The following booklet contains information collated from NTS Resource Pack, newspapers and
research.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
An introduction by Rona Munro
The House of Bernarda Alba by Federico García Lorca is described by its author as a play about
“women in the villages of Spain”. It is based on his observations of families in the community in
which he was raised.
It was written and set in the 1930s. Lorca never saw the play produced. He was killed before it ever
had a production; killed for being left leaning and for being gay; executed, in part, as a consequence
of being a powerful writer born in the wrong time and the wrong place.
This is my second attempt at translating the play. My first, produced by Shared Experience in 1999,
was a wonderful, if intimidating experience. I was initially uncertain I could do it justice. I had never
done a translation before. I had only a shaky grasp of Spanish from political solidarity trips to
Central America, which provided me only with a vocabulary of revolutionary slogans and the ability
to order vegetarian food in several dialects. I had seen one (bad) production of the play years
before, but no good ones.
At the start, I was quite uncertain I could love the text enough to do it justice. However, after battling
my way through several drafts, armed with a literal translation and several other people’s versions, I
emerged with a real love of this play and of all Lorca’s writing. I had gained an appreciation of its
power. I had a sense of why it was potent enough to be dangerous. I loved the dark, explosive,
brooding world of Bernarda Alba. I loved doing that translation and the production that followed, but
the experience still left me unsatisfied.
The problem was that I felt a lot of the play’s original shocking power had been diluted by time. We
could observe the repressed world of Bernarda and her daughters, but it wasn’t our world, we were
just voyeurs on the past. We could appreciate the absolute taboo of an unmarried woman letting a
man put his fingers on her skin through the bars of a window . . . but there were no bars on our
windows, and plenty of naked skin on view anywhere you cared to look. We understood, but we
couldn’t feel it as Lorca’s intended audience would have done.
When the National Theatre of Scotland offered me the opportunity of updating the play to the 21st
century my first thought was that I had to find some way of giving the play back its transgressive
power. I wanted to set it in a world we would recognise; in a community that was included in our
own, even if it sat at its extreme edge. I didn’t want us to be voyeurs of the play, examining the
characters like specimens from some quaint far off land. I wanted it to be about us and about now.
After that, it was a question of finding a realistic equivalent for all the events and the emotion in the
play without diluting their power. I think the first transposition that suggested itself was the
substitution of endless west coast rain for baking heat. Then we thought of baying Rottweilers in
place of the kicking stallions in the original. From there, it was a short subliminal hop to the world of
this version of the play, where violence is real, where the press can imprison you in your house as
effectively as any voraciously curious neighbour. A place where there still are real taboos, not about
sex, but about the redeeming power of love – if you can find it at all.
Rona Munro, September 2009
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
Taken from an interview with John Tiffany - Director
Why adapt of The House Bernarda Alba?
“Rona Munro is an incredibly talented writer and I first commissioned her when I worked at the
Traverse Theatre. She wrote a play called Iron, but unfortunately I left before it was complete so I
missed directing it. I was determined to get in early when I got the job at the National Theatre of
Scotland and Bernarda Alba was a play that I loved.
I think there’s something brilliant about the idea of five sisters all fighting over the same boy. I’ve
always found that quite funny as well as seeing the tragedy of it as it unfolds. I’d only ever seen
productions or pictures of productions or heard about productions of the play done in the original
way, set in Spain, with lots of black, being very dry and very hot and that fuelling a kind of languid
quality and atmosphere.
Seeing actors delivering the lines in Received Pronunciation, I didn’t really buy it, I just don’t think
our culture is fuelled in that way. I liked the idea of setting it in Glasgow and having it rain all the
time. I spoke to Rona who absolutely loved that idea. Originally we wanted to set it in a Glasgow
housing estate and Rottweillers came up at that point. But Rona went a brilliant step further and set
it in ‘gangster land’. I just think there’s so much for an audience to enjoy – particularly young girls –
who I think will really like seeing these five sisters squabbling over a lad.”
Tell us about Rona Munro’s adaptation
Because she’s such a brilliant writer, Rona’s managed to keep the poetry of the original even
though we are in a very contemporary vernacular. The poetry remains in this Glasgow setting and it
doesn’t feel weird, it exists and it blooms as the play goes on.
Siobhan Redmond, who is playing Bernarda Alba, put it brilliantly on the first day of rehearsals. She
said “it fits so well because Glaswegians are so good at self dramatising”. I think that is absolutely
true and they will use words and metaphors that are very vivid.
