A litany of names, dates and score-lines makes up most of the material used in Up the Rebels at the Everyman Palace. Written by Declan Hassett for the Cork County Board of the GAA, the production celebrates the history and achievements of the organisation in Cork by placing it firmly in a nationalist tradition.
Because this element is presented in something of the style of a local pageant, it unbalances the insights obvious in the writing, which offers subtle and affectionate cameos of sporting heroes and their vanishing legends. The clash of the ash resounds to a background of Mise Eire and A Nation Once Again. Although there is no mention of Sir William St Leger, who in the early 16th century banned hurling from the streets of Cork, the provenance of the Gaelic Athletic Association is shown as bluntly republican and class-conscious - the march of a nation led by the Artane Boys' Band.
This truth, however, does not disguise other truths; the GAA has an important place in the cultural history of this country, and Up the Rebels - Cork chauvenism allowed - elevates it to an almost spiritual status. But it is the writing, more than Michael Twomey's declamatory direction, that carries the production's component of a somewhat awkwardly staged entertainment, which is distinguished by the acting of Kevin Sheehan and the singing of Linda Kenny and John Bennet. Michael Twomey and Frank Duggan appear, wonderfully, as Cha and Miah.
Up the Rebels continues at the Everyman Palace until Saturday April 7th (021 4501673)