Next Stop from Bere is broadway
The road had suddenly turned the colour of burnished pewter, and shafts of sunlight illuminated the fat grey rain clouds.
A fiery red glow in the sky was reflected in the rolling sea, ahead of the fast falling darkness.
A special ferry had been laid on for family and friends going to the Bere Island school concert, and a late ferry to take us back to the mainland afterwards, where some of us were going for a pint and a Chinese meal.
Preparing this year’s concert called for a Herculean effort on the part of the school’s two teachers, Deirdre O’Donohue and Katrina Ladden. I have frequently been amazed by their ability to organise and channel the not inconsiderable energies of the young children in their charge, while maintaining the steady flow of schoolwork during the exciting run-up to Christmas.
For the concert, there have been costumes to source, lines to be learned, dance steps to be memorised and backdrops to be painted.
The programme includes a nativity, carols, Christmas songs, tin whistles, Irish dancing, and Windflyer, the play I have written for these great kids and helped them to work. It added up to a vast amount of work for their teachers, who are determined that these children will be rehearsed and then rehearsed again, so that they will give of their best on the big night.
As I drove through Rossmacowen towards the ferry, I realised with some surprise that I was getting nervous about the performance. Was it because I would be making my stage debut later on, as a dragon, a small but (I like to think) significant role involving some pithy lines?
No, that wasn’t it. It was the thought that the play that I have written for these great kids wouldn’t come off as well as I hoped, perhaps because I’d left some indefinable essence out of the story.
As the lights of Castletownebere appeared beneath me, I took a deep breath and decided that even if that was the case, it was a bit too late to do anything about it.
Anyway, in the rehearsals, the children had without exception remembered all their lines, and invested them with an impressive amount of wit and enthusiasm that would do credit to a professional troupe of performers.
It was a grey and murky evening in Castletownbere, the strings of coloured lights swayed giddily above the main street and with just a few days to go before Christmas the town was busy with shoppers scurrying to avoid the showers. I saw that the Bere Island ferry has just pulled in on the quayside, and the large ramp was lowered onto the slipway.
As darkness covered the peninsula, the wind gained strength, and the sea became sullen and choppy.
While I admire and respect the sea in its majesty, it will never be my natural environment, and I tend to regard its moods with a certain amount of scepticism. I was glad that tonight’s journey across that midnight-black stretch of water would only take 10 minutes. As it happened, the atmosphere on board the ferry had a distinctly festive air, with islanders heading home from distant parts for the holidays, grandparents looking forward to seeing the youngest family members perform, and other mainlanders all set to enjoy the annual school concert.
The weather had worsened, if anything, when we reached the island, and there was a scramble for cars to take us up to the Heritage Centre. Everyone was scooped up, no question of anyone getting left behind. This automatic looking out for each other is one of the things I like most about the island.
Christmas lights adorned the few houses our convoy passed as we climbed the hill to the Centre, where a flurry of activity indicated we were in for a full house.
In the large room normally used as an office, which we had taken over as a backstage, the excitement was palpable. Children ran about with no particular purpose and greeted each new arrival enthusiastically. In the main room, formerly the old school house, the crowd were settling in.
I had never seen this old room at night, and the transformation was impressive. Clouds of tiny Christmas lights hung from the ceiling. Somehow, it was easy to imagine the generations of children who came here, in the shadows cast by the old walls.
GERALDINE was in place — manning the lights — and over in the corner Teresa was ready with the audio effects. And thanks to the organisational skills of the teachers, each child had his or her costumes and props in bags, and had been assigned their space in the now-packed room.
There was even a plan for the first major costume change, which I was helping with, to avoid any danger of the junior infants’ little fingers fumbling over stubborn turbans, beards or angel wings. This operation went like clockwork and in next to no time the little ones were in their costumes, standing in orderly lines ready to go — and suddenly it really was Christmas.
The children of Ballinaskilla School sang Christmas songs, and the juniors’ nativity was a triumph, with a serene Mary and a doughty Joseph.
I remembered a story from a friend of mine, who worked in a deprived area of inner city Nottingham, about a nativity she’d assisted with.
Their play was centred round the crèche’s Wendy House, suitably festooned with tinsel and greenery. When the three kings arrived on stage, one of them poked his head in the door and politely asked Mary how the baby was. Without missing a beat, Mary, not quite five years old, replied serenely, “Oh Jesus, he’s been a right little bugger all day”.
But that’s the thing about the nativity, it only seems to increase in stature with such individualistic interpretations.
It was a magical evening on Bere Island, and an admirable show case for the many talents of the island’s children — traditional music and dance, favourite Christmas songs, and of course, our play Windflyer.
I needn’t have worried. The cast brought the play to life, taking us effortlessly back to 726, the invasion of Bere by a renegade band of Vikings, and the distressed islanders’ plan to seek help from King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table. There’s a quest, of course, and poetic licence being what it is, the intercession of Lorcan, one of the Knights, but originally from Bere.
And then there was the dragon, whose impressive head was ably supported by one of our cast, who also played a Viking. I have to confess that I hadn’t actually learned my lines as the voice of the dragon, delivered from out of sight behind a panel.
The young Viking was less than impressed by this failing. “Why have you got your script?” she asked suspiciously. The cast had dispensed with theirs ages ago. “Well actually, I haven’t my lines learned,” I confessed reluctantly. She shook her head despairingly and sighed.
Happily, despite this embarrassing oversight, our play was a huge success, enjoyed by children and audience alike. I can’t say when I’ve enjoyed myself more.
