Richard Harris

OVER 2,000 people crammed into Kilkee to hear Hollywood superstar Russell Crowe belt out a song dedicated to his late friend, Richard Harris.

As part of the unveiling of a statue to the Limerick man at the Pollock Holes in Kilkee, the Oscar-winning actor sang a tune he wrote in memory of his friend weeks after Harris died four years ago.

Kilkee was brought to a standstill as Crowe told the crowd from an improvised stage on the back of a truck trailer how the two first met on the set of Gladiator.

He said: "Richard told me 'There is a good night out in you, I think I am going to like you'."

Crowe, along with members of the Harris family, including Richard's three sons, Jamie, Jared and Damien, unveiled the statue, by local sculptor Seamus Connolly, which depicts Harris playing racquet ball in memory of him winning a racquet ball competition four times in a row in the west Clare resort where he used to spend much of his summer holidays.

Before the unveiling, however, Crowe told the crowd how he and Harris quickly talked about rugby when they first met.

Crowe said: "I was dressed like a Roman general and he was dressed like an Emperor and we started to talk about rugby. He said to me, 'I heard you were born in

New Zealand

and chose to live in

Australia

, so will we be abusive towards the Wallabies or speak in hushed toned about the All-Blacks?'"

Describing how he came to write the song in the weeks after Harris died in 2002, Crowe said that he arrived in Limerick and Clare "to pay homage to my friend" by visiting some of his favourite haunts.

The relaxed looking actor said: "I made a plan with Richard while he was sick in hospital that we would both go to the Irish Australia rugby match."

However, Harris died by the time the match was played and Crowe said: "I had a ticket and went anyway. There was a long period when

Ireland

did not beat

Australia

so it must have been very painful for you, but that particular day, for the first time in 37 years

Ireland

beat

Australia

and I knew that Richard was there."

Crowe said that after the match he was by himself drinking a pint of Guinness and wrote the verse in memory of his friend. He said: "It was written on the back of a beer coaster so it's very short."

Backed by local singers, a guitarist and an uileann piper, Crowe sang the” Requiem in the Idiom of a Football Song" with the crowd clapping to the tune. The words the actor sang were:

Mr. Harris take the field, And play the 16th man, We'll sing of Athenry, And you'll do all you can, For the green, The glorious green, The emerald green, Of Irelands pride.

We'll take the fight, We'll never yield, For Irish sons have Irish hearts, And Mr Harris, Mr Harris take the field."