"Shining City' post-mortem (4th review)

During Theatre Exile's recent production of Conor McPherson's Shining City, several theatergoers telephoned or stopped me on the street (because I served as clinical consultant to two earlier Exile plays) to ask: "Why the title? The play didn't seem to exist in a city so shining to me!" and "What was the lady ghost in red doing behind the door of the shrink/former priest at the close of the play?"

Though Shining City is set in Dublin, its plot could take place in any community. Ian, a former Catholic priest, is now a therapist counseling the tormented John, whose dead wife has returned to their home as a ghost wearing the red coat he bought for her out of guilt because of his sexual attraction to another woman. John is convinced that his desire and fascination for other women caused his wife's accidental, violent death.

There are two other characters in this play: Neasa, the woman who helped Ian with his life-altering decision to leave the priesthood, supported him emotionally, bore his child, and then was rejected by him; and Laurence, whom Ian brings back to his home for a gay encounter.

From the Bible to Reagan

The earliest reference to a shining city I know of is found in Matthew 5:14, where Jesus tells his listeners, "You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden." This phrase entered the American lexicon when the Puritan John Winthrop, in 1630, offered his sermon, "A Model of Christian Charity": "…we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us."

Those words were paraphrased by President-Elect John Kennedy in January, 1961 and by Ronald Reagan in his 1984 acceptance of the Republican Party nomination, as well as his January 1989 farewell speech to the nation: "I have spoken of the shining city all of my political life."

But as those theatergoers I mentioned above pointed out, the city pictured by McPherson is anything but shining. In their personal worlds, none of McPherson's four characters has a permanent home. All suffer. All long for the connection that eludes them. All live in desperation. All are hiding something: the lives they long for, the conversations they should be having, the terrors they don't know how to conquer.

Agony of childlessness

We learn that John and his late wife were unable to have children and, as time passes, John lost all interest in his wife even though her love remained constant. As a clinician I have seen how this issue weighs upon couples who long for children, and how distancing their pain becomes if their agony isn't confronted.

For John and his wife, this loss has been mentioned but not really developed and consequently wields enormous impact. In John's misery and sexual longings for other women, he lashes out at his wife with furious intensity. Instead of returning his anger, she crumbles in terror and misery. Soon after, she dies.

McPherson has remarked that he sees no difference between the supernatural and the natural: "This is all a weird experience of being alive… To me, it's all a huge mystery." Psychotherapists may put it another way: We are haunted by our unfinished emotional business.

Why a red coat?

John's wife returns to him, wearing the red coat she so wanted as a Christmas gift, wore constantly and died in. I believe McPherson puts her there to help her husband move toward hope, love, purpose and joy. It's as if, unable to fulfill the husband she loves by bearing him a child, she can now bring him something beautiful.

Men who remain childless often face an intractable fear: that they're seen as impotent or their seed is without strength. Women who long in vain for children often feel unfinished and incomplete. The characters in Shining City never confront the falseness of these notions, or that they can find peace and move forward in their lives and choices.

As the play moves forward, we see that John, who has moved to an inn, but sees his wife with constancy, is able to move on and love again. And with this fulfillment, his ghost— his first wife— departs. Ian, meanwhile, decides to marry the woman who stood by him and bear his child. But careful observation shows he is beyond ambivalent about this choice. We can begin to see that he had chosen the priesthood as a way to escape the gay world he yearns to join.

Antique gifts

When John comes to see Ian to thank him for their work together, he brings an antique lamp as a gift. Ian shares that perhaps he should have a ghost (to bring light). And soon after, we see that she is there. Unable to bring joy and direction in life, the ghost in the red coat— a coat representing blood (of birth and death) and life's inevitable (and potentially clarifying) tears— offers love and meaning to others in death.

Shining City draws a contrast between the rich and the poor (emotionally as well as materially). But it also functions on a deeper level. It points to the quiet, eternal desperation of those who cannot stand up for themselves and consequently cannot connect and find meaning. I believe that McPherson suggests that those with the courage to "shine light" and claim their true natures will find a second (or even third or fourth) chance to redeem themselves right here on Earth.♦


To read another review by Pamela and Gresham Riley, click here.
To read another review by Jim Rutter, click here.
To read another review by Robert Zaller, click here.