Lucy Holmes, a Trinity graduate of Drama with a master’s degree in Playwriting at The Lir Academy, founded FILTH Theatre Company at the beginning of 2023. The company’s production This Too Shall Pass ran from September 18th to 22nd at the Dublin Fringe Festival. The immersive play, written by and starring Holmes, highlights the current dangerous inadequacies of Ireland’s Children and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) as you follow Erin through her years in the system. I sat down with Holmes to discuss founding her own theatre company and their most recent production.
Why did you decide to form FILTH and how did it come about?
“FILTH came about as I wanted a place where I could create, and I always think having a company or a space that is beyond you is really nice because it means that things can happen that are beyond you. Filth has the ability to go bigger and further beyond what I possibly could. It is a company that is very interested in exploring spaces, telling stories through spaces and looking for unconventional ways to tell stories.”
Can I ask where the name FILTH came from?
“It is kind of a three-pronged answer. I love the word filth, it’s such a great word. It can be used in so many ways… it’s something that’s disgusting, it’s something that shouldn’t be talked about, it’s something that should be buried, it’s something that’s not for eyes to see. To me, filth is a very glamorous word, which so many people would disagree with, but I’m a firm believer that, in the sense of ashes to ashes, everything comes from dirt, everything comes from filth, and everything will go back to filth. All the best things we’ve had in life have come from filth and will return to that. And number three is I love the song ‘Filthy Gorgeous’ by the Scissor Sisters, so it was kind of a combination of all of those things.”
This Too Shall Pass looks at Ireland’s strained mental health service. What inspired you to tell this story?
“For me, I have a very personal relationship with the CAMHS system in Ireland and the Adult Mental Health system in Ireland. That being said, this piece is so much more than my experience, it goes much beyond that. I think the real driving force was in 2022, the Sean Maskey Review came out.”
The Maskey Review examined the care received at South Kerry CAMHS between July 2016 and April 2021. The review found that the care received by 240 young people did not meet appropriate standards.
“When that review came out, I remember my mum calling me and telling me to read the entire review. She said, ‘that’s exactly what you went through.’ It was the first time that I’d seen on paper that I wasn’t crazy, that these things were happening, that there was not the continuity of support that young people need. Then in 2023, Dr Susan Finnerty released a nationwide report, and a lot of what was seen in the Maskey Review was seen all over the country. In her statement when she released the final report she said, ‘I cannot currently provide an assurance to all parents in Ireland that their children have access to a safe, effective and evidence-based mental health service.’”
Holmes continued, “Then I did a lot of research and I talked to a lot of people, both those working as mental health practitioners and people who’ve experienced the system. You can read the report as a bunch of statistics and go, ‘it’s awful’, but I went through it, people around me went through it, and I think that’s what really pushed me to create this piece.
I’ve seen a lot of theatre created about mental illness and mental health in Ireland, but very, very rarely do any of these things recognise the systemic issue. The exact system that should be supporting us, building us up, and minding the young people of Ireland, is not doing that because it doesn’t have the facilities that it needs. It is not the people in the system that are the problem, it’s the system itself. It is really hard to help the people in front of you when you don’t have the tools.
Talking from my personal experience, you do feel like you’re going insane a little bit, because you are going to someone, asking for help … and what do you do when the help that you’ve asked for isn’t helping? Where do you go then? Myself, as a kid, I internalised a lot of stuff. I would much quicker go, ‘oh well, I’m a problem’, rather than think, ‘Actually this system is not working’. It was the same with a lot of parents. They are bringing their child to a system they had never interacted with before, that was supposed to help their child. Then years down the line they find out, the system is not working. That is an awful realisation to have as a parent, when you are trying to do everything right by your child, to find out the systems that are put in place to help said child, cannot help. What are you supposed to do when you don’t have the money to go, ‘oh well, just pay for the private.’ I think that’s part of it as well, is that the powers-that-be per se, aren’t engaging with that system because they have the money to go down the private route, so they don’t realise just how bad and just how difficult it is to access and engage with the system. I think there’s a lack of empathy from a higher level.”
You worked with Fringe Lab on the play. Can you tell me what that was like?
“I initially did this show in an educational setting in February 2023. It was a very, very different play, but the core of it and the heart of it were still the same. But for me, as both a performer and a writer, when I did that the first time I went, ‘I’m satisfied now. If I was to do this again, I would completely transform it.’ And that’s what this process has been about, particularly what the Fringe Lab space was about.
We were up in the Fringe Lab from 10 am to 6 pm every single day for a week, working through the script, getting it on its feet, seeing what worked and what didn’t work. It is great to be in a room with other people where they can poke and ask those questions. It is really important that I’m not just going, ‘this is my story about what I experienced in the system’ because that would be a gross misunderstanding of the issue. It is an issue across Ireland. Yes, I experienced it, but that, for me, has always been very much in the background.
The show itself focuses on Erin and her experience of the mental health system. But you also get to see the people around her, and how those people are or aren’t affected by this system, as there is no one experience of this system.
The play is about digging into the emotional core of that, and how it feels to grow up and try figuring yourself out, but also go into a room where everything you do is questioned. How that affects your relationship with the world. How waiting for long periods of time and not receiving help really affects your relationship with the world. It is that thing of, what happens when you can’t get the support that you need? How does, particularly a young person, respond to that, and how do you move on from that?
That week was pulling all of those threads out and creating. Moving out from the piece that it was to the piece that it is now.”
The play is a site-specific, immersive piece. Why did you choose this form for the production?
“With a story like this, if you have the opportunity to sit back and intellectualise and go, ‘God isn’t this awful’, it doesn’t have the same effect as actually bringing you into the world… because in our day-to-day life, this is not a story any of us are separate from.
With this piece as well, you do get the opportunity to, if you so please, pick up that diary that’s sitting there and read it. Look at that letter, read the Post-it notes, look at people’s pictures. I love having space and [the] opportunity where you can get the textures of someone’s life so up close and personal. I just think this as a story is not one for sitting back and taking in the story. It’s for being active and processing it with the person in front of you.”
This Too Shall Pass enjoyed a four-day run at the festival and was a chilling commentary on the shortcomings of youth mental health services in Ireland.
