0:00:10 > 0:00:14Thousands of men once crossed this bridge every morning on their way to
0:00:14 > 0:00:20work in one of Belfast's most historic landmarks - the shipyard.
0:00:29 > 0:00:32It has loomed large in the history of my family.
0:00:32 > 0:00:34My grandfather, my uncles, my father,
0:00:34 > 0:00:36all passed through its gates.
0:00:36 > 0:00:39As for me, my play, The Boat Factory,
0:00:39 > 0:00:41it tells of their experiences.
0:00:41 > 0:00:43But I wasn't the first.
0:00:43 > 0:00:46SHIP'S HORN
0:00:48 > 0:00:50While most of the men were building ships,
0:00:50 > 0:00:53there were others at work with their pens,
0:00:53 > 0:00:55inspired by this yard
0:00:55 > 0:00:58and the people of east Belfast who live beside it.
0:01:02 > 0:01:05St John Ervine, born in Ballymacarrett,
0:01:05 > 0:01:09gave a voice to early 20th century urban and rural Ulster
0:01:09 > 0:01:11with his ground-breaking plays.
0:01:13 > 0:01:18Thomas Carnduff was a shipyard labourer who dramatised the lives
0:01:18 > 0:01:23of working-class Belfast people during the recession of the 1930s.
0:01:24 > 0:01:27Sam Thompson was a painter and a fiery trade unionist
0:01:27 > 0:01:30who challenged the establishment with
0:01:30 > 0:01:33one of the most controversial plays of the 1960s.
0:01:36 > 0:01:40And Stewart Parker gave voice to a new generation
0:01:40 > 0:01:43in the 1970s and 1980s.
0:01:43 > 0:01:48Visionary and witty, his plays are strongly rooted in a Belfast
0:01:48 > 0:01:51troubled by the ghosts of its past and its present.
0:01:53 > 0:01:58These writers span a century of change in this city.
0:01:58 > 0:02:02Collectively, they have articulated the poverty and the politics,
0:02:02 > 0:02:06the hardship and the hopes of the ordinary working men
0:02:06 > 0:02:08and women of Belfast
0:02:08 > 0:02:12and, more importantly, put their voices on the stage.
0:02:15 > 0:02:19All of them were inspired by, and forged their ideas,
0:02:19 > 0:02:23here in the shadow of the shipyard.
0:02:25 > 0:02:27HORN BLOWS
0:02:35 > 0:02:37To understand a writer,
0:02:37 > 0:02:40you need to understand where he or she came from.
0:02:40 > 0:02:44And for these four playwrights, men who have inspired me
0:02:44 > 0:02:48as an actor and director, that means appreciating the very
0:02:48 > 0:02:54particular history of where they and I came from - east Belfast.
0:02:57 > 0:03:01The River Lagan is the natural marker that divides
0:03:01 > 0:03:03the east from the rest of Belfast.
0:03:04 > 0:03:08A couple of hundred years ago, the original town lay where the
0:03:08 > 0:03:10Cathedral Quarter is now.
0:03:12 > 0:03:17The east only became part of Belfast in 1853
0:03:17 > 0:03:20when land was needed for new industries, and the town boundary
0:03:20 > 0:03:25was extended to include the County Down side of the river.
0:03:25 > 0:03:28What I'm keen to know is, why did the city jump the river?
0:03:28 > 0:03:31You have to go to a lot of trouble to build all those bridges.
0:03:31 > 0:03:34When I grew up, east Belfast was just industrial,
0:03:34 > 0:03:37it was always that way. But what was there before?
0:03:44 > 0:03:48The answer may be inside this magnificent building,
0:03:48 > 0:03:50the Belfast Harbour Commissioner's Office.
0:03:54 > 0:04:00A painting from 1864 shows A View Of Sydenham, and tells us
0:04:00 > 0:04:05what was here - just two dozen large houses inhabited by business owners.
0:04:07 > 0:04:12By 1902, the population has expanded to 300,000,
0:04:12 > 0:04:14an influx from the countryside
0:04:14 > 0:04:16to work in the factories and the industries,
0:04:16 > 0:04:20and the streets of east Belfast begin to take shape.
0:04:26 > 0:04:29Ballymacarrett is the oldest part of the east,
0:04:29 > 0:04:33where there were two decisive moments in the 19th century.
0:04:35 > 0:04:38The harbour was dredged to create a deep water port.
0:04:40 > 0:04:42Then the tracks were laid
0:04:42 > 0:04:46for the Belfast and County Down Railway through east Belfast.
0:04:49 > 0:04:54There was a boom in industry, with new shipyards, ropeworks,
0:04:54 > 0:04:57engineering plants and whiskey distilleries.
0:04:57 > 0:05:01Men and women from rural parts of Ulster arrived in their droves,
0:05:01 > 0:05:05lured to the city by the promise of work.
0:05:05 > 0:05:07And the rows of red brick terraces built to house them
0:05:07 > 0:05:10ensured the spread of the city eastwards.
0:05:12 > 0:05:16Harland and Wolff Shipyard alone employed over 30,000 men.
0:05:16 > 0:05:19But other heavy industries, like the Workman Clark shipyard,
0:05:19 > 0:05:23the Sirocco Engineering Works, the Belfast Ropework Company,
0:05:23 > 0:05:27the St Ann's Iron Works Company, the Brickworks...
0:05:28 > 0:05:30..they all required a workforce as well.
0:05:33 > 0:05:37Well, in many ways, east Belfast is different to the rest of Belfast.
0:05:37 > 0:05:40It's a rural, Ulster-Scottish kind of culture.
0:05:40 > 0:05:42If you look at Belfast,
0:05:42 > 0:05:44even now, east Belfast is fringed
0:05:44 > 0:05:49by Ulster-Scots words, things like Tillysburn, Redburn, Cairnburn.
0:05:49 > 0:05:51We can imagine that these are named
0:05:51 > 0:05:54by local people who are Scots-speaking.
0:05:54 > 0:05:58It's very different to, um, to what's going on elsewhere.
0:05:58 > 0:06:01Tell me a little bit about the diversity of the people
0:06:01 > 0:06:04who found themselves working in that area.
0:06:04 > 0:06:05This creates a melting pot.
0:06:05 > 0:06:09Belfast vernacular comes out of a variety
0:06:09 > 0:06:11of different types of Englishes.
0:06:11 > 0:06:13Hiberno-English, Ulster Scots.
0:06:13 > 0:06:17And you see the strong vernacular culture developing
0:06:17 > 0:06:20because of the dynamism and the difference.
0:06:20 > 0:06:25Spoken word becomes really powerful in people's minds,
0:06:25 > 0:06:28and they have to express this, so they find ways of doing it.
0:06:28 > 0:06:33The word "culture" is bandied about here a lot.
0:06:33 > 0:06:36What is the culture of east Belfast?
0:06:36 > 0:06:41Culture of east Belfast is...is a tricky one to define.
0:06:45 > 0:06:51One might say that there is an awareness of the industrial culture.
0:06:51 > 0:06:55You see the city, you see industry, you see the great,
0:06:55 > 0:06:57red wall of the rope works.
0:06:57 > 0:07:01But if you turn around, you see what CS Lewis called
0:07:01 > 0:07:04the boundless northern sky,
0:07:04 > 0:07:06and the things that, often,
0:07:06 > 0:07:08working class people are told that they shouldn't have
0:07:08 > 0:07:13interests in - the idea of art and ideas and politics
0:07:13 > 0:07:15and philosophy and literature.
0:07:15 > 0:07:19And there's this tension within east Belfast, in a sense,
0:07:19 > 0:07:21which way you turn.
0:07:21 > 0:07:25And these writers are aware of both of those things,
0:07:25 > 0:07:28and they grasp the opportunity to move beyond
0:07:28 > 0:07:32where the red brick walls might place them.
0:07:40 > 0:07:45In 1911, shipbuilder Gustav Wolff penned a rhyme to the east,
0:07:45 > 0:07:48his favourite part of Belfast.
0:07:48 > 0:07:51He wrote, "You may talk of your Edinburgh
0:07:51 > 0:07:53"and the beauties of Perth
0:07:53 > 0:07:57"And all the large cities famed on the earth
0:07:57 > 0:08:00"But give me my house, though it be but a garret
0:08:00 > 0:08:03"In the pleasant surroundings of Ballymacarrett.'
