Reasons for Staying
by Colm Ó Clúbhán
27th February - 1st March 2025
London Performance Studios
“What do you want me to do about it? Rush out of here with a machine gun in my hands and a tri-colour flying out of me arse?”
Maeve Derivan is drinking alone in the backroom of an Irish pub in London one night in 1986.
When she overhears a young couple at a nearby table making plans for a new life together in Ireland, she is transported back twenty years to when she was a terrified schoolgirl, sailing to England in search of the abortion she couldn’t get at home.
A group of strangers gather around her, to hear her story and share their own. Each has their own version of Ireland: a place of freedom and oppression, tradition and revolt. But as the night draws on, their thoughts turn to the country’s latest political crisis — and they find their conversation has endangered them all.
Reasons for Staying is an urgent exploration of immigration and identity by Colm Ó Clúbhán. It premiered in London in 1986 and this was its first professional production in 40 years. In addition to the play, Nicky Harris performed songs originally written by Ó Clúbhán for the Brixton Faeries in the 1970s.
Ó Clúbhán was an Irish poet, playwright and gay activist who migrated from Dublin to South London in 1973. He wrote half a dozen plays for the stage and radio, including Friends of Rio Rita’s and Fair Game, before his AIDS-related death in 1989. None of them have yet been published.
Colm Ó Clúbhán (1954-1989)
Video: Lylani Devorah
To learn more about Colm Ó Clúbhán and his playwriting, visit his author page.
Behind the Scenes
Designers Max Allen and Elliott Adcock took inspiration from a fading tourist poster of Glendalough to conceive an evocative backdrop to the play’s setting, complete with pub tables and half-empty pints.
Cast
Connor Byrne
Cavan Clarke
Liadán Dunlea
Taylor McClaine
Justine Mitchell
Nicky Harris
Director
Alastair Curtis
Set and Costume Designers
Max Allen and Elliott Adcock
Sound Designer
Helen Noir
Lighting Designer
Sorcha Stott-Strzala
Language Consultant
Roisin Whelan
Producer
Izzy Parriss
Production Assistant
Cara Dromgoole
Photographer
Jake Bush
Publicist
Harry Engall
Commissioned by
London Performance Studios
Thanks to Mary Evans Young, Derek Evans and Ed Madden