Panti’s coming home to Ballinrobe

Panti’s coming home to Ballinrobe


Ciara Galvin

HE has entertained audiences in London, Sydney, Dublin and Galway but Rory O’Neill and his alter ego Panti Bliss are facing their toughest show yet.
After sell out shows of his stand up show as drag queen Panti Bliss, accidental gay rights activist O’Neill is bringing his show to Ballinrobe.
Though very comfortable on stage performing the hit show ‘High Heels in Low Places’, O’Neill is nervous about the May 30 show in his hometown.
Speaking to The Mayo News O’Neill said he didn’t have a problem bringing his show anywhere in the world, but that being on stage in a marquee at the top of his parents’ road was ‘just weird’.
“I haven’t really had time to think about it between shows and the Marriage Referendum. I’m not really going to think about it until the day after the referendum,” said O’Neill.
On the evening, a camera crew will follow O’Neill and film the show with parts of it to be included in a documentary entitled ‘Queen of Ireland’. The crew have been following Rory, and Panti for the past number of years, through the ‘Pantigate’ controversy with RTÉ and the ‘Noble Call’ speech which took the world by storm. The last section of filming will document Rory’s show ‘Panti Comes Home’.
Rory said the Ballinrobe show won’t be like past shows but will be ‘totally different’.
Asked what he was nervous about in staging the homecoming show, Rory said ‘living there as a boy I felt odd and that tied up with my sexuality and that’s part of my act. It will be odd to bring that back.’
Although he is admittedly nervous, the owner of Pantibar on Dublin’s Capel Street, said he thinks he will look back on it as something he will be ‘glad I did’.
Tickets for the 400 seater show went on sale in Ballinrobe yesterday (Monday) from Feerick Property in Abbey Street. With over half of the tickets now sold people are urged to get their tickets as soon as possible.
Tickets are priced at €25 and all proceeds of the sales go to the Maple Youth Centre, Hope House, Western Care Association and Ballinrobe Rugby Club.