0:08:06 > 0:08:09Wolff's workers had good reason to have a less rose-tinted
0:08:09 > 0:08:11view of their surroundings.
0:08:11 > 0:08:14It was thanks to their labour that Belfast had become famous
0:08:14 > 0:08:18as one of the world's greatest manufacturers of ships.
0:08:19 > 0:08:22SHIPS' HORNS
0:08:23 > 0:08:24But it came at a cost.
0:08:24 > 0:08:27Relentless, physically punishing work,
0:08:27 > 0:08:30cramped housing, unfair wages and tensions between
0:08:30 > 0:08:34Protestants and Catholics in the yard that spilled out
0:08:34 > 0:08:36into the streets adjacent to it.
0:08:38 > 0:08:43As the 19th century turned into the 20th, a teenage boy observed
0:08:43 > 0:08:47the tumult of life outside his door and began writing it down.
0:08:52 > 0:08:57This church, Westbourne Presbyterian, was built in 1880,
0:08:57 > 0:08:59but it's more commonly known,
0:08:59 > 0:09:02even today, as the Shipyard Church.
0:09:08 > 0:09:12These walls once rang with the voices of local men
0:09:12 > 0:09:15and women who worshipped here every Sunday morning.
0:09:15 > 0:09:18And their children, they attended the school just next door.
0:09:20 > 0:09:24This church could hold up to 1,500 people.
0:09:24 > 0:09:28That's 500 more than the Grand Opera House in Belfast.
0:09:28 > 0:09:31And I have it on very good authority that,
0:09:31 > 0:09:33often, it was standing room only.
0:09:47 > 0:09:49There's a blue plaque high up on the old school wall
0:09:49 > 0:09:52to commemorate one of its brightest students,
0:09:52 > 0:09:56John Greer Ervine, writer and playwright.
0:09:56 > 0:10:00He later adopted the St John Ervine,
0:10:00 > 0:10:02as a sort of dramatic flourish.
0:10:06 > 0:10:11St John Ervine wrote plays that were performed in Belfast, Dublin,
0:10:11 > 0:10:14London's West End and Broadway.
0:10:14 > 0:10:17He counted amongst his friends leading
0:10:17 > 0:10:23literary figures of the day, such as George Bernard Shaw and WB Yeats.
0:10:23 > 0:10:26His early life, however, was spent in much humbler surroundings,
0:10:26 > 0:10:28here on the Albertbridge Road.
0:10:30 > 0:10:34His father died in the year Ervine was born,
0:10:34 > 0:10:35so it was the women in his life
0:10:35 > 0:10:38who became his greatest source of inspiration.
0:10:38 > 0:10:43His grandmother was from Donaghadee, an Ulster-Scot, who moved, like
0:10:43 > 0:10:46so many others, from the country to Belfast in search of work.
0:10:57 > 0:11:01This determined and enterprising woman set up a hardware shop
0:11:01 > 0:11:03on the Albertbridge Road.
0:11:03 > 0:11:06Ervine spent much of his childhood in it,
0:11:06 > 0:11:07and both the setting
0:11:07 > 0:11:10and his grandmother's distinctive turn of phrase
0:11:10 > 0:11:15found their way into what is perhaps Ervine's best loved play,
0:11:15 > 0:11:18a rural comedy called Boyd's Shop.
0:11:19 > 0:11:21Another influence, however,
0:11:21 > 0:11:24was the unusual household kept by his mother.
0:11:25 > 0:11:29The young widow ran a boarding house for deaf-mutes.
0:11:29 > 0:11:34One of the male boarders is listed as a driller from the shipyard.
0:11:34 > 0:11:36But perhaps more significantly was the fact that
0:11:36 > 0:11:39Protestant boarders sat alongside catholic boarders
0:11:39 > 0:11:42at Mrs Ervine's dinner table.
0:11:44 > 0:11:47Ervine's childhood home clearly welcomed guests
0:11:47 > 0:11:49irrespective of religion.
0:11:49 > 0:11:52And growing up in this tolerant atmosphere arguably
0:11:52 > 0:11:56inspired one of Ervine's earliest and most successful plays,
0:11:56 > 0:12:01Mixed Marriage, a cautionary tale on the dangers of religious prejudice.
0:12:08 > 0:12:13A meeting with the influential WB Yeats in London led to
0:12:13 > 0:12:17Mixed Marriage being staged here at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin,
0:12:17 > 0:12:19under the direction of Lennox Robinson.
0:12:21 > 0:12:24The play caught the mood of the time.
0:12:24 > 0:12:27It's set in the working class home of the Rainey family.
0:12:27 > 0:12:29The men have been called out on strike,
0:12:29 > 0:12:33and there are fears that it might erupt into sectarian violence.
0:12:33 > 0:12:34John Rainey, the head of the household,
0:12:34 > 0:12:36shows his prejudice against
0:12:36 > 0:12:38the marriage of Catholics and Protestants
0:12:38 > 0:12:42when he discovers that his son, Hugh, is courting a Catholic girl.
0:12:43 > 0:12:46Did I hear you say you're going to marry this woman?
0:12:46 > 0:12:51- You did.- And you're going to take him, I suppose.- I am.
0:12:51 > 0:12:53You're a Catholic, aren't you?
0:12:53 > 0:12:55Yes, I am.
0:12:55 > 0:12:59Isn't it against your religion to be marrying a Protestant?
0:12:59 > 0:13:02Well, it can be done. But I don't care.
0:13:02 > 0:13:06- Will you turn Protestant if you marry him?- No. No, I won't.
0:13:08 > 0:13:11That production was very faithful to the period.
0:13:11 > 0:13:13I think that's exactly what people here
0:13:13 > 0:13:16in the Abbey would have seen 100 years ago.
0:13:16 > 0:13:18The play ends in tragedy.
0:13:18 > 0:13:21Nora, blaming herself for causing a rift between Rainey
0:13:21 > 0:13:26and his son, rushes out of the house amidst a riot and is shot dead.
0:13:26 > 0:13:28GUNSHOT
0:13:33 > 0:13:38Mixed Marriage premiered on the 30th March 1911.
0:13:38 > 0:13:40Due to run for just four nights,
0:13:40 > 0:13:44it was so successful that it was put on again a fortnight later.
0:13:44 > 0:13:47The Abbey then took the play on tour to the Royal Court in London
0:13:47 > 0:13:50and from there travelled to Broadway, New York,
0:13:50 > 0:13:53before finally staging it in Belfast in 1912.
0:13:56 > 0:14:00Mixed Marriage was a runaway hit, a transatlantic success
0:14:00 > 0:14:05and St John Ervine's reputation as a playwright was firmly established.
0:14:05 > 0:14:07It's an extraordinary play.
0:14:07 > 0:14:10For the first time, the voices of the ordinary,
0:14:10 > 0:14:14working-class men and women of Belfast are heard on the stage.
0:14:14 > 0:14:18And just as important, it's also a dire warning of
0:14:18 > 0:14:22the potentially fatal consequences of religious prejudice.
0:14:25 > 0:14:28The success of Mixed Marriage eventually led to Ervine's
0:14:28 > 0:14:32appointment as the manager of the Abbey Theatre in 1915,
0:14:32 > 0:14:35but his time here was unhappy and short-lived.
0:14:37 > 0:14:39How do you think Ervine's stint at the Abbey
0:14:39 > 0:14:42affected his career as a playwright?
0:14:42 > 0:14:47He was very unhappy with the Abbey players.
0:14:47 > 0:14:49He thought they were a fairly undisciplined lot,
0:14:49 > 0:14:52and, of course, they thought that he was an absolute tyrant.
0:14:52 > 0:14:55It didn't help that he was manager of the Abbey
0:14:55 > 0:14:59during and after Easter 1916,
0:14:59 > 0:15:02a very bad time to be doing anything in Dublin.
0:15:02 > 0:15:04And a number of the Abbey Players were, in fact,
0:15:04 > 0:15:06active in the Easter Rising.
0:15:06 > 0:15:09He was maverick in his politics
0:15:09 > 0:15:11and when he went off to fight on the Western Front,
0:15:11 > 0:15:17his decision to fight with an Irish regiment rather than with
0:15:17 > 0:15:20the Ulster Division in itself seems to signal a continuing
0:15:20 > 0:15:24attachment to Ireland rather than to Britain more generally.
