Playwright Philip Catherwood told David Hennessy about The Pitch, his new play about Gaelic football, Northern Ireland and the possibility of a united Ireland.
A new play about Gaelic football, modern Belfast and the possibility of a united Ireland is coming to the London stage.
The Pitch is a brand new one-act play from Belfast writer Philip Catherwood.
Directed by Thea Mayeux, the cast is made up of James Grimm, Jake Douglas and Dión Di Maio.
Set on a dilapidated football pitch in East Belfast, the story introduces us to brother and sister Robbie and Melissa who have lived there all their lives and constantly practice football together on their favourite local pitch.
However, it is also home to Gaelic Football player Deren. He has to travel miles away to play on his nearest GAA ground.
To Robbie and Melissa, Gaelic Football is that sport where you cheat, and run with the ball in your hands.
But when the unlikely trio meet, everything changes.
Plans are revealed for ‘The Pitch’ to be refurbished into a Gaelic Football ground. Deren is ecstatic. The Unionist community are outraged, Robbie included.
Melissa couldn’t care less – she quite likes this ‘new’ sport she’s discovered how to play.
As a United Ireland referendum lingers on the horizon, the country these three new friends grew up in, is shifting around them. Will they be happy with what Northern Ireland is changing into?
Philip’s previous plays include Good Gracious, Good Friday and Zigzag, both were set in Northern Ireland.
Good Gracious, Good Friday was shown at White Bear Theatre.
Zig-Zag was shown online at Space Theatre.
What inspired The Pitch? “Well, I was at a new writing night called Rapid Write Response at Theater503.
“How the night works is a bunch of writers go see the main play that they have on for three weeks and you basically write a short play in response, then they select eight of the best 10 minute shorts and put them on.
“I went to the night wanting to write something that wasn’t set in Northern Ireland because my previous two plays have been set in Northern Ireland and I was wanting to come up with something else, something new.
“It was about refugee hotels so it was all about people from different backgrounds living together and working in the same community.
“And I just thought, ‘Well, that’s Northern Ireland, isn’t it? That’s Belfast’.
“And around the same time I had seen a news story about a place called Victoria Park in East Belfast which is around the corner from where I grew up, about a Gaelic football club in the area trying to refurbish the area into a Gaelic football pitch.
“I knew that park.
“It had lots of soccer pitches but none of them used all of the time and it was becoming a bit derelict.
“And I was like, ‘Well, that would be quite interesting to change one of those pitches into a Gaelic football pitch’.
“I was like, ‘This would be a good little short play’.
“That’s how it started.
“It’s all set on this one football pitch that’s getting changed into a Gaelic football pitch in East Belfast.
“It’s about these two guys from East Belfast who meet each other for the first time and keep encountering each other on this same pitch.”
I imagine even in these days of relative peace and tolerance something as symbolic as a Gaelic football pitch can be quite inflammatory in Belfast..
“Absolutely, yeah. It kind of surprised me reading that news article way back when, but also it didn’t surprise me.
“It takes something like that that seems so insignificant to flare up what a lot of people are feeling that they didn’t even know they had in themselves.
“I suppose a lot of the play is based off my experience of someone who didn’t grow up around Gaelic football but that’s because of the area that I’m from.
“There were no public pitches near where I grew up, nothing in our schools or anything.
“They didn’t encourage us to play it.
“But I’m very much in the camp of, ‘Well, there’s definitely people in the area who play it and would probably benefit from having a local pitch instead of having to travel miles away to their nearest one’.
“There’s a few clubs out there becoming more prominent in the area, especially east Belfast and are trying to get more permanent pitches, more local pitches.
“I’m very much someone who didn’t grow up with the sport and I still feel quite new to it, but I’ve really enjoyed getting into it these past few years.”
Do you feel GAA has been surprisingly unfeatured on screen and stage? Is it untapped subject matter in a way?
“Absolutely. I’ve never really seen it on stage before.
“That was the idea behind it.
“There’s a lot of sports-based theatre plays but, like I said, nothing about Gaelic football.
“We’ve been really driving that home saying this is a play about Gaelic football.
“It’s a lot about Northern Ireland as well, and Belfast and the prospect of a United Ireland and how the area is changing in modern times , but there’s a lot about Gaelic football in there as well.”
