The narrator plays many small roles in Blood Brothers as well as being the main character. Some examples are the milkman, Mrs Johnstone's ex husband, the policeman, the gynaecologist and the judge. All of these roles seem to bring negativity and bad news to Mrs Johnstone. For example, the milkman is always demanding money, “No money, no milk!” This puts Mrs Johnstone under pressure and reminds the audience that she is really struggling as a single mother to bring up her children. The narrator plays the role of the teacher too, “You’re both suspended!” He shouted directing his speech at Mickey and Eddie. That brought misery to both Mrs Johnstone and Mrs Lyons. He rarely brings positive news and the majority of all his small roles play a negative part. This makes the audience feel that there is a lot of tension between the characters and it builds an atmosphere.
During Blood Brothers, 4 different songs are sung by the narrator, moving characters and the plot. He is a dark shadowy character, and sings his songs in a deep, mysterious manner. Firstly, he sings ‘Shoes upon the table.’ This song is the most important from the narrator’s songs. It introduces the main theme of superstition. For example: “You’re walking on the pavement cracks.” It also puts pressure on Mrs Johnstone now she has sold one of her twins. “Even when you shut your eyes you will still see that you sold a son, and you can’t tell anyone” This phrase explains that now Mrs Johnstone has given Eddie away, there will always be a constant feeling of guilt in her mind. She will also never be able to tell anyone, otherwise there will be terrible consequences. It tells you this by saying, ‘But y’ know the devil’s got your number.” This is trying to get a message across, saying that if you do tell someone about the separated twins, the devil will definitely find you and do something shocking.
The second song the narrator sings is ‘Summer Sequence’. This song mainly moves time on the characters and plot. Whilst going through Mickey and Eddie’s teenage years, it explains what has changed. “When you’re young, free and innocent and just eighteen.” This shows they’re growing up very rapidly.
All through Blood Brothers, the narrator and all of his gloomy minor roles bring chaos mainly to Mrs Johnstone, but her family too. At the beginning of the story, the narrator plays Mrs Johnstone’s ex husband. “My husband, he’d walked out on me,” Mrs Johnstone tells us. So at the start of the play the narrator’s minor role had already brought bad times to Mrs Johnstone, leaving her lonely and in despair. During the plot, Mickey gets suspended, the milkman brings her bills, the judge sends Mickey to jail etc., and all of these negative events are brought to the family by the narrator’s acting roles.
Mrs Lyons is also affected by the narrator’s minor characters. The teacher suspends Eddie as well as Mickey, which brings misery. The gynaecologist tells Mrs Johnstone that she is having twins, affecting Mrs Lyons. Although she is pleased about taking the child, if she hadn’t have got Eddie none of the negativity later in the story would have occurred.
Without the narrator, the play would not run very well and the audience would become confused. This is because there would be no one explaining the plot. The negativity of the narrator is a compulsory device, as it builds a tense atmosphere between various characters and leads to the deaths of the twins. So without this device, the storyline would not fit together very well and there would be no tension.
Willy Russell would change the play without the narrator otherwise it wouldn’t make sense. An alternative character for the narrator I believe would be Mrs Johnstone. She explains some of the story through her opinions, so more opinions and speech from her could replace the narrator. She could play the part of the narrator without anyone noticing that’s her job, so it would be a clever way to replace him.
In conclusion the narrator plays a very important part in blood brothers. If he was removed from the plot it would be tricky but there would be alternatives ways to solve it.
