Following 2011’s sold out, inaugural play, the House, Sports & Social Committee of the Ulster Reform Club announced another evening of live theatre, this year to commemorate the sinking of the Titanic.

The disaster that was the sinking of the Titanic occurred on the night of April 14/15 1912. It was not only the worst maritime accident in history with the loss of over fifteen hundred people but it also heralded the end of an era.

A small group of local people have formed a company limited by guarantee to commission (with the support of the Arts Council) a number of new works for a festival of creative arts in the week leading up to the 100th anniversary of the loss of the Titanic.

This Festival sought to reflect the creative energy that drove the people of Belfast in the first decade of the twentieth century in industrial terms and which now continues to permeate the arts in this small part of the world.

The Festival  comprised a play about emigration in the Lyric Theatre; a specially commissioned song cycle performed in the Public Record Office in Titanic Quarter; an art exhibition in the Golden Thread Theatre; a new “Requiem for the lost souls of the Titanic” in St. Anne’s Cathedral by local composer – Philip Hammond; and a one man play performed in the Barge beside the Waterfront Hall.

This newly commissioned one-man play is from the pen of one of the leading Titanic experts my friend, John Wilson Foster, formerly Professor of English in the University of British Columbia, who has in retirement moved back to his native Northern Ireland. Last night I attended the event with another of his old friends, my father-in-law Douglas Carson.  

A Better Boy was Jack’s first essay on stage and was based on the last hour of Thomas Andrews, the designer of Titanic and a member of the Ulster Reform Club who was lost in the tragedy. His memorial is on the wall of the third level landing of the Club. The play was staged by Kabosh the Belfast-based, multi-award winning theatre company, and feautured a masterly performance by the incomparable actor Lalor Roddy.

Thomas Andrews

Lord Pirrie, chairman and Managing Director of Harland & Wolff, another former member of our Club, has agreed to an interview in which he will remember his nephew Tommie-Thomas Andrews, chief designer of RMS Titanic. It is 1917, just before Pirrie is called upon to take wartime control of British merchant shipping. Pirrie’s memories and musings soon become a personal journey and a bold manifesto.Iparticularly liked his references to our mutual home village of Conlig.

Pirrie and his interviewer are in the smoking room of his Witley Park mansion in Surrey, Lord Pirrie’s third home. Above his head is a glass dome,for astonishingly the room is under the water of a lake.The irony goes unremarked. 

Supper menu 

Beef & wild Mushroom Pie with a rich Red Wine Jus

&

Goujons of fresh Plaice, Cod & Salmon

In a crispy Tempura Batter, with a roasted Sun-blush Tomato & Chive Sauce 

Vegetable fried Rice

Peppered Scallop Potatoes

A selection of freshly prepared Salads & home-made Breads 

Freshly ground & brewed Coffee

served with hand-rolled Truffles 

Dress: Black Tie

‘by ticket only’