The other thing that Rona brought to the adaptation was mother daughter relationships. In the
original, Bernarda decides that there will be eight years of mourning, so the girls are going to stay in
the house for that time. Obviously, we would never believe that in 2009, but what Rona’s done is
build a psychological prison between mother and daughter. The daughters can’t leave because
Bernarda convinces them that they won’t survive without her, that they have to stay at home in
order to survive. She won’t let them go. That, I think, is the genius stroke.
In the original, sex is the taboo and that worked for a Catholic culture in 1930s Spain. What Rona
has done is to reverse that. Here love is the taboo. They are all in a culture of sex but actually
romance and love are the things that the youngest daughter Adie believes in.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
Who is Bernarda Alba?
Bernarda Alba is a tragic figure. In trying to save her daughters, she kills one of them and that is the
tragedy.
What’s fascinating is seeing how tragedy has changed over the twentieth and into the twenty-first
century. When the play was written it was very much about authoritarianism with Bernarda Alba as
an authoritarian character. Lorca identified her with Spain at the time and the dangers of
suppressing sex or passion. Obviously, we’re not in 1930s Spain so that doesn’t apply here and my
taste isn’t to make characters into symbols. So while arguably, we do live in an authoritarian culture,
it didn’t feel as though that was urgent for me.
What Rona has done is to make Bernarda a tragic figure along the lines of Willie Loman in Death of
a Salesman or Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire. She doesn’t stand for anything, it’s
just a human story. In trying to make her daughters survive, she’s responsible for one of them
committing suicide and realises it along with the audience. We can see it coming. That, for me, is
absolute tragedy and I’m really, really excited to see how an audience connects with that.
This adaptation is faithful to Lorca, almost line by line – although we do have references to Dubai
and Asda – but it connects and it’s about trying to keep the play as urgent as it was when people
first saw it. Lorca never saw it produced. He was executed before he saw a production of it. We
directors always like to think that we are restoring something in terms of taboos but I do believe
Bernarda Alba is a genuinely tragic figure in Rona’s version.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
Plot synopsis of The House of Bernarda Alba
The play is set in the front room of Bernie Alba’s flat.
The flat is situated above a club in the East End of Glasgow.
Scene 1 it is the day of Tony Alba’s funeral. A careworker and Penny are in the room.
 Ambulance sirens can be heard outside. Penny swigs from a bottle of wine. From offstage we
hear Mary, Bernie’s mother, shouting from her bedroom. Penny and Mary’s careworker talk
about the Alba family. The two women discuss Tony’s wife Bernie Alba and describe her as ‘a
dose of weed killer’. Tony Alba was shot and murdered and today is his funeral. The police and
press are desperate for a glimpse of Bernie and her daughters.
 In this introduction we hear that Penny has worked for the family for thirty years and has known
Bernie since school. A churchgoer enters to offer condolences to the family. The careworker is
surprised to hear that Tony Alba attended church.
 Bernie enters closely followed by two television journalists. She has promised them an exclusive
interview about the shooting of her husband. Her five daughters enter and place themselves
round their mother as the camera captures Bernie’s interview. We hear of Bernie’s shock at
losing her husband and refusal to believe that her husband was involved in a life of crime. The
crew leaves.
 Bernie is left with her five daughters Agnes, Marty, Maggie, Melly and Adie.
Bernie instructs the girls that they cannot risk being photographed by the press so should not
leave the house. Agnes is looking out of the window at the Romanov boys – a neighbouring
family who are out walking the Albas’ dogs. Bernie shouts at her eldest daughter to come away
from the window. Before leaving, Agnes hints that making friends with one of the Romanov boys
could help the ‘business’.
 Alone with Bernie, Penny broaches the subject of the girls. It seems that Bernie is resigned to
having her daughters with her at home. She claims that none of them could survive without her.
The conversation halts as the police arrive with a warrant. Bernie leaves to go to the police
station.
Scene 2 – later that day
(Director’s note: Scene 1 and Scene 2 merged to become one scene during the rehearsal process.)
 Marty is watching TV and Melly enters. The two girls seem close; Melly asks Marty if she has
taken her medication, which she has. They talk about men; Melly seems more naive and less
experienced than her older sister. Marty tells Melly that she is finished with men. The girls talk
about Marty’s ex-boyfriend and it becomes clear that it was their mother, Bernie, who drove him
away.
