“Thanks God for local radio,” says Marie with pointed irony, as the weekly death notices are read out over the airwaves. “It’ll give us all our moment of fame.” The same might be said of Seamus O’Rourke’s play Ride On!, which brings life to a particular Irish small-town world and a variety of characters who will be familiar to the rural demographic that Livin’ Dred target in their touring productions.

The play is set in a ramshackle shed just hours before a motorcycle run which has been organised by the Honda 50 Club to raise funds for a variety of local charities. A group of the riders have gathered to discuss last minute plans, but most of the participants have been waylaid at the local pub, where they are sheltering from the rain. Those present are a motley bunch: dotty Doreen, the club’s secretary; monosyllabic Motor, the club’s mechanic; county councillor, Clatty; lovelorn Marie; and the energetic and idealistic Rinso, grandnephew of a local hero, who has become honorary patron to their cause. The inclement weather is fraying nerves and tempers, and it seems likely that the motorcade will never start. But then Victor Maguire, the farmer who is hosting them, arrives, full of suggestions that may or may not solve the group’s various problems. Over the course of the morning, the clouds (and the plot) thicken; fear not, though, the charities will get what they deserve.

Director Padraic McIntyre has gathered together a crew of local talent to stage Ride On! Although most of the actors are familiar faces on the Irish stage, many of the design team are drawn from Cavan’s local amateur dramatic scene. With a professional budget, however, they are given a chance to shine. Fergal Donnelly’s set is a study in naturalistic dinginess – hay bales spill from the loft, and bags of cattle feed border the stage space – while his attention to detail is rendered meticulously by Mickey McGuirk, right down to the collapsing banner advertising the event, which serves as a visual metaphor for the whole disastrous affair. Helen Foy’s costumes work as an understated complement of the characters key traits too, no more so than with Doreen, dressed in vampish red and black, whose ditziness belies a lusty streak.

McIntyre also plays a naturalistic hand in his direction of the actors, and performances by Aaron Monaghan, John Olohan, and Deirdre Monaghan are particularly strong. McIntyre casts writer Seamus O’Rourke in the part of Victor Maguire, a first-act cameo that becomes a central role in the second act, and he rises to the challenge. O’Rourke plays Victor as a recognisable character type, and the audience on the night I saw the production responded rousingly to his comic routine. What he lacked in subtlety, was more than compensated for by an amiable energy that was impossible not to warm to.

As to the play itself, Ride On! is fairly thin material. Characters are barely more than one-dimensional, storylines slide in and out of the dramatic through-line in soap-operatic fashion, and the dramaturgy is crude – there are ridiculous coincidences, deceptions featuring mobile phones, and transparent entrances and exits to move the action along. Even so, the play maintains a charming appeal. O’Rourke honed his craft on the amateur dramatic scene and it is refreshing to see work that has such popular appeal produced professionally, and it is difficult not to applaud Ride On! for what it is: a justifiably popular hit.

Sara Keating