A LONG AND BUSY DAY by Donal Kennedy

I was up early to hear the result of the American Elections. Interesting but my comment would be superfluous.

Then I went to the Garrick Theatre to see the Kenneth Branagh Company’s brilliant revival of John Osborne’s”The Entertainer” , first staged starring Laurence Olivier in 1957. The eponymous anti-hero is a seedy and cynical music hall comedian in the dying days of music hall, a metaphor for the British Empire ( some 40 years after Ireland’s “failed” 1916 Rising, though that’s not mentioned in the play or the programme.)

But the play is set during the 1956 Suez Fiasco when  British Prime Minister Anthony Eden, in his own words attempted” to knock Nasser off his perch” and conspired with the French and the Israelis to launch an attack on Egypt.The three conspiratorial regimes lied through their teeth. The British and the French withdrew in ignominy when the  USA refused to support them and threatened a run on the pound. The British Labour Party repudiated  the aggression and its newspaper the Daily Herald commented “A squalid episode ends in a pitiable climb-down……Our moral authority in the world has been destroyed. Eden resigned, a broken man. ( Though it’s no part of the play Labour had to wait nearly eight years as Harold MacMillan, who might have been a template for Archie Rice, the seedy Entertainer, went on with the show.)

After the show my lady wife and I dined in the German Gymnasium in Kings Cross, where Michael Collins and other Irish Volunteers used regularly drill before crossing to Dublin in 1916 and inspiring anti-imperialist patriotsacross the globe  – Indians, Egyptians,Vietnamese and others. Some failure, some neck!!

It’s been a long day and inspiration has dried up for the moment.

But if you haven’t tired of my writings you could Google a number of pieces I had published some years ago-

THE GENIUS OF FATHER TED.

THREE CHEERS FOR THE INFORMATION AGE.

HUMBUG, HYPOCRISY AND THE  ART OF THE SMEAR.

RUN IT UP THE FLAGPOLE.

IRISH DEMOCRACY AND ITS ENEMIES.

SAINTED BEFORE HIS TIME.

SHAMING THE DEVIL.

FAVOURED SCRIBE OF THE RIGHT.

PEDIGREE OF A PORKY.

BREANDAN MACLUA 1935-2009.

GAGGING FOR A ROYAL VISIT.