0:15:26 > 0:15:29Ervine was wounded during the First World War.
0:15:29 > 0:15:33He actually took a bullet in the knee in March 1918.
0:15:33 > 0:15:36And, erm, it turned out that it was much more serious
0:15:36 > 0:15:38than at first expected and eventually,
0:15:38 > 0:15:41the leg had to be amputated.
0:15:41 > 0:15:44People said to him from time to time, "Why are you so cantankerous?"
0:15:44 > 0:15:46Because he could be very cantankerous, which I think came
0:15:46 > 0:15:51from the irritability of being in constant pain from that leg injury.
0:15:53 > 0:15:56The 20th century, like no other century I think,
0:15:56 > 0:15:59had a real crisis of identity going on in Ireland.
0:15:59 > 0:16:02He was from Country Down, he worked in Dublin,
0:16:02 > 0:16:04he lived in London in England...
0:16:04 > 0:16:06What was his identity?
0:16:06 > 0:16:08Composite, I think.
0:16:08 > 0:16:10When he's in London, people think that he's Irish.
0:16:10 > 0:16:14When he's back in Ireland, people think that he's English.
0:16:14 > 0:16:18All of these identities - English, Irish, Ulster -
0:16:18 > 0:16:21I think feed into the way in which he thinks about himself
0:16:21 > 0:16:23and that influences his writing.
0:16:26 > 0:16:30After the war, St John Ervine made his home in England.
0:16:30 > 0:16:33Despite being in constant pain from his injuries,
0:16:33 > 0:16:36he was determined to continue forging a career
0:16:36 > 0:16:39as a dramatist and a critic.
0:16:39 > 0:16:42He wrote drawing-room comedies such as The First Mrs Fraser
0:16:42 > 0:16:47that held appeal for an English audience but, in 1936,
0:16:47 > 0:16:50he returned to his Ulster roots with a play that would become
0:16:50 > 0:16:53a staple of the local theatre scene here in Belfast.
0:16:55 > 0:16:58Boyd's Shop was inspired by his grandmother's hardware shop
0:16:58 > 0:17:01and, in a nod to her birthplace, Donaghadee,
0:17:01 > 0:17:04he set it in the fictional village of Donaghreagh.
0:17:07 > 0:17:10Billed in its first run as "a simple comedy
0:17:10 > 0:17:13"in which the essential kindliness of the Ulster people appears,"
0:17:13 > 0:17:17Ervine focuses on the gossip and intrigues of village life.
0:17:17 > 0:17:20At its heart is a love triangle between the daughter
0:17:20 > 0:17:23of shop owner Andrew Boyd, an ambitious young clergyman
0:17:23 > 0:17:26and a newcomer to the village.
0:17:26 > 0:17:30The play marks the shift in Ervine's politics.
0:17:30 > 0:17:33While Mixed Marriage offers a critique of the prejudices
0:17:33 > 0:17:37of the Protestant working classes, Boyd's Shop is a much kinder,
0:17:37 > 0:17:42almost sentimental portrayal of the Protestant rural middle class.
0:17:49 > 0:17:55It was first staged in Belfast in the Ulster Group Theatre in 1940.
0:17:55 > 0:17:58Its homespun characters and happy ending
0:17:58 > 0:18:01were a welcome respite throughout the war years.
0:18:01 > 0:18:04And it was so popular that 42,000 people saw it
0:18:04 > 0:18:08performed between 1940 and 1944.
0:18:09 > 0:18:14This success led to Boyd's Shop being made into a film in 1960
0:18:14 > 0:18:16and while the setting and the characters
0:18:16 > 0:18:19remain faithful to Ervine's original play,
0:18:19 > 0:18:25the language and the accents of the Ulster village are a little...
0:18:25 > 0:18:26off.
0:18:28 > 0:18:31We're in the wrong business for this town, aren't we?
0:18:31 > 0:18:34Selling gossip instead of groceries.
0:18:34 > 0:18:37In Boyd's Shop, Ervine wanted to capture the words
0:18:37 > 0:18:40and phrases of his Ulster-Scots grandmother.
0:18:40 > 0:18:42- ALL:- What did you hear, Miss McClure?
0:18:42 > 0:18:45The Reverent Patterson is retiring in a month or two.
0:18:45 > 0:18:46The film, however,
0:18:46 > 0:18:49was made with mostly Dublin actors from the Abbey Players.
0:18:49 > 0:18:50There's more to a man than success or failure.
0:18:50 > 0:18:52More often than not, it's a matter of luck.
0:18:52 > 0:18:55Maybe the makers thought an English audience wouldn't notice or care
0:18:55 > 0:18:59about the accents, but being an actor from Ulster,
0:18:59 > 0:19:02I'm going to try a reading in the way Ervine intended...
0:19:04 > 0:19:07You look annoyed about something, Father.
0:19:07 > 0:19:09I am annoyed.
0:19:09 > 0:19:12After the meeting the night, one or two of the elders was
0:19:12 > 0:19:15talking about Mr Patterson's remarks before the sermon.
0:19:15 > 0:19:18They seem to think he ought to retire.
0:19:18 > 0:19:21Well, he's old, Father.
0:19:21 > 0:19:24So am I. But I'm damned if I'm retiring.
0:19:24 > 0:19:28I don't like it, all this hinting and suggesting behind a man's back.
0:19:28 > 0:19:30It's not decent, daughter.
0:19:30 > 0:19:31Well...
0:19:31 > 0:19:36It's no use thinking about it the night. I'm dropping with fatigue.
0:19:36 > 0:19:41- Will you bolt the door or will I? - I'll do it, Father.- It's upset me.
0:19:41 > 0:19:43I hate to see people getting up a kind of a conspiracy
0:19:43 > 0:19:44behind a man's back.
0:19:47 > 0:19:48Goodnight, daughter dear.
0:19:49 > 0:19:50Goodnight, Father.
0:19:57 > 0:20:00Ervine lived until he was 87.
0:20:00 > 0:20:04While he died in Sussex far from his childhood home in Belfast,
0:20:04 > 0:20:06he never forgot his roots.
0:20:06 > 0:20:08Instead, he celebrated them.
0:20:10 > 0:20:16Why should a patch of land called Ulster have such an effect on me
0:20:16 > 0:20:21that when I catch sight of it from a ship's deck,
0:20:21 > 0:20:23I can feel tears rising in my eyes?
0:20:27 > 0:20:31In his later years, Ervine may have left behind the hard-hitting
0:20:31 > 0:20:33subject matter of Mixed Marriage,
0:20:33 > 0:20:37but there was another aspiring writer - a docker -
0:20:37 > 0:20:39who was ready to step into the breach.
0:20:41 > 0:20:45In the 1930s, Belfast's pride, the shipbuilding industry,
0:20:45 > 0:20:49was reeling from the impact of a worldwide recession.
0:20:49 > 0:20:52Thousands of men who depended on the yards for their livelihood
0:20:52 > 0:20:54were suddenly thrown out of work.
0:20:56 > 0:20:59One unemployed dock worker took up his pen
0:20:59 > 0:21:01and articulated the toll that the poverty
0:21:01 > 0:21:05and industrial decline was having on the men and women of Belfast.
0:21:05 > 0:21:08His name was Thomas Carnduff.
0:21:14 > 0:21:17Carnduff was born in 1886 in Sandy Row
0:21:17 > 0:21:21and he would always remain proud of his Protestant heritage.
0:21:21 > 0:21:23He would eventually become a Worshipful Master
0:21:23 > 0:21:25in the Independent Orange Order.
0:21:25 > 0:21:30His grandparents were Ulster-Scots like those of St John Ervine,
0:21:30 > 0:21:34and they had moved from the village of Drumbo to Belfast for work.
0:21:39 > 0:21:43Carnduff lost both his parents at an early age and had to fend
0:21:43 > 0:21:46for himself in a number of low-paid jobs.
0:21:46 > 0:21:49Married and with four young sons to support,
0:21:49 > 0:21:52he found work as a labourer in the shipyards.
0:21:56 > 0:21:59Carnduff laboured for 17 backbreaking years
0:21:59 > 0:22:03in Workman Clark's, the rival yard to Harland & Wolff.
0:22:03 > 0:22:06He was that most unusual of writers, a working man
0:22:06 > 0:22:09who was also a poet and a playwright.
