Loyal Women? Marie Jones and Christina Reid

Marie Jones and Christina Reid earned critical and commercial success, with the former breaking through with the Charabanc Theatre Company ensemble in 1983 and Reid emerging via the Lyric Theatre contemporaneously. The latter’s plays reveal a far closer affinity with the traditions of her Orange-supporting family than she conveyed in interviews and has been reflected in scholarly literature. While both writers profess Irish identifications, both tend to emphasize and explore social class along with gender in their lives and work. Being from different but strongly Protestant backgrounds, both were also proximate with Loyalist paramilitaries, writing and interacting with them in some personal or critical capacity. Interviews with Reid, Jones, and the Charabanc women supplement the testimony and insights of female representatives and activists.