 Maggie enters; she has been clearing out some of her father’s things. Maggie seems to be the
most emotional of the sisters. The girls argue over a memory of a family holiday. The family
appears increasingly dysfunctional. Maggie, Melly and Marty turn their attention to the fledgling
relationship between their eldest sister Agnes and Peter Romanov. It seems they are planning a
business merger. The sisters comment snidely that it must be business rather than love or
romance.
 Adie arrives and is angry and upset with the news that Agnes is dating Peter. As Adie’s anger
grows she begins to verbally attack her sisters saying that they will never leave the house again
and are totally under the control of their mother. The doorbell sounds and a huge bouquet of red
flowers is delivered. The flowers are for Agnes. Ignoring this, the girls each grab flowers, leaving
a single rose.
 Bernie and Penny arrive. Bernie is tense. The women are discussing the business and Tony’s
assets which have been transferred to Agnes’s name for safe keeping. Bernie is angry at the
lack of power she has over the business. Agnes enters and Bernie attacks her verbally and
physically in an attempt to resume her status at the head of the family. Agnes leaves upset.
Penny enters with a gun concealed in a black bag. Bernie instructs her to keep it in the safe.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
Scene 3 a few days later
All the daughters except Adie are busy emptying and sorting boxes of paperwork and
computer discs. Penny is with them. Heavy rain can be heard on the roof.
 The girls are feeling disheartened, with the exception of Agnes, as her relationship with Peter
Romanov seems to be going well. The girls are worried about their youngest sister Adie, who
seems distant. The conversation turns to the rain, which had continued all through the previous
night. Penny heard Peter Romanov drop Agnes back home after a date. There is some
confusion as Penny recalls Peter’s car being parked outside the house seemingly long after
Agnes returned. The sisters probe Agnes for details on her relationship with Peter. Agnes admits
that the new relationship is awkward at times.
 The mood changes and it is Penny who opens up about her past. She tells the girls what it was
like when she was young and fell in love with her husband. The women are relaxed and
laughing. Maggie shouts upstairs for her little sister Adie to join them but there is no answer. Her
sisters are worried. Agnes claims that Adie is in love with Peter Romanov and cannot bear to
see them together.
 Adie enters; she tells her sisters that she does not feel well.
Adie snaps at Marty despite being the one who appears to care for her the most. Marty leaves
and Penny and Adie are left together.
 Penny asks Adie if she is involved with Peter Romanov. Adie admits that it is true. Penny tells
Adie that there is no point in lusting after Peter as he has made an arrangement to marry her
sister.
Later
 We hear music. A wedding reception has begun downstairs in the club. It is a same sex civil
partnership. Maggie doesn’t see it as a real wedding but Adie has a more romantic attitude and
wants to go downstairs and dance with the wedding party. The music roars as the girls and
Penny all begin to dance. Penny leaves to help with the wedding buffet. Marty feels trapped, she
wishes the rain would stop so that she can go out.
 Agnes bursts into the room, furious. One of her sisters has been phoning Peter’s mobile, leaving
sexual messages. The girls argue and no one owns up. Bernie enters shouting at her daughters
to keep the noise down. Bernie is furious. She has worked hard to make the partnership
between Agnes and Peter work with the aim of establishing financial security for the family.
Bernie wants to find who left the messages and inspects her daughters’ mobile phones. All the
daughters pass their phones over except Marty. Eventually, Bernie finds Marty’s phone and we
realise that it is Marty who has been making the calls.
 Bernie, in a rage, tries to hit Marty – they struggle. Marty says that she was just joking when she
phoned Peter Romanov. The scene heightens as Agnes claims that her sisters are trying to ruin
her relationship. Adie hits back that it is not a relationship, it is a business deal. It is becoming
clear that Adie has real feelings for Peter Romanov. Bernie shouts at them all to go to their
rooms leaving Bernie with Penny.
 Bernie is in a panic about the business deal and she wants to bring Agnes and Peter’s wedding
forward to ensure the marriage goes ahead. Penny tries to speak to Bernie about her daughters.
Penny is concerned that the girls are trapped and don’t have their own lives or relationships.
This makes Bernie angry as she feels that the girls are too weak to stand on their own. She has
created a co-dependent relationship between herself and her girls.
