In The Fifth Step, playwright David Ireland brings two men together across a table – one seeking redemption, the other trying to help him get there. What begins as a conversation about Alcoholics Anonymous becomes something darker, funnier, and more disarming: a study in confession, masculinity, and the uneasy intimacy between strangers.
Best known for Cyprus Avenue and Ulster American, Ireland has a gift for provocation wrapped in razor-sharp dialogue. But in this latest work, opening at @sohoplace with Martin Freeman and Jack Lowden, something’s shifted. There’s still moral ambiguity, still the sting of a well-aimed line – but maybe, just maybe, a bit more light is breaking in.
I sat down with him to talk about the play, addiction, empathy, and whether getting emotionally healthy is ruining his edge.
I understand that you grew up in Belfast during the Troubles – how did that experience shape you as a writer?
Yeah, that’s right. Well, I think as a writer it gave me something interesting to write about. It’s a good subject matter to engage with – war and peace and all those kinds of things. I was a child during the Troubles, and the peace process started when I was about sixteen or seventeen. I moved to Glasgow when I was nineteen, so it was around the time of the Good Friday Agreement. Being a child and a teenager, of course it has an impact on you.
You’ve been really open about your struggles with alcohol. What made you feel ready now to explore that through theatre?
Well, it’s been said before about my struggles with alcohol, and maybe that’s something I said, but actually I never really struggled with alcohol. It was something I did too much of, but once I stopped, it was surprisingly easy – especially compared to how messy I was while drinking.
The first few weeks were hard, but it got easier with time.
When I came to write about it, I was just looking for something else to write that wasn’t about the Troubles. I was writing something for the National Theatre of Scotland, and I thought, what does Scotland mean to me? What’s my experience of Scotland? And really my experiences of Glasgow and Scotland as a young man were drinking, recovery, and sobriety. So that felt like an interesting subject matter that wasn’t the Troubles.
I suppose I’m nearly 50 now, so it also felt like an interesting idea to write a play that was about a conversation between an older man and a younger man. It was kind of like a conversation with myself.
You’ve said this play is your confession – what did you mean by that?
You can view the fifth step within the twelve steps of Alcoholics Anonymous as a confessional. And I suppose after writing it, I realised, oh yeah, this really is my own confession. But then all plays are a bit like that for me – everything I write is very personal.
In a way, most of what I write ends up being a confession. I don’t always realise it at the time – it often becomes clear only once the piece is finished.
You’re pouring your heart into something, but also you’re kind of just thinking about getting to the end of it. I’m not thinking, what are people going to think of this? I’ve got a story in my head and I’m trying to reach the end of it. Then afterwards, I go – oh yeah, this is quite personal.
Did you go through Alcoholics Anonymous yourself?
Yeah, I did. I stayed sober for one year on my own and then I decided to start going to AA. I went for a couple of years – maybe three or four – but I found it wasn’t really for me.
What struck you most when you first went to an AA meeting?
I was 23, and I thought I was too young to be an alcoholic. It felt like a big label to carry. I hadn’t really lost anything – I wasn’t married, didn’t have kids, didn’t own a house. I was just a lost 23-year-old man.
I expected a room full of older men telling me I was too young. But I ended up at a young person’s meeting, where everyone was full of hope – some of them younger than me. That really shifted something for me.
One guy started talking about God and said, “Without God, I’d be fucked.” I’d never heard those words in the same sentence before. It jolted me. That’s when I thought, okay, this is different. This isn’t church. Maybe this is something I can get on board with.
The idea of a higher power comes up a lot in AA. How does that work if you’re not religious?
That’s largely what the play is about, really. That was the struggle I had too – and it’s the struggle the young man in the play has. There are lots of atheists in AA. Someone emailed me after seeing the play and told me they’d been sober over 20 years, and every time they heard the word God, they just translated it as “Gathering Of Drunks.”
For me, the question is: do you need a spiritual awakening to get sober? Do you need one to be happy? And does a spiritual awakening mean encountering God? Those questions were in my head the whole time I was writing it.
Why the fifth step specifically? What made confessing wrongdoings dramatically compelling for you?
Originally, the first title of the play was The Fourth Step, because the fourth step is where you make a list of all the people you’ve wronged. But I realised it should be called The Fifth Step, because that’s the step where you actually talk to someone about it and go through it with another person. And I thought, well, that’s dramatically more interesting than just watching someone write something down.
In my experience, the first three steps are things you can do in your own head. Even the fourth step you can do alone. But the fifth step involves another human being. And as a young man, that was something I found really tricky – and still do, a bit. Trusting people, being emotionally intimate, especially with another man.
