Audrey or Sorrow review – darkly comic tale of ghosts and grief

Abbey theatre, Dublin
The black humour gets grimmer in Marina Carr’s latest play as two parents grieve the sudden death of their baby and a disturbing family history emerges

There are three kinds of sorrow, one character explains in Marina Carr’s latest play, which goes on to portray gradations of suffering that seem innumerable. Laced with black comedy in the first half, its grim subject matter is initially kept at a distance in Caitríona McLaughlin’s sleek co-production for Landmark Productions and the Abbey theatre.

Looser in structure than Carr’s adaptations of Greek myth, its setting is the present or recent past, with echoes of fairytales and gothic legends. When we first meet mysterious adult-children Mac (Anna Healy), Grass (Marie Mullen) and Purley (Nick Dunning), their ritualised party games come with strict rules and fluorescent costumes, reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland. Their domain is a cavernous basement dominated by two steep staircases, designed by Jamie Vartan to suggest a portal to another world.