Chapter 1: What is the controversy surrounding Rex Ryan's play The Monk?
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It's not, I did this and then I did that. It's told more as a stream of consciousness where things come into his mind and he looks at that and he might jump forward ages or he might even jump back a bit. I was discussing it with somebody after and they were saying, well, is that true, what happened?
I said, well, that's not really what it's doing, but it does capture some of his character and some of the things that defined him. So I think on that level, it's brilliant.
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But should we be morally outraged by Rex Ryan's production The Monk? Or should we simply view it as a piece of art? I'm talking with Niall Donald about The Monk, the play that everyone is talking about. You're listening to Crime World, a podcast from crimeworld.com. Sorry, could you take a head of you? No, I am. Go on. If you don't mind. That's OK. Right.
OK. OK. Yeah. Let's try and concentrate on a career ending episode.
Yes, exactly. So a question, first of all, I suppose, were you morally outraged? Well, well, I'm not. Are you capable of being?
Well, well. No, I think there's a couple of ways to look at it. We're obviously speaking about The Monk, the play, which we went to last night. And yeah, there is a couple of ways to look at it as a piece of art, as a moral debate. But no, I thought it was really, really good.
So we weren't totally expecting the monk to appear on stage. I thought that was one time only.
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Chapter 2: Why is The Monk considered a significant piece of art?
Maybe it is. But what that is, is that that theory that floats around that Hutch actually was the brainchild behind the whole catastrophe that was the Regency trial, that he had got Dowdall to go state witness against him to give the evidence as the trial could collapse, he could walk free. Dowdall did a few years and gone to the sun. Tell you one thing that's for sure, that didn't happen.
and Dowdall ain't gone off to the sunshine to live out a happy existence. Dowdall is released now, isn't he? Mm-hmm. But he will be signed off the Witness Protection Program.
He'll be relocated somewhere, undoubtedly English-speaking, and I don't know what sort of a life that is going to be, but I imagine it's going to be a very uncomfortable one, away from friends, family, and everything he has known. Yeah. So that is the kind of the criticism that comes up again and again. And obviously with the Monk play, there has been a lot of writing around it.
Crime correspondents have become theatre critics.
And theatre critics have become crime correspondents.
So it's a bit of both. So it's all kind of back again into the ether, this whole thing. You gave him platform. You didn't interview him hard enough. And he nearly got elected because of you. Clearly this podcast.
So there's, I mean, and obviously then there is the play The Monk, which takes a different stance. I mean, there's a directly different stance there, which is not that he wasn't questioned hard enough, but that he, in a sense, is being, I suppose, unfairly pushed and connected with stuff that he didn't necessarily do.
So there's a totally, the total opposite narrative is there in the play, The Monk. So this is where we are.
To start with the play itself, because there's been an awful lot of discussion around it and people being brought forward to make comments about it. And most of the people I've seen who are making the comments haven't actually seen it.
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Chapter 3: How does the play portray Gerry Hutch's character?
That is what people are saying, isn't it?
I mean, that is the overall... He is about his life story anyway.
Yeah.
So it's not unusual that he shows up to, you know, to the press conference. It's unusual in one way. But it is unusual. But in the other way, it's not like he's completely out of sync with what's happening.
No, look, I suppose, see, have we ever quoted Oscar Wilde before? I'm sure I do, all the time. I'll quote this, right? Right, go on. There is no such thing as a moral or immoral book. Books are well written or badly written. That is all. So like this is a broad sort of debate that's gone on since the beginning of writing about what is the moral position of art, I suppose.
Oscar Wilde says there's no moral position. You tell a story, it's either good or bad. Now other people... Like Tolstoy, for example, I think said, well, you know, everything should have a moral purpose that you do every piece of art. And it goes on and on. Like it's just one of these constant debates that we don't have to get involved with. So like, you know...
I think this is what Rex is saying. This is nothing to do with trying to project the moral view of Gerard Hutch's actions. Nothing to do with saying Gerard Hutch should be elected, should be not elected, is a moral person, is an immoral person, is justified in his criminal actions or should be condemned. That it's telling a tale of a person.
Yeah.
And that is all his job is. And I think that's fair. Yeah, I do too. I'm with him on that. Now, it's also fair, as I said, all of crime reporting is a moral play, though, nonetheless. We're not artists, like, We're not. So we engage in a discussion of morality in a constant basis in crime reporting and in reporting in general.
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Chapter 4: What moral questions arise from the portrayal of crime in The Monk?
Was this going to, you know, were they going to be very heavily armed? Because of that, they had contacts in the north. It was like as if people were trying to size up how two premiership teams were going to play against one another. That's what it felt like. You've been listening to an extract from The Regency, 10 years on from the hit that changed gangland forever.
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