Rough Magic's production of Take Me Away by Gerald Murphy has received excellent notices at the Edinburgh Festival and picked up a prestigious Fringe First Award from The Scotsman newspaper.
The play was listed as the Critic's Choice in numerous publications including The Scotsman, Fest, The List, The Observer, The Sunday Telegraph, The Sunday Times and The Daily Telegraph. It received the Audience Choice Award in The Scotsman and the Actor’s Choice (Owen O’Neill) in The List
Edinburgh Review quotes :
“The funniest play on the Fringe” Susannah Clapp, the Observer.
''A fast, funny, sad and brilliant comedy about the collapse of family life in the new materialistic Ireland... There’s a chilling sense of the deep silence that can lie just beyond the edge of Irish banter... Ireland keeps churning out gifted playwrights as if it had a unlimited supply” Joyce McMillan, The Scotsman.
''I suppose what one is always looking for on the Fringe is the distinctive new voice, the writer with his own individual take on the world, and a talent that looks as though it might develop and endure. They crop up infrequently, and when you hit on one, the excitement is palpable. Gerald Murphy strikes me as being just such a dramatist… I await Murphy’s next play with considerable impatience.'' Charles Spencer, The Daily Telegraph.
“Murphy’s language is fierce, direct, often highly comic and always convincing; his is undoubtedly a name to watch” Veronica Lee, Evening Standard.
''Murphy’s raw, punchy characters are coloured by entertaining dialogue, drawing strong, concentrated acting from all four actors” Lynne Walker, The Independent.
“Is modern masculinity in crisis? The debate rarely gets such a ferociously funny airing as it does in Take Me Away, Gerald Murphy’s new play, presented by the highly regarded Irish company Rough Magic. Lynne Parker’s gripping production is acted with both weight and enormous wit… Go see it and laugh till it hurts” Sam Marlowe, The Times.
“Played with hard-hitting precision and a muscular tautness from a great cast in sparkling form, Take Me away is a fast, furious look at the fact that you can choose your friends, but you can’t choose your family” Metro.
“A savagely funny and bitterly true play” The Sunday Times.
“A Brilliantly acted family tragicomedy that rings too true” Partricia Nicol, The Sunday Times.
Posted on: 15/8/2004