THE organiser of this year’s Limerick PRIDE Festival says that the event is as important as ever as the LGBTQ community continues to campaign for marriage equality.
Evan Kennedy said the goal of Limerick PRIDE 2010 is equality, love, diversity and celebration.
“This is the fourth official Limerick PRIDE festival and it gets bigger and bigger every year.
“The business community is really behind this year’s festival and we will be having a street party outside of Trinity Rooms after the parade” said PRO Cillian Flynn.
The PRIDE Parade will start at 1pm on Saturday September 11 at City Hall and will travel down Henry Street and back up O’Connell Street to Trinity Rooms.
“This year we came one step closer to full marriage with the introduction of the Civil Partnership Bill and the organisation Marriage Equality will be represented at this year’s parade,” said Cillian.
According to him, the festival is aimed at everyone, not just the LGBTQ community.
“The day of the parade will be a colourful family day geared towards everyone, we’ll have a barbecue and plenty of entertainment”.
The week’s festivities will kick-off on Sunday September 5 with the PRIDE launch party at 31 Thomas Street.
“Highlights include a play Elegies for Angels Punks & Raging Queens, performed at the Loft by BottomDog Theatre Company starting on the Tuesday, Mr Gay Limerick on Thursday night and La Boutique in Dolans on Saturday night” said organiser Evan Kennedy.
Director of Elegies for Angels, Punks & Raging Queens, Myles Breen, spoke about his production.
“The play features songs and monologues inspired by the AIDS Memorial Quilt. Each of the monologues is written from the perspective of characters who have died from AIDS and the songs represent the feelings of friends and family dealing with their loss”.
Elegies has been performed across the world for over 20 years and this will be the first Irish production.
“It’s a stunning piece of theatre incorporating music and verse to create a very personal response. We’ll be working with Music Theatre West and the musical director is Noel Lennon, so it’s a very exciting project”.
It will feature a host of well known Limerick performers, Nigel Dugdale, Liam O’Brien, Jean McGlynn and Aoife Doolan.
