It is Christmas Eve, and Sharky has come home to Dublin to care for his short-tempered, aging brother Richard who has recently lost his eye-sight. The old drinking-pals Ivan and Nicky turn up and it is time to drink and play cards. With them, is a mystical stranger, Mr. Lockhart. The bets are in, and they keep rising – and when night falls, it is almost as if Sharky is playing to save his soul. Is Mr. Lockhart the devil himself? McPherson’s latest play is a diabolic drunken comedy of the highest calibre. Entertaining situations, hilarious lines and sharp character-drawings are all over the place. Premiered at The National Theatre in London.
“It's gripping, entertaining stuff […]” - The Daily Telegraph / ”[… a] sparkling and suspenseful new play.” - The Guardian / “The title of McPherson's compelling play refers to a beautiful eighth-century Anglo-Saxon poem of the same name and whose hero sees himself as an exile, literally and metaphorically at sea. Similarly, the working-class Irishmen […] are possessed by existential sadness and loneliness for which lashings of alcohol offers them balm before the morning after.” - The Evening Standard
