Post-1914 Drama English Mrs Coley
‘Through close examination of the Narrator’s songs and speeches, explore how Willy Russell uses the role of the storyteller in Blood Brothers’
Intro.
In Blood Brothers, Willy Russell uses the narrator as a constant presence to tell the story of the Johnstone twins. When Russell first dreamt up the play, he envisioned the narrator as old story-teller, like ‘a Greek chorus’. Russell wanted the play to sound like ‘an old Greek myth’. In ancient Greek theatre, the chorus was a group of minor actors who appeared mostly in tragedies and could portray any character. This is similar to Blood Brothers in that it follows the tragic story of two families and that the narrator in the book plays several different roles. The Greek chorus would also usually communicate in song and would comment on the actions and reactions of the characters in the play, comparable to how the narrator converses in the play. For example, in Act Two as Mickey grabs the gun and runs off to confront Eddie, the narrator follows Mrs Johnstone and breaks into song, commenting on Mickey ‘running round and round’ and indicating that fate was ‘callin’ up your number today’, like an old Greek story-teller.
