A decade ago, Carol Moore helped to define theatre in the North. Now she's back, with a play to mark two anniversaries, writes Jane Coyle

It's quite like old times. Chatting to Carol Moore about her new production, for the Lyric Theatre in Belfast, is like a case of déjà vu from 10 years or so ago, when Charabanc Theatre Company was going like the clappers and regular meetings were arranged with Moore (then Scanlan), Marie Jones and Eleanor Methven to discuss the ins and outs of their latest project.

This time around, however, there are significant differences. Charabanc is long gone; the three artistic co-directors have since forged hugely successful individual directing, writing and acting careers; and this play is not one of their own - although it has been attributed to them on numerous occasions.

"People often said to us, 'You did that play, The Factory Girls,' " recalls Moore. "And the more we said we didn't, the more they would insist that we did. It was written at around the same time as Lay Up Your Ends and the subject matter and characters were similar, so we could see where they were coming from."

But, of course, The Factory Girls is one of Frank McGuinness's earliest plays, written straight from the heart and set in the Donegal shirt factory where his mother and sister worked. This year is both the 20th anniversary of its premiere, at the Peacock Theatre, and the Lyric's 50th birthday. In keeping with its intention to mark the occasion with a programme of plays by some of Ireland's finest writers, the theatre is reviving this landmark piece, directed by Moore and with Methven in the cast.

It has not escaped Moore's notice that her current situation is a far cry from the days when Charabanc relished rocking the theatre establishment's boat, performing in community venues up and down the country, creating feisty plays with mainly female roles, celebrating the extraordinary resilience and humour of working-class Northern women. Now, here she is, at the heart of that establishment, fresh from her onstage triumph alongside Jones and Methven in Jones's musical comedy Weddin's, Wee'ins and Wakes, which was one of the Lyric's biggest commercial successes in years.

"This is my first time of directing for the Lyric," she says. "But I have been very keen to direct something here. Until now, it was a case of the time not being right or successive artistic directors wanting to do other things. But I came in to see [artistic adviser] Paula McFetridge, and she invited me to do this play, which, I must admit, was not one of my suggested choices.

"But I am absolutely delighted to be doing it. Because of its content and the fact that I am working with Eleanor and a largely female cast, it does feel a bit like getting into a familiar, comfy chair."

One aspect of the play that the director, cast and designers have had to come to terms with is its physical complexity. It is set in the claustrophobic surroundings of a factory floor, with all the equipment, machinery and technical skills that go with it.

Moore and the designer travelled to a shirt factory in Bundoran - the original company having closed some years ago - to see the job being done at first hand, and the cast were visited by Marie Evans, a retired factory worker, who coached them in the techniques of the shirt examiners they will be playing.

The Lyric has invited groups of workers from the Bundoran factory to come and see the show; it hopes the initiative will attract new theatre-goers, keen to sample a play whose subject matter is so painfully close to their real-life experiences. With the Northern Ireland textile industry having suffered a succession of blows over the past couple of years, issues of time and motion, productivity deals, unattainable production targets and voluntary and enforced redundancies strike horribly close to home.

"To me, the heart of the play is of women empowering themselves," says Moore. "These are women who are accustomed to being controlled by men: by their managers, their priests, their husbands. There are no supportive husbands in this play - quite the opposite. But something happens that makes them rise up and take responsibility for their own actions. There are personal relationships at stake and larger political agendas in control."

The play is set in the late 1970s, when the developing economies in Taiwan and the Philippines were taking off, affecting the everyday lives of women like these.

"The characters make big journeys, and so do the actors, in trying to discover the truths contained in the play's subtext. Frank McGuinness feels very passionately about this play - his mother worked in this factory for 50 years. It is that kind of industry. The current supervisor has been there since she was 14. One of the directors was once a production-line manager. There is a sense of community, of jobs passing down through families over generations. Then, out of the blue, they're under threat of extinction. It's hard."

During her days with Charabanc, Moore was known as Carol Scanlan, her then- married name. She shrugs off the fact that it has been hard to lose. "Lots of people still think of me as Carol Scanlan. It doesn't bother me particularly. When I first registered as an actress with Equity, there already was a Carol Moore, so I had to change it. But since I started directing, I reverted to my own name, and it doesn't seem to have made much difference."

Since departing Charabanc, her directing career has encompassed film, television and stage. She took a master's degree in Irish studies at Queen's University Belfast and taught for a while on the performing-arts course at Belfast Institute of Further & Higher Education. She admits that, apart from the master's course, little of it was planned.

"While I was doing my master's, I studied the poetry of Cathal Ó Searcaigh, out of which came a short film, Gort Na gCnámh. It was selected for the Northern Ireland Film Commission's Première series of films, with me directing. I won an award for best first-time director and, suddenly, there I was: a film director! You couldn't plan anything like that.

"When we wound up Charabanc, I was desperate to go out and do something for myself. Something completely different. I took a course in aromatherapy and qualified as a therapist. But there was always something nagging away in the back of my head, something telling me to have a go at directing. My one regret now is that I didn't try it sooner.

"Women are funny like that. Men are completely relaxed about giving themselves titles and labels. Women are not. They need to prove to themselves and the world that they can do a job before they feel confident to stand up and take on the title of doing it. It took me a while to reach that point, but I think I'm there now."

After the joy of playing to packed houses with Weddin's, Wee'ins and Wakes, her overriding wish is that The Factory Girls repeat the success. "I would like to think that audiences are beginning to come back to the Lyric," she says. "We have a super cast, which includes four new faces. I felt it was important that I should see the new generation of actors, as I didn't know the majority of them. I auditioned over 50 people and I could have cast the women three times over.

"The depth of talent out there is really encouraging, and it is important that the roles are there for them. That, after all, was what Charabanc was all about. It would be nice to think that things have come on a bit since then."

The Factory Girls opens tonight and runs until March 2nd; bookings at 048-90381081