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Saturday, August 31, 2024

YESTERDAY’S HERO

 

(Left: Patrick Kenny. Pic supplied))

 Yesterday’s Hero is a hilarious one-man play about surviving and hanging on in-spite of the misfortunes and disappointments that life throws at you. It’s a semi-biographical story about the ups and downs of actor, writer and director Patrick Kenny. From his days as a comedian on East Coast Radio to playing dodgy Doctor Wallace on eTV’s soapie Imbewu, which comes to the Pumpkin Theatre in Ballito on September Friday 6 and September  Sunday 8.

 After surviving cancer in 2019, Covid in 2020 and political riots in 2021, Patrick decided, while recuperating in a government hospital from a very painful haemorrhoids operation in 2022, to go back and perform a one-man play at the National Arts Festival after a 25-year hiatus. With the help and encouragement of his wife Shannon and friends, Aaron & Lisa McIlroy, Yesterday’s Hero was created.

Loosely based on Patrick’s career and life, the story follows our hero as he bounces from fame to misfortune and back again in the pinball machine of life. It’s filled with hilarious stories. Some true, some almost true. Like how he really got the lead role in the famous 1998 New York Castle Lager tv advert or how he and his wife briefly become champions for the Latvian cause against Russian oppression.

Yesterday’s Hero - it’s about being ALMOST famous!

So, follow minor “celebrity” Patrick as he moves up and down the snakes and ladders of fame and fortune. From ECR drive time comedian to pushing a beer trolley in the New York Castle Lager tv advert and finally as Dr Wallace on eTV’s soapie Imbewu. Directed by multi-award-winning comedian Aaron McIlroy and written by and starring 2020 Ovation winner Patrick Kenny.

Yesterday’s Hero will be at the Pumpkin Theatre in Ballito on September 6 at 19h00 and September 8 at 14h00 – book tickets https://www.pumpkintheatre.co.za

“In Yesterday’s Hero, Patrick Owen Kenny is a ridiculously marvellous raconteur. Both his physical presence on stage and biographical narrative is larger than life. He is so funny that you keep guessing between what is really true and where an over-stretched imagination has scripted this outrageously hilarious work. If ever there was a formula to write an autobiography that can tickle every single funny bone then certainly Patrick Kenny has mastered the art.” - Dr Ismail Mahomed