‘You could say that veteran actor George Shane (68) about to tackle the role of Norman the da in Graham Reid’s new addition to the Billy canon at the Lyric Theatre Love Billy has reached the sixth to seventh thespian age. Not without ears or eyes fortunately – and definitely not doing TV life insurance ads – but sans stomach since Mr Shane needed radical surgery after suffering cancer five years ago. Yet this amiable man whose default position is humour definitely has the stomach for the role of Norman Martin in Love Billy. Approaching the final run-throughs Shane says‘It’s a big role and I’m onstage from beginning to end but I love it. There’s a scene where it’s his 74th birthday party and he gets shaved first. I enjoy it because I’m going in and out of reality. The emotions turn on a syllable – it keeps you on your toes.’\r\n\r\nBelfast born and bred Shane attended the boys’ model school in Ballysillan Roadand started at the Lyric in the 1980s when it was a repertory theatre. ‘It was a real old fashioned rep with a new play every four weeks. I remember doing Graham Reid’s Remembrance there with Sam McCready a director I really respected.’\r\n\r\nShane trained at the Royal Scottish Academy Glasgow and won most of the glittering prizes on offer. He got Best Actor for his role in Pinter’s The Caretaker. ‘My first job was as Denis in The Caretaker and my second was in Brian Friel’s Freedom of the City.’\r\nShane sounds relaxed for a man who nearly had a brush with the big sleep just a few years back. A diabetic the medics discovered pre-cancerous cells during an endoscopy. After three years Shane developed cancer and needed an operation. He says ‘I attribute my illness to a misspent middle age ciggies and drinking and working six days a week. I had the lifestyle and got the disease I deserved.’ Happily he’s in fine form now something he puts down to the care of his other halfwife and former schoolteacher Mary Claire with whom he lives in Strabane. ‘We married in 1979 and she keeps me right.’\r\n\r\nHaving conquered the big C taking on the role made famous by Jimmy Ellis in the original Billy plays holds no fears for Shane. ‘It gives me a competitive edge. Anyhow Jimmy whom I know is a darling. I played Tommy Agnew one of the hard men around Billy in the original production.’ Shane says that it was clear Kenneth Branagh the original Billy and now a friend was going to be a star. ‘Well he came highly recommended by Graham Reid who spotted him at RADA. When Ken started his Renaissance Theatre Company he asked me to act one of the paramilitaries in the play he wrote.’\r\n\r\nShane has done his fair share of hard men since and Norman Martin is the latest in a distinguished line. So how does he create the necessary anger? ‘You either imagine situations or base the character on someone you know. Norman is old Belfast and I’ve based him on my own father William John who died a year ago. In a way it’s my tribute to him.’\r\n\r\nShane’s irrepressible energy is partly the effect of Dr Stage. ‘I do feel it’ll be all right on the night yes. As I have no gastric juices I get a bit windy. They say ‘Break a leg.’ to other actorsthey tell me not to break too much wind.’\r\nThe man about to celebrate his 74th birthday and the return of his prodigal son on the Lyric’s main stage ends the chat with a roar of laughter.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n<a href=”http://niscene.co.uk/reprising-billy/” title=”Read full article online here” target=”_blank”></a>’