Oisín Kearney's Good With Faces Stuns at Edinburgh Fringe
Get the Culture newsletter
Daily culture — film, music, books, the trends and ideas worth your attention. Free.
- Good With Faces is a two-hander written and directed by Oisín Kearney, running at Summerhall, Edinburgh, until 31 August.
- Patrick McBrearty plays social worker Hegarty and Clodagh Mooney Duggan plays newly single mother Garrick in a scene where Hegarty interviews Garrick about a bruise on her son's arm, supposedly for internal use.
- The power dynamic shifts throughout as Hegarty, who already knows the answers to his questions, is gradually turned on by Garrick, with the slightest physical gesture or offhand comment redrawing who holds the upper hand.
- Oisín Kearney previously co-created 'My Left Nut' with Michael Patrick, a 2018 Fringe hit that transferred to television; the reviewer suggests Good With Faces could follow the same path.
- The play examines pressures of parenting and care work, blurring professional and personal boundaries under a harsh economic climate, with recurring motifs like a glass of milk and nail clippings taking on unnerving weight.
- Katie Richardson's discordant sound design and pregnant pauses are singled out as key tools that let seemingly casual remarks curdle into dark comedy or outright terror.
- The review compares Good With Faces thematically to Summerhall's concurrent 'You and Me (and Whoever Comes Next)' for its shared interest in domestic pressure-cooker dynamics.
Why it matters: For Edinburgh Fringe audiences weighing dozens of options, this is a one-hour, two-actor thriller from a writer (Kearney) whose previous Fringe hit transferred to TV — a rare craft pedigree that explains the reviewer's explicit suggestion that Good With Faces could follow the same route to screen adaptation.
Ask SkimNews