0:22:13 > 0:22:17He worked a punishing 50-hour week starting at 6am
0:22:17 > 0:22:20and finishing at 5.30pm for a pittance.
0:22:20 > 0:22:24And there were accidents, sometimes fatal, almost daily.
0:22:24 > 0:22:28And then there was always the threat of being laid off hanging over him.
0:22:28 > 0:22:32And on the occasions when he was let go, he would gather with the other
0:22:32 > 0:22:36men at the gates, hoping that his name would be called for a shift.
0:22:41 > 0:22:43Carnduff took pride in his labour.
0:22:43 > 0:22:47He saw himself as a member of a workforce that was
0:22:47 > 0:22:50contributing to the industrial success of Belfast.
0:22:50 > 0:22:53And he enjoyed the company of the men too.
0:22:53 > 0:22:57"Rough, hardy characters" but who were also the
0:22:57 > 0:23:00"most thoughtful and kindly" he knew.
0:23:00 > 0:23:02It was in this energetic world of camaraderie
0:23:02 > 0:23:06and hard labour that Carnduff began writing poetry.
0:23:22 > 0:23:26These lines are seen every day by the hundreds of visitors
0:23:26 > 0:23:28to Titanic Belfast.
0:23:28 > 0:23:32They're a homage to the shipyard men by one of their own.
0:23:33 > 0:23:39"O city of sound and motion! O city of endless stir!
0:23:39 > 0:23:41"From the dawn of a misty morning
0:23:41 > 0:23:45"To the fall of the evening air.
0:23:45 > 0:23:47"From the night of moving shadows
0:23:47 > 0:23:51"To the sound of the shipyard horn.
0:23:51 > 0:23:54"We hail thee Queen of the Northland
0:23:54 > 0:23:56"We who are Belfast born."
0:23:57 > 0:24:03Songs From The Shipyards, Thomas Carnduff, 1924.
0:24:09 > 0:24:11At its peak during World War I,
0:24:11 > 0:24:14Workman Clark employed over 10,000 men.
0:24:17 > 0:24:21By the early 1930s, however, orders had dried up
0:24:21 > 0:24:23and most of the workforce was laid off.
0:24:23 > 0:24:25Carnduff was one of them.
0:24:26 > 0:24:28Just as his money was running out,
0:24:28 > 0:24:32Carnduff went to a lecture by the Belfast poet Richard Rowley.
0:24:32 > 0:24:34During a chat afterwards,
0:24:34 > 0:24:36Rowley suggested that Carnduff write a play.
0:24:37 > 0:24:41The very next morning, Carnduff started on Workers.
0:24:46 > 0:24:50Into the play, he poured all his experiences of shipyard life.
0:24:50 > 0:24:55He would say afterwards, "I had drawn the characters from real life
0:24:55 > 0:24:58"and the dialogue was their everyday speech."
0:24:59 > 0:25:01Who bargains for you when you want a rise in wages?
0:25:01 > 0:25:04Who got you holidays with play and a five-day week?
0:25:04 > 0:25:06I suppose you think Santa Claus brought them.
0:25:06 > 0:25:08I'm telling you, mate, if we'd no trade unions,
0:25:08 > 0:25:09they'd be paying us in soap wrappers.
0:25:09 > 0:25:12What has the union done for us in this firm, eh?
0:25:12 > 0:25:15Sure, the working conditions here date back to Methuselah.
0:25:15 > 0:25:18Look, Alec, a minute ago, you were the fella that was saying
0:25:18 > 0:25:20it was no good of us trying to get better conditions here,
0:25:20 > 0:25:22weren't you?
0:25:27 > 0:25:29Workers focuses on a group of shipyard men
0:25:29 > 0:25:34and the complicated relationship between the violent John Waddell,
0:25:34 > 0:25:37his wife Susan and her former sweetheart, John Bowman.
0:25:39 > 0:25:44The Grand Opera House rejected it, saying it was too inflammatory
0:25:44 > 0:25:45and working-class...
0:25:47 > 0:25:49..but to Carnduff's delight,
0:25:49 > 0:25:54it premiered at the Abbey Theatre Dublin on 13th October 1932.
0:25:58 > 0:26:00As the audience showed their appreciation,
0:26:00 > 0:26:04Carnduff commented that the years of poverty, misery
0:26:04 > 0:26:10and disappointment were forgotten in the solitary moment from heaven.
0:26:10 > 0:26:11He also found humour in the fact that he was
0:26:11 > 0:26:17an Orangeman from Sandy Row being applauded on the Dublin stage.
0:26:17 > 0:26:19APPLAUSE
0:26:21 > 0:26:25Deafening cheers, a dozen curtains and imperative clamour for author
0:26:25 > 0:26:28marked the end of Thomas Carnduff's Workers.
0:26:28 > 0:26:31When the author thanked them for their sympathetic
0:26:31 > 0:26:34reception of his play, a woman in the stalls cried,
0:26:34 > 0:26:37"It was worth it!" And a man urged him to write ten more.
0:26:39 > 0:26:43One critic said that the dialogue was delightfully natural,
0:26:43 > 0:26:45written with the true eye of a keen observer.
0:26:47 > 0:26:50I think in this case, for once, the critic was right.
0:26:56 > 0:26:58Next up was Belfast.
0:26:58 > 0:27:01But would Carnduff's controversial play be a success
0:27:01 > 0:27:04when it opened at the city's Empire Theatre?
0:27:07 > 0:27:09The answer is...
0:27:09 > 0:27:10yes.
0:27:10 > 0:27:13"Last night's splendid audience not only applauded
0:27:13 > 0:27:15"warmly at the final curtain,
0:27:15 > 0:27:17"but also throughout the action of the play,
0:27:17 > 0:27:21"many of the forceful lines exciting spontaneous approval."
0:27:24 > 0:27:28Carnduff went on to write three more plays - Machinery,
0:27:28 > 0:27:30Traitors and Castlereagh.
0:27:30 > 0:27:32Again, these plays garnered good reviews
0:27:32 > 0:27:35and filled theatres in Dublin and Belfast.
0:27:36 > 0:27:40Curiously though, after Carnduff's death in the 1950s,
0:27:40 > 0:27:44the plays almost totally vanished from the public domain.
0:27:45 > 0:27:49Today, his papers are held here at Queen's University, Belfast
0:27:49 > 0:27:53and his precious typewriter has been lovingly preserved
0:27:53 > 0:27:54by the Ulster Museum.
0:27:58 > 0:28:03Tell me about the physical mechanics of Thomas Carnduff writing
0:28:03 > 0:28:04plays on this typewriter.
0:28:05 > 0:28:08Well, you can see it's a travelling typewriter.
0:28:08 > 0:28:13And that was very useful because he had to move digs regularly
0:28:13 > 0:28:15when he was laid off at the shipyard,
0:28:15 > 0:28:17so this little machine was ideal for that.
0:28:17 > 0:28:20The only problem that came across was that he was very poor.
0:28:20 > 0:28:24He frequently was out of ribbons and paper, which he had to borrow
0:28:24 > 0:28:29or beg for and so he would sit in very, very cold lodging rooms
0:28:29 > 0:28:31in the very damp, wet conditions
0:28:31 > 0:28:34of those back-street terraced houses in Belfast
0:28:34 > 0:28:41with gloves on and he would tap away determinedly.
0:28:41 > 0:28:44And his own family didn't really appreciate what he was doing.
0:28:44 > 0:28:46They thought he was wasting his time.
0:28:46 > 0:28:50But all through that, he sat tapping away at that little machine.
0:28:50 > 0:28:56That was his sole road to freedom, to a wider audience.
0:28:56 > 0:29:01This is a copy of Carnduff's letters to Mary who was his wife and muse.
0:29:01 > 0:29:03Well, you can see here quite clearly,
0:29:03 > 0:29:05it's a measure of how poor he was that he couldn't afford paper
0:29:05 > 0:29:09many times in his writing life, so he appropriated,
0:29:09 > 0:29:13borrowed and begged for paper and he used both sides of it.
0:29:14 > 0:29:18And he writes to Mary, "It took 18 long years to climb up
0:29:18 > 0:29:22"the little distance I managed, and I had to start at the very bottom.
0:29:22 > 0:29:26"While others were having a good time, I was working hard.
