Anna Burnside reviews this week’s A Play, A Pie and A Pint offering.
Barry feels as if he doesn’t exist. This could be confusing as Vic, another character in LC Stephens’s sweet West End romance, is actually dead. But the way that, as he gets older, he fades into everyone’s background is familiar to Oran Mor’s bus pass-toting regulars.
Barry meets Vic’s sister Clare, and they embark on a wild West End night out. The elephant in the downstairs bar at Tennent’s is that they are members of the same book club and even went on a date the year before. Clare has no recollection of this and proceeds to make the same jokes all over again.
What Barry does not know is that Claire was grieving for her brother and in the deep fug of depression. The night ends on a sour note; Barry heads off to have a manly chat with his son and Claire carries on chatting to Vic.
Unlike most 21st-century dating stories, it doesn’t just peter out there—Stephens ties up the story without losing sight of either character. Graham McLaren’s crisp direction keeps the pace up and the versatile third presence on the stage, Keith Macpherson, switches from Vic’s velvet kimono to every other character required with deceptive grace.
Tom McGovern is a delightful Barry, thoughtful and self-deprecating rather than whiny about his growing lack of physical presence. He admits it has taken a good deal of therapy to get to this stage. Jo Freer is a tremendous Clare: forceful, funny, unguarded.
There are some plot holes here. Barry tells us he is 61. His youngest son was born in 1987, which would make him 39. Barry could have had a child when he was 22. Would he also have a teenager at home now? That is one hell of a parenting shift.
And while it’s possible that 51-year-old Clare would forget a date - at one point she describes her friends’ partners as like Lego figures, with interchangeable heads - it’s unlikely that she would forget a man from her book club. These are rarer than bargains on Byres Road.
The dialogue is sparky and each individual is clearly drawn. What’s lacking is any kind of theatricality. Transparent is a warm, unsentimental radio play.
Transparent performs at Oran Mor’s A Play, A Pie and A Pint until 12 September 2026. For further details, go to the company’s website.
Photo by Eoin Carey.
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