Kindly Keep it Covered opens

Well, the Diary only got to see some of 'Kindly Keep it Covered' last night, but take our word for it, the latest Kilcullen Drama Group presentation is a hoot.

We won't give the game away, but while some people might feel that yet another farce from the group is one too many, if they steel themselves to go just once more, they'll come out with sore ribs.

Not from the seats, of course, which are still the leather best from Volvo. From the sparkling repartee of a show penned by the man who used to write all Benny Hill's scripts before that particular comedian dropped into the smutty depths.

It doesn't matter how well a show is written if the cast can't make it work. Well, even though last night was really the preview -- tonight is the gala opening -- the stalwarts of the group seemed to have their lines and their timing spot on.

There was a full house, the audience a mix of Kilcullen senior citizens and CPC Transition Year students, as is traditional here. For the forty minutes or so that the Diary was there, they all seemed to be having a ball.



Dick Dunphy was ... well, Dick Dunphy. Formidable in being so, as co-player Daffyd O'Shea might have said while he was playing a (false) French persona.

And what can one say about Vivian Clarke? Without folding up at the recollection ...

Philomena Breslin's over the top is classical, and there are other performances, main and cameo, which we'll be going back to see. Eilish Phillips is one of the former, and in a completely different way to Philomena's, just as great. And if you want a vision of the classic mother in law from Hell, Siobhan Cullen puts it into perspective.



Before the run is over, we'll have a proper review. In the meantime, if the foregoing has whetted your appetite, just go and see it and enjoy it and make your own judgement.

And if it hasn't, that's our fault. Go and see it anyway.

Brian Byrne.