0:29:26 > 0:29:29"I drank little, gambled little and played little.
0:29:29 > 0:29:32"But those boys down at the shipyard didn't half show me their loyalty
0:29:32 > 0:29:36"when I had to face public appreciation of my efforts.
0:29:36 > 0:29:40"During all those years, I had my dreams."
0:29:40 > 0:29:44- Wow!- So this is the means for him achieving his dreams.
0:29:45 > 0:29:49What's this image and why is it so important to Thomas Carnduff?
0:29:50 > 0:29:53This is Drumbo Round Tower which is in the graveyard
0:29:53 > 0:29:57of Drumbo Presbyterian Church.
0:29:57 > 0:30:00And this is an imitation of an Irish tower
0:30:00 > 0:30:05and Carnduff took this as symbolic of his belonging in Ireland,
0:30:05 > 0:30:08because in that graveyard, there are Carnduffs buried.
0:30:08 > 0:30:14And he looked at that and in one piece he wrote,
0:30:14 > 0:30:16"Is it my fault that my ancestors
0:30:16 > 0:30:19"looked on the land with approval and stayed?"
0:30:19 > 0:30:22So this was a hugely important to him, this was like an identity
0:30:22 > 0:30:28as a Presbyterian who was born here, but had ancestors elsewhere.
0:30:28 > 0:30:31That was hugely important in the Carnduff story.
0:30:38 > 0:30:42Carnduff never capitalised on his early success as a writer -
0:30:42 > 0:30:44he was the odd man out
0:30:44 > 0:30:47in a middle-class literary establishment -
0:30:47 > 0:30:51maybe too uncompromising, too critical.
0:30:51 > 0:30:54And he certainly never made his fortune from writing.
0:30:54 > 0:30:57He remained a working man until the end of his days.
0:31:04 > 0:31:08Finally getting a job here in the Linen Hall Library
0:31:08 > 0:31:12as a caretaker, I'd like to think he found some consolation
0:31:12 > 0:31:15spending his days amongst the books that he loved.
0:31:15 > 0:31:18But you can be sure that the world of the shipyard
0:31:18 > 0:31:20was never far from his thoughts.
0:31:33 > 0:31:36Harland & Wolff survived the recession of the 1930s
0:31:36 > 0:31:41and became a major supplier for the armed forces during World War II.
0:31:41 > 0:31:46By the 1950s, a new generation of men was working in the yard.
0:31:46 > 0:31:50Amongst them was a painter from East Belfast who would redefine
0:31:50 > 0:31:54the type of plays that could be staged in Northern Ireland.
0:31:59 > 0:32:04He was passionate in his belief that the theatre was the place where
0:32:04 > 0:32:09the social and political injustices of the day could be aired.
0:32:09 > 0:32:11His name was Sam Thompson.
0:32:13 > 0:32:18Thompson was born in 1916 at Montrose Street in Ballymacarrett.
0:32:18 > 0:32:21In later life, he would remember being aware, as a young boy,
0:32:21 > 0:32:24of two things - that his destiny lay in the shipyard
0:32:24 > 0:32:26and that there was tension
0:32:26 > 0:32:29between the Catholics and Protestants in his community.
0:32:38 > 0:32:41We always played our games on the island part of the park,
0:32:41 > 0:32:44across a bridge, and only a stone's throw from the shipyard,
0:32:44 > 0:32:49where we could see the red oxide painted boats on the slipways.
0:32:49 > 0:32:51There, our fathers and brothers worked.
0:32:51 > 0:32:54And some day, we would work there also.
0:33:00 > 0:33:03Hello, fellas. That new boat in the slips is away.
0:33:03 > 0:33:07It's not away, it's only lanced. My da saw it lanced yesterday.
0:33:07 > 0:33:09My da won't take me to see a lance.
0:33:09 > 0:33:13He says I'll see enough lances when I'm working in the shipyard.
0:33:13 > 0:33:16Hey, there's some fellas, let's challenge them to a match.
0:33:16 > 0:33:19I wouldn't play with them, they're Catholics...
0:33:19 > 0:33:22I don't care, I'll play with them if they want to.
0:33:22 > 0:33:26Although my playmates and I were around the nine years old mark,
0:33:26 > 0:33:29it was the first time we'd met up with other boys
0:33:29 > 0:33:31who we knew for sure were Catholics.
0:33:31 > 0:33:35And there was no mistaking the tension that existed between us.
0:33:35 > 0:33:37Until we realised that neither of us
0:33:37 > 0:33:40had horns or pitchforks dangling out of our pockets.
0:33:45 > 0:33:48Sam Thompson and his playmates DID end up in the yard.
0:33:48 > 0:33:52At the age of 14, he started working at Harland & Wolff
0:33:52 > 0:33:54as an apprentice painter.
0:33:54 > 0:33:56It was a place that he described as
0:33:56 > 0:34:01"a fearful, sprawling mass of gantries, cranes, ships and men".
0:34:09 > 0:34:12Soon after he finished his apprenticeship,
0:34:12 > 0:34:16he left and began working for Belfast Corporation as a painter.
0:34:16 > 0:34:20Some years later, he would write his most famous play,
0:34:20 > 0:34:22Over The Bridge,
0:34:22 > 0:34:25but for now he was painting the underside of this one...
0:34:26 > 0:34:28..the Albert Bridge.
0:34:28 > 0:34:30It was a dirty, unpleasant job.
0:34:30 > 0:34:34Sam noticed that some men were assigned it and others weren't.
0:34:34 > 0:34:37This triggered a desire to do something about it,
0:34:37 > 0:34:38so he became a shop steward
0:34:38 > 0:34:41and negotiated a rota system with the management.
0:34:41 > 0:34:44His union activities got him the sack.
0:34:46 > 0:34:50Regardless, Thompson remained a lifelong, committed trade unionist
0:34:50 > 0:34:52and this, along with his membership
0:34:52 > 0:34:55of the Northern Ireland Labour Party, allowed him to stand
0:34:55 > 0:35:00outside the dominant Unionist and Nationalist politics of the time.
0:35:00 > 0:35:04A friend of Thompson's described him as "always appearing to be
0:35:04 > 0:35:06"on the verge of exploding into flames
0:35:06 > 0:35:09"at the first glimpse of injustice."
0:35:18 > 0:35:21A chance meeting in his local pub with Sam Hanna Bell,
0:35:21 > 0:35:23a BBC writer and producer,
0:35:23 > 0:35:28gave Thompson the perfect outlet for expressing his passionate beliefs
0:35:28 > 0:35:33on the ills of poverty and bigotry that riddled Belfast society.
0:35:35 > 0:35:38At first, he wrote nostalgic radio features,
0:35:38 > 0:35:42such as The Long Back Street and Brush In Hand
0:35:42 > 0:35:46about his childhood in East Belfast and his apprenticeship as a painter.
0:35:48 > 0:35:53But in 1955, he began writing the play that would make his name
0:35:53 > 0:35:56and stir up one of the biggest controversies to date
0:35:56 > 0:35:58on the Belfast stage.
0:36:03 > 0:36:07What is Over The Bridge about?
0:36:07 > 0:36:11Over The Bridge is a parable of sectarianism in the shipyards
0:36:11 > 0:36:13and within the Labour movement in Northern Ireland.
0:36:13 > 0:36:18The figure of Davy Mitchell, the main character, decides to protect
0:36:18 > 0:36:20a Catholic worker within the shipyard
0:36:20 > 0:36:23who is under the threat of a mob.
0:36:23 > 0:36:26Sam Thompson would paint in the shipyard, come home,
0:36:26 > 0:36:29go into his attic in East Belfast
0:36:29 > 0:36:31and write what became Over The Bridge.
0:36:31 > 0:36:34But of course, Sam Thompson would say that he'd been writing it
0:36:34 > 0:36:37his whole life, and the incident was in fact based on something
0:36:37 > 0:36:40he witnessed himself in 1935,
0:36:40 > 0:36:44when a Catholic man was beaten to death on the Albert Bridge Road.
0:36:47 > 0:36:52If you're not going with us, just where do you think you are going?
0:36:53 > 0:36:57To my bench out there when the horn blows to start work.
0:36:57 > 0:37:01- But, Davy, they'll tear you apart. - Pete does my meat at that bench.
