As part of The Leenane Trilogy of plays including The Beauty Queen of Leenane and A Skull in Connemara, The Lonesome West encompasses McDonagh’s black comic style that would go on to define his plays and films.
Valene and Coleman are two brothers who have lived together for years with constant petty squabbling. Now after their father’s death, and following the exhortations of the local priest, a new understanding could develop – could – if the two brothers could stop arguing over crisps, ornaments, who left the top off Valene’s pen and whose turn it is to read a magazine.