That’s something in the play. The young man is desperate for a girlfriend – he thinks maybe a woman can help him through the steps. But the older man says that’s not a good idea. That idea of being emotionally intimate with another man was just unimaginable for me when I was that age. I could just about handle emotional intimacy with a woman – but with another man? I couldn’t have done it. I couldn’t have sat across from another man and told him all the things I’d done wrong.
Were you close to your father? It sounds like those things might be linked.
My father died when I was very young – he died when I was four. So I didn’t really have a relationship with him. And again, that’s something that’s in the play. The young man, played by Jack Lowden, has no male role models, no experience of men really. So when he finds himself in this situation, he doesn’t know who to turn to.
What makes theatre ideal for exploring addiction and recovery?
For this play, I think it’s that theatre doesn’t give the audience a chance to escape. They can walk out if they want, but it’s not like television where they can just switch it off.
You can be very confrontational in theatre if you want to be, and I like that. I like plays where it’s just two or three people talking. Just a room. The last time I saw a rehearsal, it really was just two chairs and a table, and the two actors. There’s not much set. And I like that – it’s very naked and basic. You’re depending entirely on the words and the performances.
Was it your choice to stage it in the round? It sounds like an AA meeting – sitting in a circle.
That was the director’s choice. It hadn’t occurred to me, but yeah – there is something really cool about sitting in a circle. For the audience, it does feel a bit like an AA meeting, or any kind of meeting where you sit in a circle.
I’d always envisioned it being in a traditional proscenium arch theatre, because it was written for the National Theatre of Scotland. But I think it works really well in the round. I’ve yet to see it with an audience, but I think with actors like Jack and Martin – the two of them are phenomenal – just sitting in a room and watching them is a bit like a bullfight.
How do you navigate humour and discomfort together in a play with sensitive issues like alcoholism?
I’ve been thinking about this a lot. I know I have a talent for writing comedy, so I sometimes wonder – why don’t I just write a pure comedy? Something like Monty Python or Vic and Bob? But I can’t seem to do it. I never have ideas like that. All my ideas are for intense dramas. And yet, when I come to write them, funny stuff comes up.
Sometimes I notice it – I’ll write a line and think, the audience will laugh or gasp at that. But a lot of the time, I don’t even realise it’s funny when I’m writing it. Sometimes the actors find humour in something I never intended to be funny.
So for me, it’s not really a case of consciously navigating it – it just happens. As for dealing with sensitive subject matter, I only really write about things I’ve had direct experience with. I feel like if I’ve lived it, I can write whatever I want about it. But I wouldn’t write about heroin addiction, for instance. Even though addiction has common threads, I’ve never used heroin and I don’t know anyone who has, so I wouldn’t have anything to draw on. With alcoholism, I do. That personal experience gives me the right to explore it however I choose.
Do you think there’s something cathartic about putting uncomfortable truths on the stage?
For me, there is – both as a writer and as an audience member. I like the idea of theatre as catharsis. There’s something powerful about it that’s different from stand-up or a debate or a lecture. If you’re watching two people talking and one of them says something you find morally unacceptable, I’m not telling you what to think as the playwright.
It becomes like a kind of democracy. The audience has to make up their own minds. There’s this strange moment of collective response – some people laugh, some gasp, some get offended, someone might even walk out. But then the audience as a whole settles and, in some unspoken way, reaches a consensus. It’s weird, but I’ve seen it happen a lot. It’s really interesting to me.
And yeah, it’s never exactly the same every night. Sometimes they’re a bit louder or quieter, a bit warmer or cooler. Audiences in Glasgow and Belfast are louder and more reactive – they gasp, laugh, shout things out. In London, especially at places like the Royal Court, they’re more reserved, often waiting to see if it’s ‘safe’ to laugh.
Personally, my favourite kind of audience is the one that just enjoys themselves.
Without spoiling anything, do Luka and James find genuine connection – or is the play more interested in the limits of confession?
I don’t think so. We were actually discussing this in rehearsals the other day – specifically about the ending.
It really depends on how the actors decide to play it. But I think the play is hopeful and redemptive – much more so than a lot of my previous plays, which are quite nihilistic. It’s dark, like all my stuff is, but I hope there’s a bit of light in there.
Jack Lowden played Luka in Edinburgh. What specifically did he bring to the character that made you want to bring him back for London?
Well, it was actually his idea. He’d seen Ulster American in Edinburgh, and someone told me afterwards that he wanted to work with me. I think he’s brilliant – he’s a terrific actor.