Are you in touch with the local scene here in London? I saw London GAA give the play a plug on social media..
“Absolutely. I’ve been out visiting a few different clubs in the London area.
“I went to Thomas McCurtains. I was at Cuchulainns last night. I’m in contact with Dutch Harps, I’m hoping to visit them next week.
“I’m just going out and chatting to them before their training session and just letting them know about the play.
“That’s just an effort to kind of get as much of an Irish community in London coming to see the play as possible.
“The play is for people who enjoy the sport and want to see it on stage.
“And like you said, it’s untapped. There’s not really anything quite like it out there so I’m hoping a lot of people will come see it.”
Do you think the tensions are still there in Northern Ireland and all it takes is something like a GAA pitch to stir things up?
“Yeah, a little bit just bubbling under the surface.
“Obviously, nowhere near as bad as it used to be.
“The whole idea is that East Belfast is a very highly Protestant area, highly Unionist area but that’s changing ever so slightly.
“As someone who only goes to visit it myself once every summer or Christmas or something, you see the area changing bit by bit and I think it’s becoming more mixed.
“It has changed in the 10 years since I’ve lived in London and as it becomes more mixed with people from different backgrounds and communities, I think it’s no surprise that someone wanted to build a Gaelic football pitch there.
“It probably wouldn’t have happened 10 years ago but it’s happening now and that’s because there’s different people in the area and there’s people wanting to play the sport that they love, but also it’s quite an interesting area because that’s where a lot of Unionist people still live and even though it’s become a mix, those people are still there.
“It’s an interesting flash point.
“I think it’s just a really good metaphor for how things are changing in that area and Northern Ireland in general and with talks of a united Ireland happening more and more often in the news these days.
“That’s why I wanted to tell this story.”
A united Ireland, something that becomes more and more like a possibility, is a big part of the story..
“Yeah, the play takes place over a five year period where, at the very start, a united Ireland referendum is just on the periphery. As we move forward, it’s actually happening.
“It is these people, just three randomers, meeting on the pitch but this kind of seismic event is happening in the background and they talk about it.
“They talk about sport and what they love but also talk about the political ramifications or the social ramifications of what a united Ireland could mean, especially in Belfast.
“That’s the place that it would change the most and how would that look if it happened for both a Unionist community and Nationalist community living there?
“It feels like even Nationalists in Northern Ireland obviously would want the United Ireland but sometimes they feel like they’re separate from the Republic.
“How would they feel if a united Ireland would happen?
“I don’t think it would be as simple as being like, ‘Yay’.
“How do you go from living where you’ve been living and then all of a sudden it’s changed?
“I think it would just affect a lot of different people.
“I hope I give a balanced overview in the play but it’s just more recognising how much of a seismic change it would be and the play is about learning to deal with that.
“The main message of the play is people coming together instead of being divided and hopefully that message spreads.”
The characters in the play- Robbie, Melissa and Deren- are young people who have grown up sheltered from the dark days of the past but I suppose they are also approaching the idea from their own perspectives..
“You’re exactly right. They’re very young and they mention their parents a lot and how they feel about the situation.
“It’s almost as if they have to copy them or just go along with what they say.
“But they are just young people and I feel like younger people in Northern Ireland don’t really identify as much as the previous generations with the Unionist/ Nationalist divide.
“The character of Melissa represents that.
“She’s a few years younger than the two main characters but she’s almost sort of in between.
“She goes to a mixed school, she starts playing Gaelic football.
“She represents that younger generation who are more interested in social causes rather than sectarian politics.
“I think it’s been interesting in recent years to see the Alliance Party do so well in in Northern Ireland.
“I think you’ll only see that grow more and more actually, as a younger generation grows up and are more interested in social causes more than just voting for a Protestant party or a Nationalist party.”
Speaking of Melissa, she does have her own view untainted by any if the traditions or animosities.
For her Gaelic football is just a fun game to play whereas the lads are probably more conscious of the connotations and the history.
“Absolutely.
“When Deren starts to try and teach Robbie the rules he’s like, ‘I don’t want to learn this’.
“He just sees it as something that he shouldn’t be playing.
“I wanted to try to imagine, ‘What if it was just in my school and it was just another sport to play?’
“You wouldn’t think about the background of it or what was associated with it.
