Blood Brothers At Mayflower Play Analysis

On the 11th November 2016 I went to see a play called Blood Brothers at Mayflower Theatre, it was written by Willy Russell.It was set in the 1960s in Liverpool. It was performed by the Professional Play Group and directed by Bob Tomson and Bill Kenwright. The play was a musical which meant during the performance there was songs suited to a specific moment within the play. Before attending the performance I already knew the story line however I was intrigued as to how they could perform the play themselves. I personally thought the play was performed very well and it was as if you were emotionally attached to the characters.

The playwright was trying to show the audience that living in Liverpool in the 1960/70s was very challenging because there was such low employment and social class made a huge impact on how someone is brought up. This is shown with to two brothers called Mickey and
For example when the Narrator was singing the song about the devil knocking on the door the stage went red to show evil and he was singing loudly to show it was a key moment within the play. Also at the end of the play the gunshots were very loud to show the deaths of the two brothers at the same time.

The directors used split stage as a dramatic effect throughout the play, for example near the end of the play when Linda and Eddie meet up to talk when Linda is upset they used split stage when they hugged while Mrs Lyons found Mickey and pointed it out to him that Eddie and Linda were together as they were hugging. They also used the levels to create dramatic effect throughout the play, for example the Narrator was always in the background watching everything go downhill for the Johnstons like he was up in one of the buildings looking out of the window or standing on the