AN IRISH MOMMIE DEAREST

A darkly comic exploration of the
links between intimacy and violence

Parker Jennings

What does it mean to take care of someone? That might be one of the questions raised in Theater UnCorked’s production of The Beauty Queen of Leenane, Martin McDonagh’s Tony Award-winning study of a fraught mother-daughter relationship.

Parker Jennings and Sehnaz Dirik

Directed by Sheriden Thomas, the show features two of Boston’s most acclaimed actors: Parker Jennings as Maureen and Sehnaz Dirik as her mother Mag. Maureen and Mag share a cramped and modest home (Dirik is also the scenic designer) in 1990s rural Ireland. There is little in the way of décor. Photographs of John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy adorn the wall. A pot-bellied wood-burning stove and its associated tools, a kitchen sink, a kitchen table, and an upholstered rocker are the primary features of the setting.

Sehnaz Dirik

Mag has numerous physical complaints: a urine (which she pronounces u-RINE) infection, a bad back, and an injured hand purportedly prevent her from doing much around the house. Thus her daughter Maureen manages the work of maintaining the home, which includes feeding chickens, shopping, making cups of tea, and preparing Complan, a nutritional drink powder that is an essential part of Mag’s diet and that requires some skill to remove the lumps. Maureen is a fiery nationalist, resentful of the English as well as the “Yanks” for requiring the Irish to speak English rather than Irish to survive economically. But at age 40, Maureen is also an embittered virgin who longs for a romantic and sexual relationship. It initially appears that Maureen is the put-upon caretaker of her demanding, manipulative, and hypochondriacal mother. As the story develops, however, a more complex relationship comes to light.

Parker Jennings and Tim Hoover

Both performers land their emotionally demanding roles squarely. Dirik is spot-on as the grumpy and elderly passive-aggressive Mag, constantly requesting cups of tea and adjustments to the volume of the radio with annoying indirectness. Maureen gives as much as she gets, joking darkly about the possibility of inviting a man who recently murdered an old woman in Dublin home to meet her mother so he could do the same to Mag.

Peter Tone

Mag thinks Maureen doesn’t know about the invitation that arrived while Maureen was out of the house—an invitation to a farewell “do” from a neighboring family, one of whose sons will be returning to Boston after a visit to his homeland. The invitation was delivered by Ray, the younger son of the neighbors. Dressed in bright synthetics that clash against the dun-colored backdrop and everyone else’s clothing (costumes, Natasha Newcomb), Peter Tone carries the role off with all the smirking attitude of a 1990s Irish version of an obnoxious bro.

Parker Jennings

Mag destroys the invitation, scribbled on a bit of notepaper, and drops it into the wood-burning stove at the center of the set, but Maureen has run into Ray on her way home from her errands and is determined to go to the party. She buys a little black dress for the event, and our dowdy Maureen is transformed into a sexy party girl, who returns from the event after Mag has gone to bed with Pato in tow. Tim Hoover is the most appealing character in this psychodrama. Unlike every other character, he is seemingly well-adjusted, though frustrated by his dangerous and unrewarding construction job in London, where he faces anti-Irish mockery and discrimination. He gives Maureen the appreciation she craves and tells her he has always thought of her as “the beauty queen of Leenane.”

Parker Jennings

I’ll avoid spoilers at this point, except to say that Hoover’s recitation of the impassioned love letter he writes to Maureen from London is a real highlight of this show studded with highlights, a moving interlude in the midst of many darkly comic or downright harrowing moments.

By the end of the show, Jennings has traveled through a range of emotions, from low to high and from resignation to rage. Maureen and Mag both “take care of each other” in ways that twist the meaning of the phrase but leave us full of admiration for the depth and insight of these performers.

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photos by Garg Ng

The Beauty Queen of Leenane
Theater UnCorked
BCA Plaza Black Box Theatre, 539 Tremont Street, Boston
ends on November 22, 2026
2 hours, including one intermission
for tickets, call 617-933-8600 or visit Theater UnCorked

for more shows, visit Theatre in Boston

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