Walter MacDonagh: Key figure in Sligo theatrical and social life

Walter MacDonagh, who died aged 92, was a key figure in the social and theatrical life of Sligo for many decades. He was a founding member of the Sligo Drama Circle and every year during the Yeats Summer School, he directed productions of Yeats’s plays.

His interest in the theatre began in his home town of Strokestown, Co Roscommon, where, with a group of friends, he formed the Saint Asicus Players, “because there was nothing else to do”. While it lasted for only a year, the group presented a play at the Western Drama Festival in Tubbercurry, then in only its second year.

He left Strokestown for Dublin to train as a chef in the Clarence Hotel, but studied in the Brendan Smith Academy in his spare time. Following a hotel strike, he began working in catering in CIÉ and was sent to the Great Southern Hotel in Sligo for a month.

He never left, eventually opening a guest house and restaurant, the Bonne Chère in High Street, which was to become a social centre for all those interested in theatre and the arts, a sort of unofficial arts club, where Walter’s skills as a raconteur shone.

Shortly after arriving in Sligo he joined Sligo Unknown Players, but a group of its members, including Walter, broke away to form the Sligo Drama Circle. This campaigned throughout the 1970s for a purpose-built theatre for Sligo, culminating in the opening of the Hawk’s Well Theatre.

In subsequent years, he directed numerous plays for the Drama Circle, including most of the plays of WB Yeats. His family was drawn into these efforts, with his daughter, Kate (later to become an artist), making masks for Yeats's Noh plays, and his other daughter, Mary (now a choreographer-director), directing him in The Playboy of the Western World in 1992.

Awards

His awards in the world of amateur theatre included winning the Ulster Drama Cup at the Opera House, Belfast with JM Synge’s

The Playboy of the Western World

in 1967 and several All-Ireland one-act play winners in Athlone and Naas. He was also a prolific actor in a variety of roles that included Hamm in Beckett’s

Endgame

, the Tailor in

The Tailor and Ansty

and SB O’Donnell in Brian Friel’s

Philadelphia, Here I Come

.

However, his interests were not limited to the theatre and he and his wife were deeply socially committed. His daughter Kate remembers them bringing full Christmas dinners from the restaurant to needy families every year. “We thought this was normal until we were adults,” she said. When the St Vincent de Paul set up a Christmas day dinner for those who did not have families, it was hosted by the Bonne Chère, and evolved into a social service centre. When Walter sold the restaurant, he worked in the social service centre cooking for Meals on Wheels.

Teaching

Walter greatly enjoyed teaching speech and drama in schools, which he did for many years. “I’m a firm believer that drama can be a great confidence booster for youngsters,” he told the

Sligo Champion

in 1993.

“I never look upon it in the sense of building a career for the kids, because trying to make stars out of children is a load of rubbish. The real importance is giving them that bit of self-confidence.”

His wife, Kay, predeceased him by 24 years and he is survived by his daughters, Mary and Kate, his sons-in-law and three grandchildren.