Maybe Rupert Murdoch can lob £600 million at Manchester United, but Brian Dempsey doesn't carry that kind of cash. The Scottish businessman's campaign to take over the running of Celtic Football Club needs the hearts and minds of hundreds of Irish shareholders and thousands of Irish fans; The Celtic Story is Dempsey's travelling road show. It was commissioned 10 years ago to mark the club's centenary, but this Dempsey-financed production is the musical pageant's first trip outside its native Glasgow. A far cry from angsty post-modern paeans to football fandom (a la Fever Pitch), it's essentially a warm embrace between the club and its community, the nth generation Irish in the west of Scotland.
Written by David MacLennan and David Anderson, The Celtic Story comes from an honourable British tradition of what might be called civic theatre. Aimed at a broad (though definitely Celtic-minded) audience, it spoons out large doses of palatable, right-on social history and (didactically) emphasises those elements of the club's story that run counter to the bigoted Catholic viewpoint of some fans.
The Celtic Story tries to be only peripherally about football itself, following the club's fortunes over 100 years through the lives of its supporters - women and men alike. There's some fine ensemble playing, nice costumes, effective comedy and stylish musical numbers (including a little hint of Brecht-Weill for a Depression-era tune); nonetheless, the dragged-along non-fan might find it long at close to three hours.
The show's vision of Ireland (home of "famine by landlords' decree") is also peripheral, and unapologetically emigrant-romantic, which is to be expected. Its vision of football and of Glasgow is more inexcusably nostalgic; its updated response to the era of Sky Sports, of continental players and of multicultural Scotland seems to be the fervent prayer that it will all just go away.
Runs until Saturday, September 19th. To book phone 01-6771717
