In the play Russell makes the two twins become ‘Blood Brothers’, this creates dramatic irony amongst the audience because we know that they really are brothers, we see this when Mickey introduces Eddie to his mother, Mickey says “Mam… Mam this is my brother. ” Mrs Johnstone is very stunned by the fact that this has come up, so to try and avoid the twins knowing shes says “what” Mickey thens replies to that “my blood brother, Eddie”.
This shows that Mrs Lyons telling Mrs Johnstone that ‘if the twins find out they were once brothers, they will die’ has worked because she acts dull when Mickey says Edward is his brother. During the play we see that Mrs Johnstone and Mrs Lyons get treated differently by members of the authority, such as a police man. We see this when the policeman goes and confronts Mrs Johnstone about her sons behaviour, we see this when the police man says “he was about to commit a serious crime, love. Now do y’ understand that?
You don’t wanna end up in court again do y’? ” We see in this quote that the policeman is threatening her about going to court ‘again’, he is patronising her and talks down to her. When the policeman goes to confront Mrs Lyons, he removes his helmet and holds a glass of scotch, the glass of scotch indicates wealth within the Lyons family. The police man then says to Mrs Lyons “An’ er, as I say, it was more of a prank, really, Mrs Lyons. I’d just dock his pocket money if I was you. ” He then laughs to make a bit of a joke out of it.
The pocket money shows the Lyons family can afford to give their kids pocket money. The police man then says “But, one thing I would say, if y’ don’t mind me sayin’, is well, I’m not sure if I’d let him mix with the likes of them in the future. The fact that he says “if y’ don’t mind me sayin” shows he has a lot more respect for the Lyons family. As the police man is about to leave he says “he’s a good lad, aren’t you Adolph? ” this shows great respect and is a polite thing to say, he’s even ‘enjoying’ the joke that Eddie started.
As the two twins get older, their lives change a lot, they grew apart from each other, we see this when Edward goes to university and Mickey has to work. Edward becomes a lot more care free, he is having more fun, we see this in many different ways through out the play, we see this when he says “you can do exactly as you choose sir. You can take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut! But you shall not take my locket! ” This results in Edward getting suspended from the university, this shows that he doesn’t care as much anymore.
Edward also says “I haven’t been to so many parties in my life, this shows that during his time at university he has become a typical teenager who parties a lot. Where as Mickey is a lot more responsible now that he is working. We see this in many ways including when he says “I’ll have to go home and get some money” this shows that now he is working he has money. We see Mickey has become more responsible when Edward says to him “why is a job so important? If I couldn’t get a job I’d just say sod it and draw up a dole, tilt my hat towards the world and say ‘screw you’.
Mickey says “you don’t understand anythin’ do y’? I don’t wear a hat and tilt it at the world. ” this shows that beside Edwards attempts to tempt Mickey into going on the dole, Mickey has basically said no, this shows that he is more responsible and thinking about his family, this is like role reversal, Mickey is now the sensible one. We see during the play that the cycle of poverty and lack of money suffered by Mrs Johnstone is continued when Mickey and Linda are together, we see this in many different ways but one way is when Mickey takes up Sammy’s offer to do a little job for an extra i??
50, on the one hand this shows desperation for some extra money but on the other hand this shows that he is thinking about Linda because he tells her to be ready by eight o’ clock so they can go out dancing and have a slap up meal. During the play, Mickey and Linda’s relationship can become quite confusing at times, we see this when Mickey boss’s her about by saying “look, stop arguing” he also says “now shut up” this can be quite annoying and intimidating when in a relationship because you feel as if you don’t have a say.
We realise that Mickey and Linda’s relationship becomes full of arguments, they are always arguing about petty little things and this makes the relationship quite un-successful, we see this when Mickey and Linda are arguing about Mickey’s tablets, we also see it when Mickey mentally abandon’s Linda, she feels as if she is being blocked out of Mickey’s life.
The relationship between Mickey and Linda seems to be slowly breaking down, we see this when they both drift away from each over, we see this hen Linda wants to meet up with Edward to talk, they eventually kiss and walk off together hand in hand, this shows that Linda thinks just as much about Edward as she does about Mickey. I think Willy Russell has done very well to present two contrasting worlds, he shows us the many difference’s between the two family’s.
We see this in many ways and Russell has used many effective terms to make us recognise this. The many effective terms he has used has provoked many different thoughts into our heads and he has made his style of writing very catchy. I think his style of writing is very successful because as we are reading the story we can almost visualise what is happening in the story.