 Bernie admits that she has known about Adie’s feelings for Peter Romanov but feels her being
hurt will be a learning experience and that Adie will get over it. Throughout the course of the
conversation, noise comes from the wedding reception below. There is violence and screaming.
Penny goes downstairs to investigate. Bernie snatches a baseball bat and follows her.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
Later
 Adie and Marty are talking about Peter Romanov. Adie tells her sister that she is too dirty for
Peter and that it is her that he wants. Marty tells Adie that she is deluding herself and she will not
let her sister be with Peter.
 Penny returns and the family witness a brutal homophobic attack on guests at the wedding
reception downstairs. One of the grooms is violently beaten as the girls look on from above.
Everyone is upset except Bernie and Marty who treat the incident with disdain.
Scene 4 a few weeks later
The family watches TV.
 The girls are sharing a takeaway and drinking beer. Bernie sits staring at the TV screen.
Prudence, Tony’s cousin, sits watching Bernie. Downstairs, there is a tremendous burst of
shouting. Bernie explains that she is running bare knuckle fights and taking a cut from the
betting. There is more noise from downstairs and the atmosphere in the room is becoming
tense. Bernie grabs her baseball bat and heads downstairs to clear the club. The conversation
turns to the wedding this coming Saturday. Agnes shows her ring off to Pru. Melly, Adie and
Marty exit.
 Bernie returns and is alone with Agnes; Bernie asks her if she has forgiven Marty. Agnes knows
that Marty does not like her and confides in her mother that Peter seems distant and distracted
and thinks that he is hiding something from her.
 All the girls head off to bed. Penny enters. All is calm and quiet. Bernie comments to Penny that
everything is fine and the girls are all happy. Bernie goes to bed.
 Alone and putting the night’s takings in the safe, Penny talks aloud she is worried that trouble is
brewing and Bernie can’t see it or control it. There is a commotion outside.
 Adie enters wearing just underwear. Marty follows and asks Adie where she is going. Adie is
leaving to run off with Peter Romanov. The sisters argue and Marty finally admits to her younger
sister that she wanted to be with Peter. Bernie, on hearing the noise, enters. She is carrying her
baseball bat. Tension builds as Adie faces her mother and says she is leaving no matter what.
 Bernie darts to the safe and takes out the gun. She goes outside to where Peter is waiting for
Adie. There is the sound of a gunshot. They all freeze.
 Bernie comes in with the gun and puts it down.
 Distraught, Adie screams. As she leaves to go to her room, no one notices that she picks up the
gun.
 Penny asks Bernie if she killed Peter. Bernie replies the she didn’t, though it is best if Adie thinks
he is dead.
 We hear a gunshot from upstairs. Bernie runs upstairs, we hear her scream. Bernie enters
holding Adie’s lifeless and bloody body. Bernie is hysterical. Marty carries Adie off.
 The girls emerge wearing their funeral clothes. They transform Bernie, putting on makeup, fixing
her hair, dressing her in her funeral suit. The daughters gather round their mother, a camera
crew and interviewer enter.


Bernie gives another interview.
The women freeze in tableau as the lights fade.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
Character Study: Mary
 Bernie’s mother, Mary, is an important and symbolic character in the play. We are first
introduced to her from offstage; acknowledging her presence, albeit absent from the action on
stage.
 Mary only appears on stage twice during the play. When she does appear the audience might
assume she is suffering from an illness, possibly Alzheimer’s disease; her sentences are
disjointed and often seem to make little sense.
 Mary also sings which establishes a childlike and innocent side to her character. Mary’s
character represents many of the key themes in the play; entrapment, the past, regret, love, fear
and death. Towards the end of the play, Mary holds a pigeon she has found on her window
ledge. Mary tries to climb out of the window passionately and repeatedly indicating her
desperate need to escape. During this scene, Adie is preparing to leave, bringing a suitcase on
to the stage. Here the two women, grandmother and granddaughter, are joined in the same
desire to escape.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
From the original but it may help you understand the characters.
The House of Bernarda Alba
Characters
Bernarda Alba – (Bernie)
At age 60, she feels out of place in the village, sure that everyone town despises her. She feels
superior to her neighbors in social status and will not allow her daughters to be courted by the men
of the village, whom she generally finds inferior. Bernarda rules her house with an iron hand; Poncia
calls her a "domineering old tyrant." Her husband, Antonio Maria Benavides, has recently died, the
family has gathered at her house for the funeral. Her domination over the family and servants
intensifies the day of her husband's funeral. She is hard on her own daughters out of a sense of
what is proper behaviour for women in a period of mourning. She plans to keep the house s for
eight years, and requires the daughters to cover their heads in mourning. She is a vicious and
manipulative person who keeps a record of every scandal that involves her neighbors, so she can
use information as a weapon against them. Bernarda seems unmoved by her daughter Adela's
death, more concerned about the perceptions of neighbors as she orders her daughters to uphold
the lie that "She, youngest daughter of Bernarda Alba, died a virgin."
Adela – (Adie)
Adela, age 20, is the youngest, most attractive, spirited, and rebellious of Bernarda's daughters. As
Magdalena says of her, Adela "still has illusions," and thus has difficulty submitting to the strong will
of her mother, who keeps all the daughters under tight reign. As a form of rebellion, Adela puts on a
green birthday dress and goes out in the yard shouting, "Chickens, look at me!" She craves social
interaction and cannot bear to be locked away from the world. She has a deep connection to nature,
yearning to be free of the house and breathe fresh air of the fields. As the conflict with her mother's
will intensifies Adela's defiance is symbolised in her breaking of the walking stick which Bernarda
has beaten her daughters. Ultimately, Adela chooses death as a means of escape from an
intolerable life, when the only alternative she can envision -Pepe- is no longer available.
Angustias – (Agnes)
The eldest daughter at age 39, Angustias is a half-sister to the others because she was born of
Bernarda's first marriage. She is therefore the only one with any inheritance worth mentioning,
and thus has gained interest from Pepe el Romano. Bernarda strikes her when she learns that
Angustias has been looking out the cracks in the door at the men departing funeral. Angustias
knows that Pepe only wants her for her money, and has resigned to this fact. Near the
conclusion of the play, Angustias stands her ground when a hysterical Adela lets out the truth.
Martirio – (Marty)
Martirio, Bernarda's second youngest daughter at 24, has been under care of a doctor but does not
express any hope of her condition improving (Indeed, she takes her medicine more out of routine
than concern for health). She is in many ways a younger picture of her mother. Martirio feels that
God made her weak and ugly and that all things considered, "it's better to look at a man." She
hypocritically says having a boyfriend does matter to her, but she is consumed by jealousy and
sexual frustration. She steals the picture of Pepe el Romano so she can at least possess an image
of a man. Martirio is the one daughter who reluctantly agrees Pepe el Romano really loves Adela
and not Angustias, to whom he engaged. Still, she does all she can to keep Adela and Pepe apart.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
Poncia – (Penny)
She expresses bitterness about Bernarda's treatment of her and the other servants (Bernarda
must have everything perfect, and work servants hard to get it). Poncia, who is 60 -years-old, is
perhaps the most complex character in the play. A mediator, she is all things to people, without
being a hypocrite. Poncia is torn between debt and hatred of Bernarda. Additionally, her sons
work Bernarda's fields, Bernarda controls the economic fate of the entire family. Nevertheless
Poncia is extremely frank with her employer, which may be due to age (Lorca is careful to
indicate they are exactly the same age) Poncia provides the daughters with friendly
conversation, which they lack, and on occasion defends them to Bernarda. Poncia persists
trying to make Bernarda recognise there are real problems brewing the house.
Magdalena – (Maggie)
Apparently the only daughter who truly loved her father, Magdalena is 30 years -old, faints during
his funeral. Realistic to the point of pessimism she is convinced she is never going to get
married. Like Martirio, she claims not to care if she lives or dies. She speaks out against
hypocrisy when she hears it, and believes women should be strong and not receive poor
treatment by men. She refuses to contribute a stitch to the making of clot hes for the christening
of Angustias's future first child. Her fantasy of escape is a pleasant memory of the past.
Amelia – (Melly)
Of all the characters, Amelia, Bernarda's third youngest daughter 27, perhaps stands out the least
as an individual. She is kindhearted and hates to hear her mother speak unkindly. She is concerned
about Martirio's health even if Martirio is not. Like Martirio, she feels uncomfortable and
embarrassed around men. Like Magdalena, she feels that being born a woman is life's worst
punishment. Amelia seems afraid of almost everything; unlike Adela, who seeks the truth, and
would rather close her eyes to it.
