The Dramatic Devices in Our Day Out by Willy Russell

The Dramatic Devices in Our Day Out by Willy Russell

Willy Russell, the author of ‘Our Day Out’ was a playwright in

Liverpool writing at a time when there was a high level of

unemployment and a feeling that even with an education there was

little work available.

In the inner city areas there were low levels of literacy, schools

attempted to deal with the disaffected students in special classes.

Willy Russell grew up in Liverpool and worked in various jobs there in

his adult life, so he knew what it was like. He expressed this

culture of negativity in his writing, giving a ‘voice’ to these

people, who he had an affection and understanding for.

The screenplay is about one of these special classes. It is called

the ‘progress class’. Their teacher organises a coach trip for the

children she genuinely cares for in the hope of giving them an

experience beyond their usual day to day life.

Russell also explores another level with another teacher who is on the

trip and has very different views about what a day trip should be.

The text is effective and entertaining because of the devices used and

they are particularly evident in the zoo scene.

The first device Willy Russell uses is in the stage directions at the

start. ‘They point and shriek with horrified delight at the sexual

organs of monkeys’.

Russell uses this as a device to show the children’s immaturity, the

aiming to emphasize the fact that the children have never never been

exposed to this experience before as they have never been outside the

inner cities and this is shown in their reaction. His choice of

language ‘horrified delight’ highlights the fact h...

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being compared to that of caged animals let loose in various part of

the script.

This is basically the underlying theme to the story, the children are

like caged animals in the inner cities and so don’t know how to behave

when they are ‘released’ from their ‘cages’. The points Willy Russell

is making is that we would expect wild animals to be (to quote Ronson

earlier in the script) ‘mad and’ wanna kill people’ when released

after spending their whole life ‘in a pit’. So what he’s saying is

why should we expect children not to behave in the same way when

they’ve treated in the same way’.

This script was interesting and enjoyable to explore and I believe

that many of the scripts most important elements about education and

living in a deprived inner city are sill recognizable and relevant in

today’s world.