Shifting
An Interview with Stephen Rea
Language
The longstanding collaboration between Stephen Rea, the renowned actor and Artistic Director of Field Day Theatre
Company, and Legacy Playwright Sam Shepard dates back to 1974, when Rea starred in Shepard’s play Geography of
a Horse Dreamer at the Royal Court Theatre. Rea spoke with Literary Associate Sarah Rose Leonard a few days after
the opening of Irish playwright Enda Walsh’s Ballyturk at the National Theatre in London, in which he starred.
SR: In 1980 I went to Brian Friel and asked him if he would write
Signature: How do you feel the current political situation affects
the context of A Particle of Dread?
a play that we could tour with. He happened to be writing
SR: It’s very hard to imagine that [the Troubles] never happened,
Signature: Could you tell us about how Field Day came about?
Translations, so we formed the company to do that play.
but basically that’s what people are trying to do. They are trying
But then it had such an impact, and released so much energy
to ignore the legacy of thirty, forty years of murder and political
in the both of us, that we gathered some of the finest creative
turmoil rather than dealing with it. Sam is such a great writer, he
minds in Ireland around us—Seamus Heaney, Seamus Deane,
couldn’t be in a place and have that not enter the play.
Tom Paulin, David Hammond, and Tom Kilroy—and went on doing
The current peace process in the north of Ireland is predicat-
more plays and publications, and really pushing the discourse.
ed on two separate groups of people looking at each other
with resentment and insisting on their own particular rights
Signature: Field Day’s productions have always started in
the city of Derry. How do you think Derry finds its way
into the work?
and belief in their own integrity, but something has to give a
SR: I always think of Derry as a live theatre space. The audience
it altered the language somehow. People were offered a new
there engages completely with what it sees, and feels a real con-
language. I believe theatre can have that impact. In any post-
nection with Field Day. That gives us an opportunity to be freer
conflict situation people don’t just put down their weapons
in what we do, and that feeling is unique in Ireland. It’s partly be-
and rush into each other’s arms, but something happens to
bit. And I’m not sure what. But I do think, ultimately, theatre
can help. For instance, when we started doing plays in Derry
cause Derry, although it’s technically in the northern jurisdiction,
really doesn’t belong in either jurisdiction. It’s not so polluted with
the discourse of either so it has an openness somehow. I find that
very liberating. Sam was with us throughout rehearsals in Derry
last year, and I know that he absorbed the history of the city as
he walked its ancient walls each day.
Sam was with us throughout rehearsals
in Derry last year, and I know that he
absorbed the histor