Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Cast: Damien Molony, Finbar Lynch, Rebecca O’Mara, Trevor Kaneswaren, Kitty O’ Sullivan, Will Kirk.
Our environment shapes us but are we willing to listen to demands that the Earth below our feet asks of us in return for the bounty it supplies. If we look upon the last couple of hundred years of abuse we have savagely wrecked upon the soil, the heavy metals we have allowed to poison our lands, the sheer scale of strain we have placed on that which feeds us, then its no wonder that it could be argued, that the earth has rejected us, and no amount of pleading or sacrifice made in arrears will satisfy or placate that which has been abused.
If it is to be believed that we leave a trace of ourselves in every room we enter, then what of the piece of ground that we stand upon as we either tread lightly and gain assurance, or in which we metaphorically spit and leave more than a trace, we leave disease, we leave a shadow of corruption in our wake.
Stewart Roche’s Shard looks at the way a well-meaning community of people set up home on an uninhabited island off the Irish coast, seemingly idyllic, a place where living off the land and leaving the residue of the 21st Century behind is a prospect that captures the imagination and feeds hope, is soon to be seen as a war between nature and humanity.
The tension of such a journey is one we don’t always comprehend, for many, the idea of leaving our programmed understanding of modern society behind is one of concern, the convenience of modern living is too alluring to discard, and yet people thankfully do find mercy and a life of fulfilment in a community dedicated to renewal, and yet we are the behest of a monster of our own making, one that will eat us alive if we do not make the right call, if the leadership we place our faith in is nothing more than an empty promise.
The sense of the land acting as a deceit is palpable, the fear that comes when all around you is dying, not just the land, but that of faith, is overwhelming, and with a tremendous cast, which includes a terrific performance by Damien Molony as Spooner, showing the persuasiveness of radio drama at its best, and in a genre that suits the medium perfectly, a truth is presented with eerie fascination.
The Shard is but a fragment of all that was once available to see, and as for our environment, as for that which nurtures us, we are staring in the face our own demise through a sliver of reflection.
Ian D. Hall