Maid – (Careworker)
Like the other servants in Bernarda's employ, her life consists of cleaning the house until her
fingers bleed, without ever earning Bernarda's approval. When the maid hears the bells tolling
Bernarda's dead husband, she curses him, "You'll never again lift my skirts behind the barn
door!" She is 50-years-old.
Maria Josefa – (Mary)
Bernarda's mother, 80-years-old, is the most poetic character in the play, identified closely with
Adela (they share a desire to escape the house and be free). Maria Josefa is a voice of truth, painful
to Bernarda who keeps her locked away. What she claims to want - marriage to a virile young man
and lots of children - is irrational. But Maria Josefa also very perceptive, more aware than Bernarda
of the dire situation the house. When she cradles the lamb, she knows it is not a real baby but
accepts it as better than nothing.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
The House of Bernarda Alba
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 20 September 2009 21.30 BST
Delicate tussle for power … Julie Wilson Nimmo, Una McLean and Jo Freer in The House of
Bernarda Alba at the Citizens Theatre, Glasgow.
With not an Andalusian plain in sight, this House of Bernarda Alba is not exactly as Federico García
Lorca imagined it in 1936: it's less about pre-Franco oppression than post-credit-crunch neurosis.
The closest we get to Spain is a Royal Doulton figurine of a flamenco dancer. And even that
smashes on the plushly carpeted floor of Bernadette Alba's all-beige Glasgow living room as soon
as the play begins.
Beneath the family's penthouse apartment, meanwhile, the El Paso nightclub is gearing up for a
same-sex wedding reception. And outside, camera crews are queuing up to find out who shot
Bernie's husband, a crime boss and father to the five sisters who are just back from the funeral in
their designer mourning gear.
However, Rona Munro's bold translation for the National Theatre of Scotland is not the gimmick it
may sound. This is a portrait of an all-female household cocooned from the outside world by a
domineering mother (a sharp-tongued Siobhan Redmond) and fear of the paparazzi. With only one
man – the son of a local mobster – to share between them, the daughters let claustrophobia and
sexual frustration get the better of them. By staying loyal to the family, they repress their instincts
until something has to give.
But although the relocation does not jar, it cannot match the brooding intensity of the original.
Having swapped Spanish austerity for consumerist comfort, these women are more grumpy than
desperate. When things get tough, they can always lie back on the sofa and escape into an episode
of Gossip Girl. That might make us smile, but it doesn't elicit our sympathy. And, refreshing though it
is to see Lorca played with humour, John Tiffany's production strikes an uncertain note. It looks like
a raucous all-girls-together comedy – especially with Munro's waspish language – but it pulls us in
the opposite direction, towards tragedy.
The approach works well in the communal scenes, as the strong cast engage in a delicate tussle for
power. It is less successful in quieter moments, however, when the actors' energy is muted by
Laura Hopkins's enclosing white box of a set. The result is a 21st-century family drama with a
conclusion that is bitter and bloody, but lacks any sense of cruel inevitability.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
Theatre review: The House of Bernarda Alba
Published Date: 19 September 2009 – The Scotsman
By JOYCE McMILLAN
THE HOUSE OF BERNARDA ALBA ****
CITIZENS' THEATRE, GLASGOW
IT'S a high-risk business to attempt a radical update and relocation of a classic play such as
Federico Garcia Lorca's great 1930s drama The House Of Bernarda Alba. Set in a village in Spain
in a time of fierce sexual and political repression, when t
he shadow of Franco's fascist rule loomed on the horizon, the play famously uses the household of
its savagely authoritarian heroine, and the plight of her five unmarried daughters, as a metaphor for
the state of a country in which love, joy and the force of life were suppressed, in an effort to sustain
a culture of absolute political and social control.
Now, though, writer Rona Munro and National Theatre of Scotland associate director John Tiffany
have boldly relocated the action to a penthouse above a nightclub in a tough area of Glasgow,
where Bernie Alba, recently bereaved widow of a gangster, holds her five girls in thrall to a cult of
savage and cynical pessimism about human nature, and about the transforming power of human
creativity and love.
Munro's version of the play places a sharp stretch on the original drama; some in the audience are
clearly inclined to take this mouthy Glasgow Lorca as a kind of pastiche. And Siobhan Redmond, as
Bernie, has to struggle with the loss of the huge symbolic weight carried by the original Bernarda
Alba. It's hard to see a hard-faced gangster's wife with a gift for comic timing as a key
representative of our whole culture.
