Dion is the 'Sheriff' of the Zakynthos holiday town. He is because Big Yannis says he is (and because he asked for the title), and he's there to be the local law enforement. That his duties include looking out for mainland police and the excise hasn'r raised his suspicions. He's been on the island a long, long tiem, done many jobs, had a lot of drink and drugs, and he loves it all. Doesn't he? His world is so beautiful (while admitting he'd love to describe it all, if only he had the mind of a poet) and people respect him. He's somone in the town.
So why is he so keen to hide away when he here's there's a man, a fellow Scot, looking for him? Especially when it turns out that that man is his long estranged brother, come to save him from his alcoholic poverty. Or is he? As we hear about the family history it's clear there are other motives at play on both sides.
They're played by real life brothers Paul and Stephen McCole, who take Douglas Maxwell's clever script along at a cracking pace. It's an interesting (and demanding) work structurally, with a long monologue from each sibling, broken by short peiods of dialogue in the middle and ending. Which works well, because the overriding theme is the myths and delusions we tell ourselves so that we can emerge as the heroes of our own stories, and the doubts and realities that spoil the perfection of our tales. The monologues allow the characters to say who they want to be seen as, and the imperfections in those pictures.
Both performances are impressive. Paul's Dion is funny, friendly, immediately likeable in spite of all of his obvious flaws. Stephen plays brother Ally as a man of god, buttoned up, hypocritical. Both are delusional about their true sevels. But aren't we all?
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