Fringe Round-Up

Edinburgh Festival: God Save Ireland Cried The Hero

Michael Collins - shot by both sides - Irish hero or opportunist charlatan? Discuss. We might finally have the chance now, with a forthcoming blockbuster movie upsetting all sides, while this new one-man play by investigative journalist Eamonn O'Neill for Wiseguise should also help redress the balance. Set in Collins's hotel room the night before his assassination in 1922, the Collins here is every inch the condemned man, racked with insecurity and doubt as he takes stock of his actions. The room essentially becomes his cell as he unwittingly (or not) dresses for death, the knife-edge creases masking the terror of the boy within. As Collins, Liam Brennan grasps the complexities and contradictions of the Heroic Gesture made vulnerable by human failing. If the text itself is overly dense - no doubt caused by O'Neill attempting the impossibility of stuffing too much information in too short a time - it doesn't detract from the bullet-in-the-back impact of the piece.

To Sat. Famous Grouse House (venue 34)

NEIL COOPER