So I started thinking about what kind of character I’d like to see him play. I do that a lot – if I hear an actor wants to work with me, I’ll often build a character around them. In this case, I thought, I’d love to hear Jack act in a Scottish accent, because I haven’t seen that a lot. I knew he was funny, and I wanted to see him do more comedy.
Jack’s intense, funny, and has a kind of purity that felt perfect for the role – especially with a Scottish accent.
So yeah, there was never any doubt. If we were going to go to London, he was going to be doing it. He’s just so brilliant.
Is Martin Freeman also Scottish in this?
No, he’s using his own accent. Luka was always intended to be Scottish, but James could really be from anywhere.
What made Martin the right choice for James? Did his interpretation surprise you?
Other than the fact that he’s a totally brilliant actor, he just has all the right qualities for James. He’s very calm and centred, very naturalistic and believable, and very warm and likeable. But he also has a real darkness to him – a real danger.
He and Jack are very different actors, but in some ways they’re very similar. They have very different stage presences, but their working methods are quite aligned. They both have brilliant comic timing, and they play off each other beautifully.
And yes, he has surprised me in rehearsals. He’s brought a real empathy to the role – even more than I’d expected. The character was already sympathetic, but Martin’s made him even more so. You really feel for him.
Is this a drama or a comedy – or something in between? Where does it sit on the genre spectrum?
I always have problems with these kinds of categorisations. I never really know how to label my plays. It’s particularly hard when it comes to television – trying to pitch something and figure out what it is. Some people have said The Fifth Step is a black comedy, but I don’t think it is. Others call it a thriller, which also doesn’t feel quite right – although there’s definitely tension.
When people describe the play as a thriller, I’m like, really? It’s not Line of Duty. But I suppose in terms of pace and tension between the two men, especially towards the end, there’s something of that flavour. Secrets are revealed – that’s the thriller bit.
It’s certainly a drama, but it’s a very funny drama. It has elements of absurdism and magical realism, but again, it’s not quite that. I’d say it’s heavily influenced by David Mamet, maybe with a touch of Neil LaBute, and a bit of Paul Schrader too.
I tend to resist calling it a comedy-drama – that label makes it feel like Last Tango in Halifax or something. And it’s not that.
Do you think your work is becoming kinder or gentler, or do you still really embrace confronting audiences with the moral ambiguities?
Yeah, that’s a good question. I hope that I’m becoming a kinder, gentler person. And maybe that’s reflected in my work. Your work is just a byproduct of your life, so hopefully the more compassionate and kinder I am, the more that will be reflected in my plays.
That said, the stuff I write is still pretty confrontational. But I don’t think it’s as angry as it used to be. When I first started writing, I was a very angry person – a very angry young-ish man. And now, I think a lot of that anger has gone. There’s no point trying to manufacture it and keep pretending to be the angry young man. You have to evolve – as a person and as a writer.
This play definitely has confrontational, controversial moments. But I think it also has more compassion for the characters.
Sometimes I do think – ‘damn it, I’m getting emotionally healthy and it’s affecting my art’.
Do you need to be miserable in order to be a good writer? I hope not.
After writing The Fifth Step, has your perspective on forgiveness or redemption changed at all?
Yes, it has. Sometimes you write a play hoping it’ll change you – and often it doesn’t. But I think this play has. Maybe watching it in performance will change me too.
It’s made me realise something I already knew – that I need to be more forgiving. Forgiveness and redemption are big themes in the play, and I think I need to practise more of that in my own life.
When you look back at your body of work from Cyprus Avenue to now, can you see yourself working through different things in different stages of your life?
Yeah, I mean, I try not to do that too much. I try not to over-analyse or examine it all too closely, because that can keep you stuck in the past. You’ve got to keep moving forward. But yes, I can see how my work has changed as my life has changed.
I’m definitely not the same person who wrote Cyprus Avenue. For better or worse.
Is there anything you’re asked too much?
I don’t think I’m asked it too much, but I do find it odd how much people talk about the darkness in my plays, or the dark humour. I get why they ask, but to me it’s sort of invisible. I don’t think about it. It’s just what happens when I start writing.
I don’t think I’m a darkly funny person in real life. I think I can be funny. And I can definitely be dark. But not really both at once. So I don’t know why that combination comes out so strongly on the page.
People ask about it, and my brain kind of goes: what are they talking about? Then I remember – oh yeah, they’re talking about that.
Thanks for your time, David, I can’t wait to see the play.
The Fifth Step is at @sohoplace until the 26th July.
Tickets from www.theatreticketsdirect.co.uk
Interview Nick Barr
Photography Johan Persson