But there's an intensity in the ensemble playing of Tiffany's tremendous all-female cast – and in Una
McLean's heartbreaking, lonely performance as Bernie's mad, love-starved old mother – that carries
this high-risk production through to a successful conclusion.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
Venue: Citizens Theatre
Where: Glasgow
Date Reviewed: 25 September 2009 – “Whats on Stage”
WOS Rating:
Reader Reviews: View and add to our user reviews
This NTS production presents (Rona Munro’s) second stab at an adaptation of
(Federico Garcia Lorca’s) very Spanish tragedy. As with all translated works it’s
difficult for monolingual audiences to judge whether this is a piece with its tongue cut
out, but even before a word is spoken the visual links to its Iberian origins are clear.
Bright 1930’s Andalusian stone finds new form in an off-white ensemble of a living
room that’s all leather and mirrors; designer (Laura Hopkins’) well-rendered replica of
gangland gaudiness is the home of a woman whose girlfriends must surely include
some Old Firm Footballers’ wives.
The house holds domineering mother Bernie (Siobhan Redmond) and five daughters, all recently bereaved
after the death of Bernie’s husband. The shady family business is the backdrop for their struggle for some
semblance of sanity in the aftermath. It wouldn’t be a Glaswegian tale without splashes of caustic humour,
and it’s to these expulsions of vitriol that Redmond’s talents seem best suited. Elsewhere, her histrionics slip
somewhat from the tragicomic tightrope the script has her walk over.
It’s a tough trick, but one performed with success by (Myra McFadyen) as long-suffering family friend Penny.
The script is a gutsy one, and McFadyen best digests the fibre of the phrasing Munro serves up. Also excellent
here is (Louise Ludgate) as willfully damaged daughter Marty. Ludgate powers through the play like a
juggernaut jammed in top gear, seeming to best master the heady pace of the piece. Hurtling toward a tragic
finale, the all female cast are asked to find time to meditate upon the idea generations of their gender have
been racked by a desire to break free from bonds peculiar to their sex and sexuality.
With that in mind, special mention should be made of the punchy portrayal of youngest daughter Adie
(Vanessa Johnson) and the poignant one of her grandmother Mary (Una McLean). The two show each of their
characters is as desperate as the other to escape the space that’s artfully enfolding and tantalisingly expanding
at intervals through subtle staging by director (John Tiffany) and lighting designer (Natasha Chivers).
In the end, though, neither of these elements can conceal the shortcoming of a climax that is decidedly, if
inexplicably, hurried. It’s one that leaves us feeling this Scottish re-telling of the tale, done with no little haste,
may well be at much expense to its original taste.
- Andrew Davies-Cole
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
National Theatre of Scotland's The House of Bernarda Alba
Review
By Lindsay Corr - Posted on 04 November 2009 – www.edinburghguide.com
The potential pitfalls of taking on an iconic writer’s work makes most shy away from the challenge,
but Rona Munro (The Last Witch) has confronted Federico Garcia Lorca's classic, updating it from
scorching Spain’s Andalusia to the soggy wetness of Glasgow’s East End. Lorca’s great tragedy,
first performed in 1945 but written in 1936, is the story of matriarchal Bernarda Alba struggling to
look after her senile mother and five daughters after the death of her husband.
Clasping an iron grip over the girls she announces an eight year mourning period confined to the
house, causing tension that escalates when a suitor is expected to marry the eldest daughter for
financial convenience.
Munro translates the tale to Glasgow ganglands. The women are confined to their home after
returning from the funeral in their designer blacks to avoid the eager paparazzi, queuing up to find
out who shot Bernie's crime boss husband.
Meanwhile, underneath the family's chic penthouse apartment, their El Paso nightclub is gearing up
for the wedding reception of a gay couple.
Confined to the house with only Gossip Girl to watch, the girls pent up claustrophobic frustration and
sexual aggravations begin to push the limits of family loyalty when pitted against their repressed
instincts in a highly tense situation, slowly unraveling.
Although Munro’s relocation works, it cannot match the ominous intensity of the original; the sharp
stretch in style making it seem like a comic pastiche that fails to hit the juggernaut when it comes to
the underlying tragedy reflected in Munro’s biting dialogue.
