Review: HEAVEN, Southwark Playhouse Borough

How would life have turned out if you had stayed with your first love? Where would you be if you had gone against social convention? Eugene O'Brien's deftly crafted play, HEAVEN, asks us these questions and many more in this captivating and bittersweet two-hander.

A middle-aged couple are attending a wedding. The event sparks an existential crisis for both people as they remember past passions and reflect on the journey of their own relationship. This seemingly rather straightforward premise is given real depth and emotion as it manages to encapsulate two lives; separately and together.

Mairead and Mal are partners of twenty years. They have built a life and family together and are each other's best friends, but both reveal frustrations. In many ways, their relationship has been one of convenience, albeit stll friendly and respectful. They have have settled for one another, pushing their own personal desires and passions deep within themselves.

Janet Moran is a fiery Mairead. After hooking up with her first love at the wedding, she is swept back to a time when she felt both desire and being desired. Moran is incredibly natural and completely convincing as woman who laments the way her life has turned out. She reflects on her difficult relationship with her only daughter with realism and heart and speaks of her husband with real affection.

Andrew Bennett’s Mal is seemingly calmer; sober for two years since a heart operation. He quickly reveals a lifetime of sexual repression, intricately connected with confusion and Catholic guilt. Bennett is also entirely believable; veering from shame to moments of hedonism. He loves his wife and daughter, but also feels an absence of personal fulfilment.

In the vein of Brian Friel, O'Brien takes the concept of a character's monologue to develop, affirm and contradict that of the other person and Jim Culleton's deft direction keeps the natural rhythm of the piece going. Speaking separately, the two actors never speak to each other and yet feel deeply connected. O'Brien's writing manages to fit much of two lifetimes into just 90 minutes, with real poignancy and credibility. 

We feel we know, understand and sympathise with both characters, even if we don't always agree with or understand their actions. It is a bittersweet and thoughful production which concludes with elements of hope, but also uncertainty.

If theatregoers have learnt anything in 2025, it is that a buzzy star billing is no guarantee of a successful production. In HEAVEN we have the exact opposite; a beautifully acted,  quiet and unassuming gem of a play.

Read our interview with actor Janet Moran on returning to the role of Mairead in HEAVEN here.

Heaven is at the Southwark Playhouse Borough until 22 February; then the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh from 25 February - 1 March; and tours Ireland until April.

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