Girl from the North Country

by Conor McPherson, Bob Dylan

Duluth, Minnesota. 1934. A community living on a knife-edge. Lost and lonely people huddle together in the local guesthouse.

The owner, Nick, owes more money than he can ever repay, his wife Elizabeth is losing her mind and their daughter Marianne is carrying a child no one will account for.

So, when a preacher selling bibles and a boxer looking for a comeback turn up in the middle of the night, things spiral beyond the point of no return...

In Girl from the North Country, Conor McPherson beautifully weaves the iconic songbook of Bob Dylan into a show full of hope, heartbreak and soul. It premiered at The Old Vic, London, in July 2017, in a production directed by Conor McPherson.

Genres: Plays, Fiction, Drama

133 pages, Kindle Edition

Published July 25, 2017

About the author

Conor McPherson is an Irish playwright and director.

Reviews

[Doug · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5, rounded up. This provides an almost textbook example of how NOT to turn a songwriter's tunes into a musical. The most successful ones incorporate the songs in surprising and yet logical fashion, in ways that either further the plot and/or illuminate character (see 'Mamma Mia'). And the songs have to be a natural fit for the story. I must admit I am not a huge fan of Mr. Dylan - I know the more iconic numbers ('Blowing in the Wind', 'Mr. Tambourine Man', etc.), but full 90% of the songs here I'd never heard before. However, his lyrics are at once elusive, impressionistic, and yet very precise in their use of language - and they can't just be shoehorned willy-nilly into any situation. Here, when the lyrics contradict the storyline - or make absolutely no sense, McPherson will just have someone sing them while other action is going on, for underscoring. Or else, the action stops altogether and the ensemble sings two or three songs joined together that have NOTHING to do with what is otherwise happening onstage.

I have been a fan of Mr. McPherson's earlier Irish plays, but he seems an odd choice to try to write an original story around Dylan's songs. He appears to have no knowledge of, nor affinity for, Depression-era Minnesota (a tip of the hat to Dylan's home state) ... and his boarding house characters seem recycled O'Neill-ian clichés. He also has an even more bizarre notion about the racial dynamics of the time - and neglects to mention that a pivotal character is even black until page 40!! (Of course, in production this would be obvious - but give your reading audience a clue!).

I read this in conjunction with listening to the very fine CD from the original production, which McPherson himself directed (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKzRD...), and I suggest anyone who hasn't seen the production do the same - taken by themselves, the songs are nicely sung and arranged (albeit someone seems to think Minnesota is part of Appalachia!) ... they just are an uneasy fit with Mr. McPherson's melodrama. The show got mostly negative reviews in the UK and most probably will never be seen again. I rounded up to three stars on the strength of Shirley Henderson's incandescent renderings of 'Like a Rolling Stone' and 'Forever Young', the discovery of which is worth the extra 1/2 star.

[Javier Fernandez · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was weird. The musical has 22 Bob Dylan songs with lyrics that have nothing to do with the story line. I suggest a split. Do the play first and then have a concert of Bob Dylan songs or vice versa.

[Jonathan Daley · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this play, McPherson has effectively echoed the work of Miller and Williams. This really suits Dylan’s discography. However I struggled a little to see the coherence between the song choices and the plot of the play. However I feel like this may be that I didn’t see it and read it instead. I feel like seeing this play in production would do a lot of the atmosphere building that I felt the text lacked. Still very enjoyable nonetheless.

[Kat · Rating 2 out of 5]

it's fine...

[Sarah Rayner · Rating 5 out of 5]

I bought this because I thought it was the book of the musical which I had seen on the London stage but it was actually the play. It’s an amazing play to see on stage and I read this while listening to the soundtrack really enjoyed it. Really depressing story but well worth seeing and reading

[Not Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

"musical." A Bob Dylan concert with some dialogue every other song.

[Jean]

I ordered this book because I left LV before the Broadway show was happening so I would not be able to see it. I knew that the music was by Bob Dylan but had no idea what the story was. It takes place in a boarding house in Duluth MN in the 1930s. The owners of the house, Nick & Elizabeth, owe more on it than they can pay & Elizabeth is showing signs of dementia. Their adopted daughter, Marianne, who is black, is also pregnant & Nick is trying to set her up with a local widower so she has some means of support. But Marianne ends up leaving with a boxer who came to stay at the boarding house on his way to Chicago where he hopes to get his career back on track. Their son Gene is looking for work but only finds odd jobs & can't support himself.

Regular boarders include the Burkes, whose son Elias is autistic; and Mrs. Nielson, who is in Duluth waiting for her husband's will to be probated & having an affair with Nick, who plans to run away with her back to St. Paul once she gets the money.

In the end, Mrs. Nielsen leaves without all the money she had hoped to get & she announces as she leaves that she is pregnant. Mr. Perry, the widower who Nick had hoped would take care of Marianne, gave Gene a job & a place to stay. Although Nick had planned a murder-suicide ending for himself & Elizabeth but she dumped the bullets out of the gun & the town doctor explains that they headed south & made it to Sioux City where Elizabeth got into a home for women & Nick found a hostel nearby & visited her every day.

