Confessions Of A City Supporter, Hull Truck Theatre, Hull, September 16 until October 8

THE perennial pantomime sidekick to Berwick Kaler at York Theatre Royal is bouncing back in a new Alan Plater play that celebrates the centenary of Hull City Football Club. Martin Barrass, himself a son of Hull, is putting the Tigers in his tank in Confessions Of A City Supporter, playing the lead role. He is over the moon, as he tells Charles Hutchinson

Martin, we have grown accustomed to seeing your pantomime stooge adopting all manner of superhero guises. Now you are to play an everyman football fan, just William, Hull City nut. Who is he?

"He's the narrator, telling the story of four generations of a family of fans, all called William and all born on the day of a nil-nil draw. The play is like stand-up comedy with interruptions. As I narrate the tale, the earlier generations will challenge me or I'll insist on them demonstrating the story, sometimes begrudgingly as it unfolds.

"William, or Bill as he's called, is married, or at least he gets married in the play. He doesn't come into the story until towards the end, because we're looking back at the earlier generations, and then we see his life, from boyhood to becoming a maths teacher. Hence his Peter Snow-like obsession with statistics, such as the Long Dark Night Of The Soul, the 1998-1999 season when City were bottom of Division Three and were faced with dropping out of the League."

Does it help to be a football fan when watching this play?

"It's an affectionate comic piece, and the whole thing is full of heart, but what distinguishes it as a clever piece of writing by one of Britain's great playwrights is that it really is for general consumption, even if it probably helps if you're a fan.

"But Alan told us how one time he went to America, some old guy said 'If you're going to put over a piece of information, try to wrap it up in a gag', and that's what he does.

"The play may seem to have a narrow band of interest, but not at all. It will appeal to anyone who's had a passion for anything. The whole thing opens out into a more general look at life with a tremendous twist at the end. There's no real sentimentality about the writing; it's more about empathy, and we've all met people like the characters in this play."

Hull playwright Alan Plater is a long-suffering Hull City supporter himself, isn't he?

"Alan, Tom Courtenay and Roy North - who is in the play with me - are all big City fans, and they all used to travel to matches together in Alan's car. They all live in London now, and up to about six years ago, any time City were playing in London or the Home Counties, they would go to the game.

"Apparently at Saturday matinees, Tom's radio in his dressing room is always tuned to the football."

You have been to a couple of Hull City matches this season, watching with Alan Plater. How did he behave at a match?

"Cut him in two and he bleeds amber and black. He was doing a lot of shoulder charges! Like a theatre director watching actors, he was playing the game as he watched it, full of twitches! Normally, he has a lugubrious face but when the game was on, he could have been Frank Skinner on stage."

This is Alan's second play on Hull City. How come?

"Gareth Tudor Price, Hull Truck's associate director, had talked to Alan about re-writing his 1970 play, The Tigers Are Coming, written when City were on the crest of a wave. Alan said, 'Well, look, why don't I write a brand new play from scratch about the club's centenary?'.

"With City getting promoted last season, he's been able to make that promotion seem like an event of almost biblical proportions in the play."

Confession time, Martin. You are known to be a lover of Yorkshire cricket, but are you are a Hull City fan?

"At heart I'm a Hull Kingston Rovers fan, a Rugby League fan, but the thing is if you have a passion for any sport, it has its parallels with theatre. You live it, you breathe it, you tend to ignore your loved one, and you just can't help it, but if your team is doing well, it's like walking on water.

"On press night next Friday, Ken Wagstaff and Chris Chilton will be there in the audience, and for me, as a kid growing up in Hull, they were living legends. It was like having Jason and the Argonauts down the road."

Confessions Of A City Supporter, Hull Truck Theatre, Hull, September 16 until October 8, kick-off 8pm. Box office: 01482 323638.

Updated: 15:44 Thursday, September 09, 2004