0:37:01 > 0:37:03If he lifts one tool to start work,
0:37:03 > 0:37:07I'm duty bound as a fellow trade unionist to work with him.
0:37:07 > 0:37:10Two weeks before the play was due to go on,
0:37:10 > 0:37:13the board of the Group Theatre decided by six votes to two
0:37:13 > 0:37:15to withdraw the play.
0:37:15 > 0:37:18There was a very interesting moment where Sam Thompson went round
0:37:18 > 0:37:20to the house of John Ritchie McKee,
0:37:20 > 0:37:23who was a former estate agent and a golfing companion
0:37:23 > 0:37:26of the Unionist Prime Minister Lord Brookeborough.
0:37:26 > 0:37:28And Ritchie McKee said, "I can't do this play,
0:37:28 > 0:37:30"I can't do Over The Bridge.
0:37:30 > 0:37:34"It's too incendiary, what will happen, firstly,
0:37:34 > 0:37:37"I regard the language which you use as blasphemous
0:37:37 > 0:37:41"and if we show this play, the theatre will be wrecked by a mob."
0:37:41 > 0:37:44I don't give a damn about old boy. He's had his chance.
0:37:44 > 0:37:46But I do care about you, Davy.
0:37:46 > 0:37:49And when that horn blows, there's only one man going out to work,
0:37:49 > 0:37:51and by Christ, it's not going to be you.
0:37:51 > 0:37:53Just get one of you try to stop me and see what happens.
0:37:53 > 0:37:56If I refuse to go out there and work alongside Peter,
0:37:56 > 0:38:01everything I've ever fought for and believed in is nothing.
0:38:03 > 0:38:06What do you think Sam Thompson was trying to achieve?
0:38:06 > 0:38:10Sam Thompson's view, in that very combative, pugnacious
0:38:10 > 0:38:15and feisty way, is that we have to confront sectarianism.
0:38:15 > 0:38:19And I have to show it within this play, so that we can confront it.
0:38:19 > 0:38:22You can reason all you like,
0:38:22 > 0:38:25but you're not change one iota the feelings of that mob out there.
0:38:25 > 0:38:27Come on, lads,, let's start.
0:38:27 > 0:38:30The man that tries to stop me doing my duty...
0:38:33 > 0:38:34So help me...
0:38:35 > 0:38:37..I'll kill them.
0:38:37 > 0:38:39Thompson's play pulls no punches.
0:38:39 > 0:38:43He writes Davy Mitchell as a fair-minded, courageous
0:38:43 > 0:38:46and selfless man who puts his trade union principles
0:38:46 > 0:38:51of supporting his Catholic workmate before his own personal safety.
0:38:51 > 0:38:54His stand against an angry mob results in
0:38:54 > 0:38:57his eventual murder at their hands.
0:38:57 > 0:39:00To see it is a shock. You're meant to be shocked by it.
0:39:00 > 0:39:02And you're meant to find it abhorrent.
0:39:02 > 0:39:04When we didn't see that on stage,
0:39:04 > 0:39:06and we didn't hear that on the radio,
0:39:06 > 0:39:09even though it was there, was very important.
0:39:09 > 0:39:12The play is a great warning from history in that way.
0:39:13 > 0:39:17There had been outbreaks of sectarian violence in the yard
0:39:17 > 0:39:19in the 1920s and the 1930s
0:39:19 > 0:39:23and Thompson believed that it could happen again.
0:39:23 > 0:39:26He also believed the issue was not being talked about
0:39:26 > 0:39:28by ordinary people and those in power.
0:39:28 > 0:39:33He would later say that the play was his own "plea for tolerance".
0:39:33 > 0:39:36Getting it onto the stage, however,
0:39:36 > 0:39:39would be Thompson's greatest challenge.
0:39:39 > 0:39:43Belfast Telegraph, Thursday, May 14, 1959.
0:39:43 > 0:39:46"Over The Bridge man gets legal advice.
0:39:46 > 0:39:49"Mr Thompson said today that he had done so
0:39:49 > 0:39:54"after reading a statement made yesterday By Mr Ritchie McKee,
0:39:54 > 0:39:57"chairman of the theatre's board of directors, that,
0:39:57 > 0:40:01" 'It is the policy of the directors to keep political
0:40:01 > 0:40:04" 'and religious controversies off our stage.'
0:40:04 > 0:40:08"Mr Thompson said, 'That is an unfortunate statement.
0:40:08 > 0:40:12" 'Not only for me, but for Ulster playwrights in general.
0:40:12 > 0:40:16" 'It lets the playwrights see where he stands with this theatre.' "
0:40:18 > 0:40:22Sam Thompson and director James Ellis saw
0:40:22 > 0:40:24the withdrawal of the play as censorship.
0:40:24 > 0:40:27Ellis resigned from the Group Theatre and although it took
0:40:27 > 0:40:32months of struggle and strife, the two men set up their own company
0:40:32 > 0:40:38and staged Over The Bridge at the Empire Theatre on 27th January 1960.
0:40:38 > 0:40:41On the first night when that curtain came down
0:40:41 > 0:40:44to an absolutely tremendous reception
0:40:44 > 0:40:46from all parts of the house,
0:40:46 > 0:40:49I think Sam's and my feelings were both
0:40:49 > 0:40:52one of triumph and of justification.
0:40:52 > 0:40:54There were no missiles being hurled at the stage, there was
0:40:54 > 0:40:58nothing but applause. People were standing shouting for the author.
0:40:58 > 0:41:01I remember in the confusion having difficulty in introducing him.
0:41:01 > 0:41:04There were people from all sections of the community,
0:41:04 > 0:41:06people who'd never been in a theatre,
0:41:06 > 0:41:10there were shipyard workers who'd never visited a theatre before
0:41:10 > 0:41:13and they were on their feet cheering a play about themselves.
0:41:13 > 0:41:16Belfast audiences voted with their feet.
0:41:16 > 0:41:18Over The Bridge was a roaring success
0:41:18 > 0:41:22playing to a full house every night for six weeks.
0:41:23 > 0:41:26As Thompson's friend Sam Hanna Bell said,
0:41:26 > 0:41:27it was possible to detect
0:41:27 > 0:41:30an almost extraordinary feeling of relief
0:41:30 > 0:41:36that at last the unclean spectre of sectarianism
0:41:36 > 0:41:39had been dragged before the footlights.
0:41:43 > 0:41:47I don't know the answers, Rabbie, I don't know.
0:41:49 > 0:41:53I've asked myself what unions would be like
0:41:53 > 0:41:55if there wasn't men in them like Davy.
0:41:55 > 0:41:59And I've wondered what sort of Christians they were
0:41:59 > 0:42:02who'd form a mob and maim a man
0:42:02 > 0:42:07and murder another in the sacred name of religion.
0:42:10 > 0:42:13- And man told me yesterday... - "A ma told me yesterday
0:42:13 > 0:42:16"that when the mob went into action, he walked away.
0:42:16 > 0:42:21"And so did hundreds of his so-called workmates.
0:42:22 > 0:42:24"They said it was none of their business.
0:42:26 > 0:42:28"None of their business, Rabbie.
0:42:29 > 0:42:30"That's what they said.
0:42:32 > 0:42:34"And then they walked away.
0:42:34 > 0:42:36"And that's what frightens me.
0:42:38 > 0:42:40"They walked away."
0:42:47 > 0:42:50The success of Over The Bridge meant that Thompson could become
0:42:50 > 0:42:52a full-time writer.
0:42:52 > 0:42:56He continued to challenge the status quo in Northern Ireland society
0:42:56 > 0:43:00writing three more plays that again explored controversial issues
0:43:00 > 0:43:03including evangelism and dirty election tactics.
0:43:03 > 0:43:08He said, "A writer like me may criticise his own people
0:43:08 > 0:43:10"because he likes them very well."
0:43:13 > 0:43:16His career as a playwright, however, was short-lived.
0:43:16 > 0:43:22In February 1965, aged just 49, he died of a heart attack
0:43:22 > 0:43:25in the offices of the Northern Ireland Labour Party.
0:43:28 > 0:43:31This bridge is a relatively new Belfast landmark.
0:43:31 > 0:43:34It links the old shipyards with the Victoria Park
0:43:34 > 0:43:36and right into the heart of East Belfast.
