For Dolores – Traverse Theatre

Two larger-than-life women. One very small lift. Sparks are inevitably going to fly.

Eva O’Connor’s For Dolores throws Réaltín, a little Irish star with an inexhaustible capacity for storytelling, together with Mo, a gloriously forthright Glaswegian, in a broken-down lift. What follows is surely one of the great encounters of this year’s Fringe.

Lara McDonnell as Réaltín and Catriona Faint as Mo make a classic double act, and an unusually refreshing all-female one. Réaltín embellishes and romanticises, Mo punctures and corrects. When Réaltín recalls romantically “coming off the boat” from Ireland, Mo reminds her that she actually got off a £19.99 Ryanair flight.

That rhythm drives the play. A joke becomes an insult, an insult becomes affection, and affection occasionally reveals something darker underneath. Their friendship moves through jealousy and dependency, and eventually motherhood while constantly questioning precisely what these two women mean to one another.

The lift scene is beautifully played and extremely funny. We are told that sparks flew from the angle grinder used to free them, an image perfectly suited to these two combustible personalities. There is a tiny continuity mystery when their liberation later seems to involve some sort of snipping machine instead. Angle grinder or snipper?

Director Jim Culleton keeps everything moving at tremendous speed, perhaps occasionally too much so. If I have one reservation, it is that both characters seem to know only one gear: fifth. The continuous banter is exhilarating, but a few quieter moments might allow us further inside these women and give the performances another emotional layer.

But it seems almost churlish to complain when McDonnell and Faint generate this much energy, laughter and affection in a room, not to mention the tears! By the end, the Traverse audience is on its feet, the applause rapturous and thoroughly deserved.

For Dolores is an extraordinary piece of theatre and already set to be one of the hot ticket highlights of the Fringe. This pair are going to haunt me.

But please, sort the angle grinder.

Playing until August 30^th 2026, https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/2026FORDOLO

Reviewer: Greg Holstead

Reviewed: 7^th August 2026

North West End UK / Theatre Muse UK Rating: