Milo, my hero

The boy in the photograph looking up in awe at one of his great heroes could not imagine, even in his wildest dreams, that the day would come when, as colleagues, they would work together in the US on some of the great plays of the Irish repertoire.

The occasion of the photograph is a story in itself. Growing up in 1950s Dublin, and determined to make a career in the theatre, I attended Ena Mary Burke’s elocution and drama classes at her Kildare Street studio.

Burkie, as we irreverently called her, was a formidable figure who expected her favoured pupils to work hard and to achieve results. Her pride in her successful graduates was tremendous, and we were constantly, and usually unfavourably, compared with these deities.

The movie star Maureen O’Hara got her first acting lessons under her tutelage, as did the broadcaster Eamonn Andrews. By the time I started with her, her most recent success story was the young Milo O’Shea, who had played with Micheál Mac Liammóir, Jimmy O’Dea, Maureen Potter and other theatre stars whose careers we followed as avidly as pop-music fans today might follow Justin Bieber or Lady Gaga.

The Fr Mathew Feis was the highlight of our year. This was an annual competition at which children from all over Dublin gathered to compete in music, poetry, drama and mime. It was in the latter category that I first met O’Shea. One of his great skills, among a legion, was mime. His ability to create a situation and a character without language was a gift that entranced audiences in the theatre and subsequently on television. He was the ideal adjudicator for the mime competitions at the feis.

To my great delight, I won the under-12 solo mime competition there in 1960. My winning entry was a whimsical portrait of a happy-go-lucky child sent to the shop for errands. Becoming infatuated with a dog on the way home, he loses the sausages to the hungry hound. Profoundly human and filled with dramatic potential, wouldn’t you agree?

The great treat of the day was the presentation of the gold medal by the adjudicator, my idol, Mr O'Shea. Thus came the fateful meeting, which was recorded for posterity the next day in the Irish Press . My proud mother purchased the photograph and, somehow or other, managed to get it to O'Shea for an autograph.

Obligingly, he phoned to say that he would deliver the photo, duly signed, the following Sunday. That week saw a flurry of domestic fervour as my house-proud mother insisted that we clean every nook and cranny in case our distinguished visitor caught a glimpse of the usual chaos created by five boisterous boys.

To my profound disappointment, he failed to show up that Sunday, and we resumed our less-than-careful ways. Imagine my mother’s shock when, the following Sunday, a knock on the door heralded the arrival of O’Shea and the photograph. I am sure he was scandalised by the brief look at an untidy hall table in the 15 seconds it took him to deliver the precious envelope.

Thirty years later, O'Shea was an internationally renowned stage and movie star living in New York. I had moved from acting to directing and was establishing a new career in the US. When I was asked to direct Brian Friel's early masterpiece Philadelphia, Here I Come! for a Broadway production, he was the first actor I sought for the role of SB O'Donnell, the taciturn father of Gar.

In rehearsal, I discovered that my hero lived up to all my imaginings. A warm, generous, funny man with great sensitivity and a ready smile for everyone, he instantly charmed the company, and his performance was subtle, deeply felt and profoundly moving.

He and I became firm friends and, to his utter astonishment, I gave him a copy of the much-travelled photograph as an opening-night gift.

More than 40 years after that first meeting, Milo played Fluther Good in The Plough and the Stars at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, where I am artistic director. It was his first time playing this role and would be his last stage performance.

With his innate comic skills and his deep Dublin roots, he was a definitive Fluther. I can still hear that rich Dublin voice taunting the Tommies in the final act with “Fight fair? Fight fair? Do youse want us to come out in our skins and throw stones?”

Milo O’Shea will be deeply missed, particularly by his beloved Kitty and his family. For the little boy, proud and happy in his best jumper all those years ago, and now in the “sere and yellow” stage of life, he will always be someone to look up to, and memories of his warmth, kindness and sense of fun will live on.