“People are always interested in nuns. People love nuns. So they come to see anything with nuns in it,” Triona Adams tells me matter-of-factly.
She’s right of course; from The Sound of Music to Nuns On The Run, Sister Act and Paddington in Peru, we’re all fully invested. And Triona should know having spent a year as a nun aged 26.
Yes that’s right, the West End theatrical agent jacked in the bright lights and celebs for a life in a Benedictine convent in Faringdon, a decision she’s been making sense of ever since, hence her show Nun The Wiser coming to OFS in Feb.
‘I was probably like a petulant child who never shut up, which is saying something as it was a silent order’
Nun The Wiser is her bittersweet and comic account of what happens when a modern, independent woman tries to become a nun and discovers she’s not exactly a natural. “Looking back now I was ghastly, and I feel much more sympathy for the older nuns now,” she reflects.
Triona is as bemused as anyone that a) she became a nun, b) that it didn’t work out, c) that she recalls the time with great fondness and d) that the seismic episode would have such a profound effect on her life.
“I am profoundly glad I did it. As I grow older, if not necessarily wiser, the painful parts recede and the lovely parts remain,” the Oxfordian explains.
On a diet of Spam fritters and Dad’s Army, cut off from the world beyond the convent walls, Nun The Wiser is therefore as funny as it is moving — a unique glimpse into faith, community, and the search for purpose in unlikely places.Â
But let’s go back. How did such a glamorous creature, obsessed with shoes, fashion, going out, VIP events, eyeliner, and dating, give up her life in London to go into a convent?
‘I thought my parents would be thrilled but they were appalled. They thought I would be a really bad nun’
“Well I am a catholic,” she smiles. “So even though I studied English at Oxford, then RADA and became a theatrical agent, I think most catholics consider it at some time and fantasise about wearing a habit. So really it’s about God.
“But of course it’s a fallacy that nuns are docile and compliant. They are actually opinionated and fierce – you have to be to do it in the first place. People always talk about sacrifice but you have to remember this is what they’ve chosen to do, to be closer to God. And that’s also what I decided to do.”
Setting off to Fernham Priory near Faringdon under the misapprehension that it was near Oxford, only to find that Swindon was closer, Triona entered a centuries-old way of life and discovered, sometimes painfully, how modern values, intellect, and spirituality clash with ancient traditions. Amid the silence and discipline, she found moments of tenderness, fleeting laughter, and unexpected friendship.Â
“My mother wonders if going to a convent school would have helped me get it out of my system. Either way, I thought my parents would be thrilled but they weren’t, they were appalled.” Why? “They thought I would be a really bad nun,” Trina admits.
In fact, Triona says everyone she knew was horrified at her decision: “They just kept saying ‘but you like men'”, she laughs.
Liking men was what got her into the situation in the first place: “I considered dating my second job,” Triona recalls, “and it was while looking at dating ads in The Catholic Herald, that I spied an ad for a monastic weekend away and envisaged a few days of chanting and organic vegetables.”
Triona’s stay was enough to convince her to become a nun, and after applying and being vetted, she was accepted. “I was in it for life. You don’t become a nun to give it a go. You know it’s going to be hard, that’s the point. Put it this way, I went in with the best intentions. You have to really want to do it in the first place.”
Triona was 26 at the time, the rest of the nuns aged 57-101, so she was the youngest by far. “It meant that everyone else was senior so there was no one else my age starting out, someone I could go through it with together,” she reflects.
So what was it like? “Quite lonely. Even the cat didn’t like me. And I began to question it quite early on. I had seen it as such a positive move so was I not trying hard enough? Was I not right or was it not right? I know there were lots of conversations about me joining in the first place, so was I drawn to the wrong community or did I just not have a vocation after all? It was hard to tell. Even now I am not sure.”
‘Even the cat didn’t like me And I began to question it quite early on. I had seen it as such a positive move so was I not trying hard enough?’
Nun The Wiser therefore offers a unique glimpse behind one of society’s last closed doors and Triona’s incredible journey is brought to life in an evening filled with unflinching honesty, warm humour, and heartfelt reflection in this exploration of identity, faith, and the surprising places we search for meaning.
“Looking back now I think I was probably like a petulant child who never shut up, which is saying something as it was a silent order and we could only speak twice a day. I was probably unbearable. Maybe I should have had a gap year! A year in Tibet rather than The Vale Of White Horse,” Triona considers.
Once she decided to leave, a friend came to pick her up and the first thing Triona did was go to a Happy Eater and order a burger, chips and a milkshake. “No more spam fritters.”
So what went wrong?” I just don’t think they were equipped to deal with me. It was pretty rackety there. If it had been a bit more shipshape it might have been different, but who knows? I did go and look round a few other places afterwards but they obviously knew I’d left and told me not to do anything for a year – not to rebound – so I went back to my old job and that was that.”
Except it wasn’t, because Triona debuted Nun The Wiser in Edinburgh in 2009, ‘toured it for a bit’, transformed it into a play for Radio 4, and then took matters back into her own hands to revive it.
‘Maybe I should have had a gap year! A year in Tibet rather than The Vale Of White Horse’
“I’m still flogging the same horse because I think the show is funny, and the older I get I can add another level of wisdom and expertise to it,” she muses, “so yes there is a sort of compulsion to speak about it. It’s my story.”
And how does Triona feel about her time in the convent now? “There is no guilt around it and I still have my faith. I genuinely look back at that time with great fondness so there is nothing irreverent, religious or blasphemous in the show, and all identities are hidden. But the reason the show works is that a lot of it was genuinely funny, and as a postulant I made a lot of hilarious mistakes.
Nun the Wiser comes to OFS on Feb 5-6. https://oldfirestation.org.uk/whats-on/nun-the-wiser/
