A review of "Anyone Could Rob A Bank"
Performed in Cullybackey High School, on Thursday 14 October 2010

The Country Players have proven themselves over the years as a well produced stage act with their hilarious comedy plays. This year "The Players" returned to the July Summer Theatre in Portrush with "Anyone could rob a Bank" by Thomas Coffey. As someone who knows nothing about drama, I went along to Cullybackey High School curious to find if "The Players" could pull it off this year without the immense stage influence of my good friend Mervyn Dickey who switched over to co - producing the Play along with Margaret Ferguson.

The title "Anyone could rob a Bank" intrigued me as being some sort of serious drama perhaps along the line of cops and robbers theme. Nothing could have been further from the mark as characters entirely fictional played out an eventful week set in Cloughmills in the 1960's. The drama centred on and an outrageous plot to rob the local Bank, all in the imagination of the lead act Peter "Badger"Grey (Kenneth Rock) and his associates Jerry Grey and Windy O'Connell (Sammy Park).

I couldn't help but think these characters remind me of some sort of TV sitcom and even the story behind farce pointed towards an episode of BBC's "Last of the Summer Wine". There was the ever popular Robert Harbinson playing Jerry Grey a Ballymena version of Compo the late (Bill Owen) on the BBC series. As the drama unfolded, a box of bank notes appeared in the living room of Peter "Badger" Grey apparently, after the Bank had been robbed in circumstances similar to the imaginary plot of the three rouges.

As to who carried out the raid on the Bank we will never know, but it was wonderful entertainment as suspicion past from character to character in a pass the parcel type fashion. Other actors in the play included Noreen Grey (Ashley Harbinson), Sarah Grey (Alison Caldwell), Tony O'Shea (Andrew McAuley), Sergeant O'Hara (Mark McAuley) and Mickey Grey (John Christie).

The "Players" will be performing their play at a number of venues during the autumn and I would recommend anyone to go along and see "Anyone could rob a Bank".

Jimbo for galgormparks.com

The cast of "Anyone could rob a Bank" from left to right Robert Harbinson, Ashley Harbinson, Mark McAuley, Andrew McAuley, Kenneth Rock, Alison Caldwell, John Christie and Sammy Park