The only thing dramatic about the first day of Senator George Mitchell's review was the weather. The heavens opened and the rain poured down on press, politicians and peace campaigners alike.
At least the politicians made it inside. It was dry and warm and comfortable in Stormont's Castle Buildings. But the rest of us were kept firmly at the gates. The Portakabins where telephones, desks, food and drink were once provided for journalists had been removed.
There were Portaloos but nothing else. "It's zero facilities," said one amazed hack. "Where are we meant to shelter - the bushes?" asked another. "There's not even a waste paper bin," complained a cameraman. "What do we do with our cans and cigarette packets, throw them on the ground?"
An RTE reporter said at Dublin Castle events, the media were provided with "three-course meals and freebie packs with miniature bottles of whiskey". There wasn't even a glass of water on offer at Stormont.
The Northern Ireland Office had thoughtfully protected the grass with plastic grids. "They think more of the bloody grass than they do of us," snapped one reporter.
The lack of media facilities was the first controversy Mr Mitchell faced at his press conference. If the powers that be didn't want journalists there, why didn't they just lock us out, asked one angry reporter.
"You have a job to do," said Mr Mitchell. But he didn't offer a convincing explanation. NIO staff claimed the situation was deliberate. Mr Mitchell didn't want a media circus at Stormont.
It would put too much pressure on the politicians. So, in the meantime, the press suffered. Mr Mitchell met half the political parties yesterday. They were the big guns - metaphorically speaking - Sinn Fein, the Ulster Unionists, the DUP and the SDLP.
It's the smaller parties' turn today. The SDLP delegation was minus John Hume, who is recovering from an operation in Austria. Like an injured footballer, he would be "out for the rest of the season", a party spokesman explained.
Another SDLP member confided that he wasn't coping well with being out of the action. "He is climbing the walls. He has made a dozen phone calls already this morning. He is ripping that he is missing all this. I wouldn't fancy being a nurse on his ward tonight."
"Who are those fellows?" asked an English reporter, new in town, as Sinn Fein arrived. As each delegation approached about 20 peace protesters shouted: "What do we want? An Executive! When do we want it? Now!"
Sinn Fein, unsurprisingly, was the only party which shook their hands. But the Shinners had their problems. As Pat Doherty addressed the media, a loyalist heckler claimed to have been told he was on an IRA death list.
"Who are the IRA going to murder now?" he yelled. "What's your name?" asked a reporter. "Never mind my name. Now there is a rascal," he said, pointing at an innocuous looking Mitchel McLaughlin.
Eventually the man wandered off. "We intend to go in here with, as the Americans say, a can-do attitude," continued Mr Doherty, showing that Sinn Fein's old anti-imperialist rhetoric is long gone.
As David Trimble appeared on the steps, the peace campaigners shouted: "Come on, David, don't be shy. Give the Executive a try." If Mr Trimble was impressed, he certainly wasn't showing it.
The DUP was full of determined defiance when it arrived to tell Mr Mitchell why it was boycotting his review. Wasn't the party just trying to wreck the Belfast Agreement, a journalist asked?
"Yes, we are out to wreck anything that is going to destroy our province and fill our graveyards with Ulster's dead," said the Rev Ian Paisley with pride. By the afternoon, the rain was coming down in torrents.
Journalists, sheltering under umbrellas, clutched rain-sodden notebooks. Hats and caps provided scant protection. Even the peace campaigners' priorities had changed. "What do we want?
Hot soup and tea! When do we want it? Now!"