"Until the final moments, when the women stand on deck and contemplate their future, 'Belfast Girls' never quite manages to reach out from its world into ours, which is what makes a drama like this feel essential. For a shipbound play, it only rarely raises anchor."
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"'Belfast Girls' offers a welcome fresh perspective on the myths that still dominate popular narratives about the immigrants of a previous era. It wasn't all rugged adventurers, nor were British emigration schemes merely a way to make the very poor disappear. The truth lies somewhere in between, in the wide ocean between here and there."
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The Irish diaspora is the source of many gritty tales and Belfast Girls can stand up to the toughest of them…If director Nicola Murphy might arguably do more to tauten the action of the first act, she orchestrates a second act full of fury and suspense. She also stages a simple, yet stirring, finale, in which the women step onto dry land to warily face an unknown future.
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"At the 'Belfast Girls' end, the women represent anyone anywhere attempting to keep a dream awake, if such a thing can be done. That’s even as the dream appears to be fading. This is often described as hoping against hope. McCarrick quite impressively presents a poignant version of it."
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"McCarrick’s play, predictably, is not a happily-ever-after tale. We meet her characters, five women of questionable age and background—those boarding the ships were supposed to be 'morally pure' teenagers, but were often older and more, well, experienced—as they’re about to set sail, and leave them as they arrive in Sydney. What we learn in between—of their back stories, their aspirations and the worlds they are departing and entering—gives us cause for both hope and dread."
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"Close quarters, wild seas and boredom bring out the worst in some and the best in others. In her thought-provoking play 'Belfast Girls' Jaki McCarrick seizes on a third option — actively contemplating being 'mistresses of their own destiny.'"
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All the performances are strong, forthright, and colorful, adorned with the authentic Irish accents you invariably hear at this bastion of the brogue, but none, for me, were able to break through the veneer of artificiality the play imposes. I was happy to go along with the history lesson being taught, but not so much the emotional journey on which it sought to take me.
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"'Belfast Girls' is at its best when it offers a rich character study of these five fascinating women. The play’s sea legs, though, become much wobblier when it veers into political diatribe and social militancy."
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