Can't wait to see the play & hear the music one day!

[Russell Sanders · Rating 5 out of 5]

Conor McPherson’s Girl from the North Country is a play rich with character. Set in 1934 Minnesota in a boarding house, the characters are all trying to navigate the choppy waters of the Great Depression. They are a diverse group: the boarding house operator and his wife with early-onset dementia, their adopted pregnant daughter, an alcoholic writer son, a young woman obviously in love with the writer, a woman awaiting an inheritance from her deceased husband, a middle-aged couple with a son physically in his 30s but with a mental age of 4, an older man trying to court the pregnant daughter, two drifters—one a con-man Bible salesman, the other a prize-fighter, and a doctor who serves as narrator. Peppering the action and driving the narrative are the songs of Bob Dylan. McPherson, choosing from the entire Dylan catalog of songs, has selected songs that heighten the action and define the characters without the audience expecting those songs to advance the plot, as songs in most musicals do. Seeing Girl from the North Country onstage is a memorable experience, one that is made even better by reading the script, which leads to more fully understanding this impactful musical play.

[Gregg Narber · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a play which incorporates some of Bob Dylan's finest songs. So I guess it is a musical and I first heard (and love!) the soundtrack by the London Cast. It is set in a boarding house in northern Minnesota during the height of the Great Depression. People's lives are falling apart, some are grifters, one mentally enfeebled young man may have committed murder and is there with his parents (seemingly under false names) who fled (apparently) from the scene of the murder, one may be pregnant with no father in sight, the wife of the man who owns the boarding house suffers from dementia, etc. In short, misery abounds. I think I would really enjoy seeing this on a stage with the music incorporated, though the music only sort of fits, but it is not really a read I could recommend, certainly not without access to the soundtrack.

[Esther · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read the play because I had been introduced to the songs from the musical by a friend and didn't have the opportunity to see it live. If, like me, you're simply curious about what happens in between the songs, go ahead, it's a very fast read.
If, however, you're curious about the play itself, I would suggest that listening to the song adaptations might be a better use of your time.
This is the kind of play that thinks it's a study of humanity and misery and is actually in fact, rather boring. I'm well aware reading a play is not the best way to experience it, but all the characters feel like parodies that are made to interact with each other to try and achieve the most possible misery in one place, while enduring it in such a passive way that you can't really feel any sadness for any of them.

[Ray Quirolgico · Rating 5 out of 5]

After seeing the musical performed on Broadway, I knew I had to go back and read this - and the story is as sentimental and haunting as it was then. Perhaps reading the text, with the voices and actions only in my own mind, made it all feel even more introspective and otherworldly. Really nicely constructed work from Conor McPherson.

[DD · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hmm - this didn't work for me. It's not because it was depressing, and unrelentingly so, but rather because the songs didn't fit well in my view. There are better song choices that could have been made, I thought. Disappointing.

[Jay Gabler · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not the easiest play to grok in script form...purely for Dylan/McPherson fans who can't make it to the theater. I reviewed Girl from the North Country for The Current.

[Will Farris · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading the script much more than seeing the show live which is normally not the case. I really think this should have just been a play. The music just didn’t make sense with the story. I love the story and the characters though.

[Brian McCann · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very different musical. A friend of mine was in the first national tour. After seeing it, I knew I had to read it. It’s non-traditional in many senses, yet the backbone are the strong stories of the people in the world of this boarding house.

[Steve Mayer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two hours of almost unrelieved depression-era misery, interspersed with Bob Dylan songs, some of which fit.

[Paul Reiners · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hope this comes to the Guthrie.

[Phanesia Pharel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Song and plot barely connected and plot felt more like stereotypes Americans

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Heart wrenching

[Amy Evans · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good dialogue but some really tired disability tropes

[Jasmin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Saw the play in London a few years ago and bought the script, was amazing to revisit this story and to listen to the sobgs on Spotify alongside reading!

[Ian McNair · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m going to see the show next month so I thought I’d read the play beforehand. I hope the show is better than the book. The songs are amazing.

[janet wakefield · Rating 5 out of 5]

A play written to include songs by Bob Dylan taking place in Duluth, Minnesota. Interesting...

[Uri Cohen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I like the premise of writing a script around Dylan's songs, but I didn't think they fit so well.

[Jonathan Guttenberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

unashamedly sat front row four times

[William Chambers · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was a slog to get through. The jokes weren’t funny, the characters were annoying and the songs felt shoehorned into the key moments.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars

[Chambers Stevens · Rating 3 out of 5]

Conor McPherson is a powerful playwright.
And Dylan well Dylan is Dylan.
One of the most depressing nights I have ever spent in the theatre.

[Jesse · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was an odd musical.

The music is great, the story and characters engaging, and the feel of the world was well rendered... but I left it feeling disappointed. I didn't feel that the music serviced the story at all, so it felt more like it was a scripted Bob Dylan concert with pieces of a separate play happening in between the story.

[Mia P. · Rating 3 out of 5]

saw the musical