0:43:36 > 0:43:39And also, in recognition of the work of Sam Thompson
0:43:39 > 0:43:42as a playwright and trade unionist, it's named after him.
0:43:42 > 0:43:46It's a fitting monument because there is an overwhelming sense
0:43:46 > 0:43:48of crossing over that bridge to stand beside a workmate
0:43:48 > 0:43:53or a friend, just as Sam Thompson did, no matter what the religion.
0:43:53 > 0:43:57And also, being able to stand up and speak out about it.
0:44:01 > 0:44:06In 1960, a teenage boy who had dreams of becoming a writer,
0:44:06 > 0:44:10went to see Over The Bridge with his uncle, a shipwright.
0:44:10 > 0:44:15For the boy, it was the first time he had seen characters from his own
0:44:15 > 0:44:20community - working-class men and women from Belfast - on the stage.
0:44:20 > 0:44:21In later life,
0:44:21 > 0:44:24he said it was as if he'd been thrust in front of the mirror
0:44:24 > 0:44:28for the first time and he was both scared and delighted by what he saw.
0:44:32 > 0:44:35Witnessing the power of theatre in showing the two faces
0:44:35 > 0:44:37of Belfast working-class life -
0:44:37 > 0:44:40ugly and violent, and civilised and decent -
0:44:40 > 0:44:42was a life-changing experience.
0:44:44 > 0:44:47The boy, Stewart Parker, would eventually become
0:44:47 > 0:44:51one of Northern Ireland's most lauded and visionary playwrights
0:44:51 > 0:44:53of the 1970s and 1980s.
0:44:54 > 0:44:59And the mirror he held up to Belfast reflected an image of the city
0:44:59 > 0:45:03that was provocative, witty, honest and hopeful
0:45:03 > 0:45:05during some its grimmest years.
0:45:08 > 0:45:11Parker spent his early childhood here in Sydenham.
0:45:12 > 0:45:16As an adult he remembered the trains to and from Bangor
0:45:16 > 0:45:18rattling past at the end of the street
0:45:18 > 0:45:23and beyond the tracks rose the inevitable gantries of Queen's Island.
0:45:23 > 0:45:26Three sounds were constantly in the air.
0:45:26 > 0:45:28There was the industrial noise,
0:45:28 > 0:45:30the distant clanging of the shipyard
0:45:30 > 0:45:34and the sudden roar from the aircraft testing at Shorts.
0:45:39 > 0:45:43Tell me what it was like growing up, to have Stewart Parker as a brother.
0:45:43 > 0:45:47He had lovely blue eyes, really blonde hair.
0:45:47 > 0:45:49And we all mollycoddled him
0:45:49 > 0:45:52because he wasn't well and he couldn't come out that much,
0:45:52 > 0:45:54so we played indoors with him,
0:45:54 > 0:45:56colouring in, snakes and ladders, stuff like that.
0:45:56 > 0:45:59He had terrific lung problems.
0:45:59 > 0:46:03It was called "delicate" in those days, he was a delicate child.
0:46:03 > 0:46:06When did you realise that Stewart was a writer?
0:46:06 > 0:46:09Well, he told me he was going to be a writer.
0:46:09 > 0:46:12I says, "What's your future? What are you going to do?"
0:46:12 > 0:46:14"I'm going to be a writer."
0:46:14 > 0:46:16And if you read that little poem there,
0:46:16 > 0:46:18you'll see what I mean about that.
0:46:19 > 0:46:22This poem is titled I Will Write.
0:46:22 > 0:46:28"Though soft sleep tempts my leaden eyes to warmth and comfort
0:46:28 > 0:46:31"Or fills this pen with rock
0:46:31 > 0:46:35"Though trend or temper will always be of my everything,
0:46:35 > 0:46:38"Till all but pen and paper stay
0:46:38 > 0:46:42"And then they'll never have, I say
0:46:42 > 0:46:45"Though the weird masters, time and age
0:46:45 > 0:46:48"Make the body an abhorrence
0:46:48 > 0:46:51"Pouring senile liquid through the brain
0:46:51 > 0:46:53"Turning the hair white
0:46:53 > 0:46:55"Still I will write."
0:46:55 > 0:46:58- He knew he was going to be a writer. - Yes.
0:47:00 > 0:47:04He wrote the original in 1957, so he was 15, 16,
0:47:04 > 0:47:07and then he revised in May 1958.
0:47:07 > 0:47:11So that was way early on, before he really seriously started to write.
0:47:11 > 0:47:15How did you and your parents feel about somebody who was moving
0:47:15 > 0:47:18away from the kind of traditional route the family took?
0:47:18 > 0:47:20My father said the usual things to Stewart.
0:47:20 > 0:47:24When Stewart said he was going to write, my father said, "Well,
0:47:24 > 0:47:28"that'll do till you get a proper job, son, I'm happy with that."
0:47:28 > 0:47:32I think that's pretty typical of working-class fathers
0:47:32 > 0:47:34whose sons elevate themselves
0:47:34 > 0:47:37into literature and stuff like that, you know.
0:47:42 > 0:47:45Unlike his predecessors, Thomas Carnduff and Sam Thompson,
0:47:45 > 0:47:48Parker wasn't destined for the shipyards.
0:47:48 > 0:47:49After the Second World War,
0:47:49 > 0:47:53there were a lot of university grants and places available
0:47:53 > 0:47:56for smart teenagers from a working-class background.
0:47:56 > 0:47:58Parker seized the opportunity with both hands
0:47:58 > 0:48:01and came here to the Queen's University of Belfast.
0:48:04 > 0:48:07Queen's was a revelation for Parker.
0:48:07 > 0:48:09He became involved in the drama society,
0:48:09 > 0:48:13writing and appearing in revues for the first Queen's Festival.
0:48:13 > 0:48:16He wrote and published poetry
0:48:16 > 0:48:19and acquired the education that enabled him to travel
0:48:19 > 0:48:24and work in America as a tutor for five years after university.
0:48:24 > 0:48:26EXPLOSION
0:48:32 > 0:48:36However, in August 1969, Parker returned home
0:48:36 > 0:48:39to a radically different city.
0:48:39 > 0:48:43He recalled later how, "After a long slow simmer,
0:48:43 > 0:48:47"the place exploded - the very week I came back.
0:48:47 > 0:48:50"Barricades in the streets, gutted buildings,
0:48:50 > 0:48:53"the Army everywhere and then gunfire at night."
0:48:56 > 0:48:59Parker's relationship with the city of his birth would become
0:48:59 > 0:49:04a constant theme throughout his work for radio, stage and screen.
0:49:04 > 0:49:08He confessed to a love-hate relationship with Belfast.
0:49:08 > 0:49:11But it was also, as a friend of Parker said,
0:49:11 > 0:49:14"the live wire that electrified his writing".
0:49:15 > 0:49:19And like his predecessors, Irvine, Carnduff and Thompson,
0:49:19 > 0:49:23Stewart Parker returned to the industrial heritage of East Belfast.
0:49:23 > 0:49:28But his take on the Titanic story, with his radio play The Iceberg,
0:49:28 > 0:49:31was not like anything anyone had ever heard before.
0:49:31 > 0:49:34SHIP'S HORN BLASTS
0:49:36 > 0:49:39"At least they could have put us in the table of statistics.
0:49:39 > 0:49:44"SS Titanic, length overall - 882 feet, 9 inches,
0:49:44 > 0:49:47"gross tonnage - 46,328,
0:49:47 > 0:49:50"passenger capacity - 2,440,
0:49:50 > 0:49:52"crew - 860.
0:49:52 > 0:49:55"Workers killed during construction - 17."
0:49:59 > 0:50:04The two main characters in The Iceberg, Hughie and Danny,
0:50:04 > 0:50:07are ghosts who died while building Titanic.
0:50:07 > 0:50:11Nevertheless, they "join" the passengers on board the maiden voyage.
0:50:11 > 0:50:15Their ghostly status gives them freedom to roam the ship
0:50:15 > 0:50:20and they weave in and out of first class, third class, the boiler room
0:50:20 > 0:50:22and even briefly join Thomas Andrews,
0:50:22 > 0:50:25the chief designer of Titanic.
