`The members of this congregation believe in the freedom of individuals to form their own opinions and fashion their own faith, free from compulsion or coercion from any ecclesiastical or civil authority. We do not seek to exclude persons because of their beliefs nor do we seek to impose ours upon them. We welcome all who are seeking to work out and understand the purpose of life, with freedom of thought and without constraint of uniformity." These words, engraved on a plaque outside First Presbyterian Church in Belfast's Rosemary Street, could justifiably be interpreted as a statement of intent on behalf of the play that is soon to be performed in its austerely imposing central hall. They could have been coined by its writer and spoken by its central character. And the fact that this church was once one of three Presbyterian places of worship, which lay in the city centre, at the spiritual heart of the United Irishmen's movement in the 1790s, injects a thrilling resonance into the revival of Stewart Parker's Northern Star by the three-handed partnership of Field Day, Tinderbox Theatre Company and the Belfast Festival at Queen's.

Stephen Rea will direct the play that some people believe Parker wrote with him specifically in mind. In the pivotal role of the rebel leader, Henry Joy McCracken, he has cast Ballycastle actor Conleth Hill, who recently got glowing reviews for his solo performance in Andrew Hinds's The Starving at the Dublin Theatre Fringe Festival. "I have no knowledge of Stewart having written the role for me," Rea declares. "But I knew from the start that I wanted Conleth for this production. After that, the rest of the casting was accomplished very quickly. I was able pick out almost immediately those who seemed to be on for the work, who showed a willingness to try to do it." A softly-spoken, unassuming man, whose natural reticence disguises a massively versatile talent, Hill has no intention of being overawed by the huge stage persona of McCracken, as created by Parker. "I'm approaching it as I would any role, without complacency or ambition. If you were to let it get under you and be overwhelmed by it, you would be lost. I never think too much about the size or the significance of a role. If I did, I would be terrified. I'd probably never work again." Around him will appear some of the North's best known young actors, many of them involved with Tinderbox since its establishment, 10 years ago. Paula McFetridge will play McCracken's sister Mary-Ann, Annie Farr, his mistress, Mary Boden, with Micheal Doherty, a company stalwart in its earliest days, making an eagerly-awaited return to his home town, as Simon Magill, Maggie Hayes and Peter Ballance complete the Northern contingent, with Dubliner Sean Campion closing the circle. Belfast musician and composer Neil Martin, a long-time associate of Rea, is musical director.

On the production side, familiar names with distinguished Field Day connections ring out - designer Bob Crowley, lighting designer Conleth White and painter Basil Blackshaw, emerging from rural seclusion to design the poster, as he did in the halcyon days of the Derry-based company. It is a happy coming together of two of the North's most radical companies, though neither party wishes anything of overbearing significance to be read into their union. In each case, they are quick to point out, the play was the thing. "We had a passion for the play," recalls Tinderbox joint artistic director, Stephen Wright. "It is our 10th birthday year and the 200th anniversary of the 1798 Rebellion. We were acutely aware of the importance of the play and how much we wanted to get it into the Tinderbox repertoire this year. We heard that Stephen was keen to direct it and, after many phone calls and faxes, it all came together."

Likewise, Rea puts the emphasis where he always placed it during his time with Field Day. "I only ever wanted to do a play, if we had a play to do. Field Day came together to do Translations and it so happened that an incredible string of plays followed. But after touring Ireland for 10 years, I called a halt. There were other things I wanted to do. Field Day has actively continued with its publishing work and this, I suppose, is a form of revival of its performing arm. I had the rights to do Northern Star but not the means. This partnership with Tinderbox and the Belfast Festival has provided the means." The staging of the play in this atmospheric setting is an added incentive to the two companies to attempt something a little more complex and challenging than a straightforward theatrical experience. The play, with its abrupt changes of language and form, its sidesteps into the styles of other distinguished writers and its intellectual examination of ideas, is a piece of artistic daring, perfectly in harmony with the philosophy of First Presbyterian Church.

"It is important to remember that this is a non-subscribing Presbyterian congregation," Wright points out. "It is a very liberal tradition. McCracken and his family belonged to one of the more traditional and conservative congregations, though this was , of course, before the schism that took place in Presbyterianism. The fact that they have been prepared for us to come in here and put on this play is a tribute to their open-mindedness." Rea, too, is buoyed up at the resonance of the setting and keen to return to the Presbyterian consciousness the long-denied credit for its contribution to Irish culture. "There is an amnesia amongst Protestants in this town about their part in the creation and preservation of so much of the culture of modern Ireland. It is no coincidence that in this play, Parker calls upon writers who were almost all Protestant - Synge, O'Casey, Farquhar, Beckett, Shaw, Boucicault, Wilde; the exception is Behan. "It could be that the context for Northern Star has finally come. The ideals of 1798 were wiped out by sectarianism and 200 of bigotry and discrimination followed. The life-blood of ideas was cut off and we were the poorer for it. This church was built to hear ideas; its ideology is shot through with debate and discussion.

"The play is based on a very daring, intellectual conceit, it is deliberately artificial, its currency is ideas. Here in the North we are possibly moving towards new attitudes; there is a demand for renewal and reassessment. By opting to do it outside a conventional theatrical context, we are setting up the possibility for something to happen. It will be heard quite differently here from the way it would be, say, at the Lyric (where it was premiered in 1985), where audiences have an endless capacity to absorb whatever is presented to them. "I would compare doing Northern Star here with doing Translations in the Guildhall in Derry. The setting itself has the potential for cultural combustion. We have a licence to explore ideas in the very place where they were introduced and then wiped out 200 years ago. I am hoping that something very significant will soon occur in this beautiful building."

Northern Star runs at the First Presbyterian Church on Rosemary Street from Saturday, November 14th until Saturday, December 5th, at 8 p.m.