The Beauty Queen Of Leenane

The Beauty Queen of Leenane is playing at the Harvey Theatre located at 651 Fulton Street, Brooklyn, New York. It runs two hours twenty minutes with one intermission. The play closes on February 5, 2017.

The play premiered in 1996 in Galway, Ireland. On February 11, 1998 it premiered in the United State Off-Broadway at the Linda Gross Theatre. It then transferred to the Walter Kerr Theatre on Broadway. It opened April 14, 1998.

It received six Tony nominations and won four. It won Best Actor (Tom Murphy), Best Actress (Maureen Mulen), Best Feature Actress (Anna Manahan), Best Direction (Gary Hynes). It was nominated for Best Play and Best Feature actor (Brian F. O’Byrne).

Maureen Mullen played the daughter in the original production.

It takes place in the kitchen of the Falon’s home.

We can feel the friction between Mag Folan (Marie Mullen) and her daughter Maureen (Aisling O’Sullivan).

Maureen is forty and resents the fact that she has been taking care of her mother for the past twenty years. Her sisters have not helped at all.

Mag plays on her sympathy that she needs her, she is seventy.

While Maureen is out Mag is visited by a young man, Ray (Aaron Monaghan). Ray invites Mag and Maureen to come to a farewell party for his visiting Uncle Pato (Marty Rea).

Of course Mag doesn’t tell Maureen. She finds out and goes leaving her mother alone. Maureen brings Palo home with her. They were intimate and she flaunts it in front of her mother while Palo is there.

Things happen in the second act which are heart rendering. I won’t tell you what they are as to not spoil it for you.

Frances O’Connor did a terrific job with set.

This is a very well done play. The only flaw is the cast accent is very thick and at times is hard to understand what they are saying. There is a radio on the table and at times you can’t hear what is on. At the end it’s important to hear it. Hopefully it is corrected because it is a play worth seeing and you don’t want to miss out on anything.

Review by Rozanna Radakovich.

Photos by Annazor.

To read a candid interview with the cast, scroll down to the left for recent photos. Click on a photo, then click back to album, back to gallery, for this and other shows.

To read a candid interview with the cast, scroll down to the left for recent photos, click on a photo, then back to album and the back to gallery for this and other shows.