0:50:28 > 0:50:32The exchanges between Hughie and Danny are witty and eloquent,
0:50:32 > 0:50:36expressed as they are in the vernacular of East Belfast,
0:50:36 > 0:50:38but they serve a greater purpose -
0:50:38 > 0:50:42to address the bigger issues of the day, things like social injustice
0:50:42 > 0:50:45and Home Rule, and ultimately to remind the audience
0:50:45 > 0:50:49that the deaths of two humble workmen are just as important
0:50:49 > 0:50:52as the deaths of the world's wealthiest men.
0:50:57 > 0:51:03After writing The Iceberg, broadcast on BBC Radio Ulster in 1975,
0:51:03 > 0:51:06Parker fully committed himself to drama.
0:51:06 > 0:51:09He gave himself an even greater challenge for his next project -
0:51:09 > 0:51:13a stage play that would use the humble bicycle as a symbol
0:51:13 > 0:51:17that could potentially unite the divided city of Belfast.
0:51:18 > 0:51:21I realised it was going to be difficult to write a play
0:51:21 > 0:51:23set in contemporary Belfast,
0:51:23 > 0:51:30which would take account of the last 50, 60, 70 years of history there,
0:51:30 > 0:51:36and I was searching around for some kind of unifying image, really,
0:51:36 > 0:51:38and I just came up with bicycles.
0:51:40 > 0:51:42HE SNAPS HIS FINGERS
0:51:42 > 0:51:45The evolution of the bicycle!
0:51:45 > 0:51:46An illustrated lecture.
0:51:49 > 0:51:52Spokesong is set in a run-down Belfast bicycle shop
0:51:52 > 0:51:57inspired by Stone's Bicycle Shop, which once stood on Cromac Square.
0:51:57 > 0:52:01The main character, Frank Stock, is a good-hearted shop owner
0:52:01 > 0:52:04who is under threat from developers, paramilitaries
0:52:04 > 0:52:09and his prodigal brother Julian, who is a rival for love interest Daisy.
0:52:10 > 0:52:13And then came the internal combustion engine.
0:52:13 > 0:52:16Stewart was so far ahead of his time.
0:52:16 > 0:52:22In 1975, in the bicycle shop, he gives Frank Stock these words.
0:52:23 > 0:52:25"Something more is needed.
0:52:29 > 0:52:32"Imagine a fleet of civic bikes,
0:52:32 > 0:52:35"gleaming with the city's coat of arms,
0:52:35 > 0:52:39"stacked on covered racks on every street, which anybody can ride
0:52:39 > 0:52:43"anywhere, free of charge, inside the city centre.
0:52:43 > 0:52:46"The air clean, the people healthy,
0:52:46 > 0:52:48"the time saved, the energy conserved.
0:52:48 > 0:52:52"Earth would not have anything to show more fair."
0:52:57 > 0:53:02Spokesong offers up a glimmer of hope in a time of gloom and despair.
0:53:02 > 0:53:06It catapulted Parker into the limelight and he was awarded
0:53:06 > 0:53:10the prestigious Evening Standard Most Promising Playwright Award.
0:53:12 > 0:53:14Stewart Parker really excites me.
0:53:14 > 0:53:17I was lucky enough to meet the man and be in his plays
0:53:17 > 0:53:20and he brought an exciting, fresh new approach, like new paint.
0:53:20 > 0:53:24He had ghosts in his plays, he had flashbacks,
0:53:24 > 0:53:26he had music and song and dance,
0:53:26 > 0:53:28and bicycles.
0:53:31 > 0:53:34Parker had been deeply affected by
0:53:34 > 0:53:38his discovery of radical Presbyterianism in 1790s Belfast.
0:53:38 > 0:53:43It connected with his belief that his own heritage was more complex
0:53:43 > 0:53:48than simply being a Protestant from a largely unionist area of East Belfast.
0:53:48 > 0:53:52He said that, "The ancestral wraiths at my elbow are,
0:53:52 > 0:53:55"amongst other things, Scots-Irish, Northern English,
0:53:55 > 0:54:01"immigrant Huguenot - in short, the usual Belfast mongrel crew."
0:54:03 > 0:54:07It must be understood, there is no vendetta against the Orange society.
0:54:07 > 0:54:10It's true that many lodges have been formed into companies
0:54:10 > 0:54:12of yeomanry by the landlords.
0:54:12 > 0:54:15They will be sent against us, just as the Catholic militia are,
0:54:15 > 0:54:17but all these men are the gulls of history.
0:54:18 > 0:54:22In his highly acclaimed play Northern Star, Parker delves into
0:54:22 > 0:54:25the history of the United Irishman Henry Joy McCracken,
0:54:25 > 0:54:29one of the Belfast Presbyterians who brought together Protestants
0:54:29 > 0:54:34and Catholics in a rising against British rule in 1798.
0:54:34 > 0:54:38It is set in a crumbling cottage on Cave Hill, in the aftermath
0:54:38 > 0:54:43of the failed rising, just before McCracken is captured and hung.
0:54:43 > 0:54:46Throughout, the character of McCracken alternately mourns
0:54:46 > 0:54:50and rages against Belfast's lost opportunity of unity
0:54:50 > 0:54:52between Protestant and Catholic.
0:54:58 > 0:55:02"We can't love it for what it is, only for what it might have been.
0:55:03 > 0:55:08"If we had got it right. If we had made it whole. If.
0:55:09 > 0:55:12"It's a ghost town now and always will be,
0:55:12 > 0:55:18"angry and implacable ghosts, me condemned to be one of their number.
0:55:18 > 0:55:20"We never made a nation.
0:55:21 > 0:55:26"Our brainchild, stillborn, our own fault.
0:55:26 > 0:55:28"We botched the birth.
0:55:29 > 0:55:34"So what if the English do bequeath us to one another some day?
0:55:34 > 0:55:36"What then?
0:55:36 > 0:55:41"When there's nobody else to blame except ourselves?"
0:55:43 > 0:55:48Parker died tragically young in 1988 after contracting stomach cancer.
0:55:49 > 0:55:53He was at the height of his creativity and there's no doubt
0:55:53 > 0:55:55that he had many more plays inside him,
0:55:55 > 0:55:59but nevertheless, in his relatively short career,
0:55:59 > 0:56:01he managed to hold a mirror up to Belfast -
0:56:01 > 0:56:07one that showed the city in all its glorious variety and contradictions.
0:56:26 > 0:56:31The four playwrights I've been exploring - Ervine, Carnduff,
0:56:31 > 0:56:36Thompson and Parker - were all inspired by East Belfast.
0:56:37 > 0:56:40They all shared a sense of what was fair and unfair,
0:56:40 > 0:56:44and they also had a strong desire to challenge the status quo.
0:56:44 > 0:56:47It's often said that it's part of the Ulster-Scots identity
0:56:47 > 0:56:50to stand up and to say things that others won't.
0:57:00 > 0:57:04In Mixed Marriage, St John Ervine confronted prejudices
0:57:04 > 0:57:06about Catholic and Protestant intermarriage,
0:57:06 > 0:57:10while in the milder play Boyd's Shop he still reveals
0:57:10 > 0:57:12a strong dislike of hypocrisy.
0:57:12 > 0:57:16I've seen a great many smart people who seemed awful foolish in the end.
0:57:16 > 0:57:20Thomas Carnduff was a trailblazer, a man who wrote
0:57:20 > 0:57:24about industry and the issues faced by the working-class man in Belfast.
0:57:26 > 0:57:30In Over the Bridge, Sam Thompson tackled on stage
0:57:30 > 0:57:33issues that weren't being confronted in society.
0:57:36 > 0:57:41Stewart Parker started writing in the 1960s, an era of optimism
0:57:41 > 0:57:44that was shattered by the Troubles.
0:57:44 > 0:57:47But he believed that writing can bring about change -
0:57:47 > 0:57:50that it is something inherently worthwhile.
0:57:58 > 0:58:02The East has changed, the streets redeveloped and the industries gone.
0:58:02 > 0:58:06Only Harland and Wolff, the original biggest and busiest of them,
0:58:06 > 0:58:11is still here, and they now repair oil rigs and build wind farms and tidal generators.
0:58:12 > 0:58:16Is there a new generation of playwrights waiting in the wings,
0:58:16 > 0:58:19ready to articulate what needs to be said about this place?
0:58:19 > 0:58:21That's the challenge.
0:58:21 > 0:58:23But if they are out there,
0:58:23 > 0:58:26they'll be standing on the shoulders of giants.