous era - a secret nightclub; the office of a support service. Such locations come in surreal transitions, like an underground culture lit up in disco lights.  

Inevitably, gestures of shame hold a different poignancy in pre-decriminalisation Ireland. When two men meet in the toilets (Matthew Williamson and Stephen Quinn), they exchange discreet glances before erupting in a passionate and violent dance. The gripping movement is external as it is internal, the dimly lit encounter receding into the blue otherworld of Ciaran O’Melia’s lighting.  If the men look like they are locked in combat, that’s because they are at war with themselves. 

“I can be anywhere I want to be,” says one tormented soul, looking at his reflection in the toilet mirror. It’s chilling when the line is repeated later on, by a police officer intimidating customers in a café. An abuse of power comes into focus, as an activist hands us a leaflet about irregular investigations following a homophobic murder. 

This heartfelt depiction of a community under pressure is most sympathetic during a scene at a gay men’s helpline. There, Matthew Malone’s tie-wearing Paul is berated by peers for moderate views, before attempting something exceptional: guiding a closeted caller towards self-acceptance. After some reflective questions, the caller begins to agonise with fears of rejection and damnation. He lashes out and hangs up. Malone’s face scrunches into a picture of frustration. “People use this word ‘movement,’ and it’s just a few people in a room,” he says.

If the campaign seems hopeless, the play generously allows it to be encouraged. A singer (Nandi Bhebe) raises the activists' spirits, like a divine messenger from on high. The pathos is mostly conceptual, though, as the complex absurdities of gay activism instantly dissolve into the syncopated baseline. 

More convincing is the play’s simple but touching coda, a brief farewell that gets interrupted by the ring of a phone. Another conversation, another step. This movement is gaining ground.