“You would just start playing it and see if you liked it, and at least you have that choice.
“I don’t like rugby but at least that choice was given to me.
“This just goes to show if you implement the changes slowly but surely, you just give those choices to people, it becomes less of an issue and just more, ‘Is this a sport that I enjoy?’
“The play does comment about how we’re still stuck in a hangover of the previous generation because it does feed down and it might take another generation in the future.
“Who knows what the future will bring for Ireland, Northern Ireland?
“It totally is about this younger generation.
“My previous two plays: One was set during the Good Friday Agreement, then the second one was set in the future.
“I wanted to write something that was happening right now and on how people view what’s happening in the country right now.”
There seems to be a lot of great stuff coming out of Northern Ireland recently such as Derry Girls and Kneecap to name just two. Is it not just that the province is finding its voice but that also the world is ready to listen more?
“Absolutely and I’m so happy to see it.
“I think it’s just more a case of people in my generation or a bit younger are speaking out a bit more.
“It’s those similar themes that we were talking about.
“It’s growing up where your parents went through a much more violent and turbulent generation, it kind of feeds down and it’s us kind of trying to make sense of that.
“I just think you’re seeing younger people growing up in a time of relative peace since the Good Friday Agreement but hearing all these horrible things that happened and you’re still getting the after effects so it’s a bit of a strange world.
“It makes for good drama, I think that’s why we’re getting such rich content.
“I think a lot of it’s still to do with identity which is what my play is about, it’s just that kind of struggle of identity.
“It’s just like, ‘What am I? Am I British? Am I Irish? Am I something in between?’
“I think a lot of people are just asking that and that’s what we’re seeing right now coming from Northern Ireland.
“I feel like sometimes, just in my experience, Nationalist people have just a better sense of their identity but people I meet who are Unionist, especially my generation, have grown up kind of going, ‘Oh yeah, I’m unionist but I don’t feel very British’.
“I have talked to some people who would identify as Nationalist and also kind of say, ‘Yeah, I’m Nationalist but I’m from Northern Ireland so I don’t know what that means’.
“There is a fantastic video I’ve seen randomly on Tiktok, but it’s exactly how I feel,
“It’s of a Northern Irish person from a Unionist background moving to England. He comes over and he says, ‘I’m Northern Irish’.
“And people keep calling him Irish and he’s just like me. He’s become so lazy that he’s just like, ‘Oh, I’m from Ireland’, he doesn’t even correct English people anymore.
“He says, ‘It’s so ironic that I call myself British and English people who I find myself more aligned to have made me feel more Irish’.
“That’s kind of the journey I’ve been on.
“That’s why I’m more open to a United Ireland, because when I moved over to uni 10 years ago I said, ‘I’m Northern Irish’.
“I always tried to press ‘I’m Northern Irish, that actually means a difference from Republic of Ireland’.
“It’s just amazing that English people did not care and would put Irish down.
“I was like, ‘Well, fine, okay, I’m Irish’.
“It’s made me more Irish.
“It’s so ironic that the English people do not give a sh*t about Northern Ireland being part of the UK.
“I think a lot of people maybe have experienced that and that’s what would maybe push people to be like, ‘Well, f**k yis then. Okay, we’ll be part of Ireland because you clearly don’t give a sh*t about us’.
“That’s what the play is about.
“But if a united Ireland would happen, how would all those people from different backgrounds feel?
“I don’t know how I would vote if I’m honest.
“If a referendum would happen, you’d have to ask me the day before. That’s why I had to write this play to make sense of it all.”
You also say it is a story about Taytos.
How do Taytos come into it? Is it that the Northern Irish Taytos are Protestant Taytos?
“You’re exactly right.
“Well, it’s to do with the two different Taytos.
“I was on the website of Tayto researching the history of it and how it started in Dublin and then it was started in Northern Ireland as well, but they had two different identities.
“I was like, ‘This is perfect’.
“It becomes a big flash point in the play.
“It’s all very tongue in cheek but I think it’s a really good metaphor for how you have got the differences between the two countries and how people see them, how people kind of identify with their own one and everything like that.”
The Pitch is at Space Theatre 17- 21 September. The Space Theatre, 269 Westferry Road, E14 3RS.
For more information and to book, click here.
You can donate to the crowdfunding campaign here.