A Tribute to Robin Glendinning

The Lyric are very saddened to hear of the recent passing of Belfast playwright Robin Glendinning.

A founding member of the Alliance Party, Robin was also a playwright, a prolific writer of radio plays, short stories, and a number of stage plays for theatre. The Lyric produced two of Robin’s plays - the Irish premier of his award-winning play ‘Mumbo Jumbo’ in 1987, and premier of ‘Culture Vultures’ in 1988. The Linen Hall theatre archives have digitised the programmes for both productions:

http://www.digitaltheatrearchive.com/archives/1640

http://www.digitaltheatrearchive.com/archives/1631

David Grant, theatre director and Senior Lecturer in Drama at Queen’s University and former pupil of Robin’s at RBAI, remembers Robin fondly:

“Robin taught me at Inst and directed me in school plays. And when I came back to Belfast after university he continued to be a great support, inviting me to regular pep talks at the Linen Hall bar. I still have the supportive letter he sent me when I directed ‘The Crucible’ at the Lyric in 1997.

His Lyric premiere was ‘Culture Vultures’ in 1988, inspired by his experience of amateur drama in Omagh. The action is set against an amateur production of Chekhov, but like all his plays, the play reflects on the wider politics of Northern Ireland. In 1987 the Lyric had also staged the Irish premier of ‘Mumbo Jumbo’, his award-winning play, originally premiered at the Royal Exchange in Manchester where it was directed by Nick Hytner, the future AD of the RNT. The Belfast production, just a year later was directed by Jeremy Howe (now the editor of the BBC's The Archers.) I directed his later play, ‘Donny Boy’ for Tinderbox at the Dublin Theatre Festival in 1991. This is a critique of how Republicanism can be mythologised. But his greatest play, I think, is ‘Summer House’, ostensibly about a declining Unionist aristocrat, but really an analysis of the mourning process Unionism was going through as the reality of United Ireland became more likely. Robin was also a prolific writer of radio plays.

At his funeral and in the obituaries there was an understandable emphasis on his important contribution to the creation of the Alliance Party, but those who knew him as a dramatist would want equal emphasis placed in his important creative output.

Here's his entry from Irish Playography:

"Robin Glendinning was born in 1938, Belfast. Educated at Campbell College and Trinity College, Dublin, he received an Honours Degree min Modern History and Political Science. A founder of the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland, he was a full-time organiser for the party for two and half years during the height of the Troubles in the 1970s. He has had five plays produced for stage: ‘Stuffing It’ (Tricycle Theatre, 1982) ‘Culture Vultures’ (Lyric Players Theatre, 1988), ‘Mumbo Jumbo’ (Manchester Royal Exchange and Lyric Hammersmith, 1986 – joint winner of the Mobil Theatre Award 1986), ‘Donny Boy’ (Manchesster Royal Exchange, Theatre Royal Oslo, 1991), winner of the Manchester Evening News and Martini Rossi Provincial Theatre Award for Best New Play of 1991 and ‘Summerhouse’ (Druid Theatre, Galway, 1994). He has written more than twenty radio plays for the BBC, winning nominations for Sony Award for ‘Condemning Violence’ (1987) and a Giles Cooper Award for ‘The Words Are Strange’ (1991). A television play, ‘A Night of the Campaign’, was produced by BBC Northern in 1987. He also writes short stories, many of which have been published by journals throughout Britain and Ireland."

He had the most amazing laugh which I can still hear when I think of him. I remember him telling me that he found himself at the opening night of his satire of the Belfast middle-class ("Stuffing It") in London standing at a urinal next to Irving Wardle, the Times drama critic. Not knowing he was talking to the playwright, Wardle asked Robin - "Who do these people think they are? They behave as if they lived in the Home Counties!". "They think they do", replied Robin with a hearty laugh.

David Grant, Sep 2025