John Tiffany directs the piece indecisively with lots of humour and while it is refreshing to see Lorca
portrayed in this way, it jars with the culminating tragedy of the end. A perfect example of this is Una
McLean's show stealing turn as Bernie's doddery, lonely old mother which is heartbreakingly
moving, yet received many giggles as it was set amidst comically staged interchanges, deflating the
intensity of McLean’s performance in favour of laughing at the loopy old lady.
Despite the wobbliness of approach, Tiffany has created an underlying intensity in the ensemble
female cast with the communal scenes offering intrigue to the delicate skirmish for power.
Yet the main problem is with the comfort of the family’s plush living conditions. With fluffy beige
carpets and melt-into leather sofas, it takes away the desperation of the piece and makes the
women seem like spoiled wannabe WAGS who are just having a grump which fails to emote a
sympathetic viewing, with Laura Hopkins's white box set successfully portraying the enclosed cabin
fever but counteracting the energy of the actors onstage with its confinement.
The overall result is modern family drama packaged in a spirited but fitful play that fails to realise the
brutal inevitability of its bitterly tragic and bloody conclusion.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean
National Theatre of Scotland's The House of Bernarda Alba
Review 2
By Irene Brown - Posted on 04 November 2009- “www.edinburghguide.com”
It is a brave thing to transpose a classic play out of its time and update it to a contemporary setting.
Rona Munro did not take on the task lightly when she tackled Lorca’s The House of Bernarda Alba
which was originally written in and set in 1930’s Spain. In her note in the programme, she writes of
“…giving the play back its transgressive power.”
The original story is about a recently bereaved and highly controlling mother of five daughters, one
of whom, the plainest, is from her first marriage.
This widow, Bernarda Alba (Siobhan Redmond), insists on enforcing extended mourning on her
already isolated girls. Tensions are high in such a pressured atmosphere and when a marriage is
arranged sexual jealousy becomes part of the mix, the climax is both shocking and inevitable.
Munro has transposed this tale, which in Lorca’s words is about “women in the villages of Spain”, to
a Glasgow gangland family where violence and control are part of every day survival.
The opening set is like an advert for one of these sofa warehouses – all pale leather, pale carpet,
corner units and nothing out of place. Very nouveau riche. Along with the six female portraits, there
is a Spanish fan on a wall, a nod to their ill-gotten villa in Spain but also to the play’s roots.
There are lots of references to fiddling the social in spite of their trappings of wealth, setting the tone
for their edgy, dangerous life. They refer to living in the ‘scheme’ a lot, which either means they still
use the language of their class or that they have physically stayed close to their roots despite their
wealth. They do live ‘above the shop’ i.e. the El Paso club whose neon light crackles on and off
throughout the performance.
Two of the characters, Adie and Marty sound more Bearsden than Barmulloch, so maybe Mr and
Mrs. Alba splashed out on a private education on these two. Bernarda Alba belies the myth of the
cosseted gangster’s wife, seemingly ignorant of her lavish lifestyle’s source, as she steps easily into
her dead husband’s shoes and emasculates the house by immediately and unsentimentally
ordering the clearing out of his things.
The daughters live in the cabin fever atmosphere of a strange celibate bordello or a highly sexed
convent. While it is hard to believe that modern women would obey such extreme restrictions, the
utter controlling nature of this fierce matriarch, along with a baseball bat, make it convincing. The
enforced mourning in the original play was symbolically broken by the youngest daughter wearing
green, and this is repeated in Munro’s version. Ultimately, it is outward appearance that matters to
Bernarda as she forces the black of mourning on her girls and plays to the paparazzi.
Lorca was killed by Fascists before his play was ever performed for having leftist views and for
being homosexual. It can be no accident in the text that the El Paso club is the venue for a gay
wedding that ends up in serious gay bashing. Throughout the play, the character, Penny( Myra
McFadyen), an old school friend of Bernarda and now club employee, acts as a narrator through her
dialogue. She is both convincing and comic. She has her cowboy boots firmly planted on the
ground but it is Bernarda’s mother, Mary (Una McLean), also locked away in her demented goonie,
who expresses truth when she reverts to her childhood of open doors, of Mammy and Daddy, of
laughter, sun and kisses as she symbolically releases her briefly captured doo. This 12 strong all
female cast shows survival techniques in its many forms.
Grangemouth High School – Drama Department
M McLean