John Ford

[JackFavell]

Lest we forget:



Happy Birthday, Pappy!

[MissGoddess]

Looooove this picture, and it's one I've never seen before!

[JackFavell]

[MissGoddess]

I love that documentary so much.

[JackFavell]

I like that clip because it shows how Bog ties every little thread together - starting with the anecdote about Welles, then suddenly, it's Welles himself narrating! And then the clarion horn signature John Ford credit.... oh, it just moves me beyond words.

I just wanted to post something for the old Bull....

[MissGoddess]

Donal Donnelly as he appeared in John Huston's The Dead.


I didn't see anything in the "Gone With Or Without Fanfare" thread about this actor's passing back in December, so I thought I'd post here since he appeared in a couple of John Ford films (and was Ford's choice at one point for the part of Sean O'Casey in Young Cassidy, which eventually went to the more bankable Rod Taylor):


From the Ulster Herald:

http://www.nwipp-newspapers.com/UH/free ... 588589.php

As The Man Says: An actor bows out


This bitter winter has deprived us of several distinguished actors of stage and screen. Some of them, such as Jennifer Jones and Jean Simmons were well known, others such as Gene Barry and Parnell Roberts less well so. In the latter category we could place Donal Donnelly, an actor of Tyrone provenance, who died in early December at the age of 79. Essentially a stage actor, Donal Donnelly was a familiar figure in quite a few movies for half a century, even though most film goers would have found it difficult to fit a name to the face. His lithe frame and lean features made him a natural as an exponent of the works of Samuel Beckett, and he was also widely praised for his interpretation of Private Gar in Brian Friel's classic play 'Philadelphia Here I Come'. Mr Donnelly's father was a doctor from east Tyrone and the future actor was born and educated in England.

He achieved a greater prominence beyond his work on the stage when he was cast by John Ford in a 1957 film called 'The Rising of the Moon', known in the US as 'Three Leaves of the Shamrock'. The film was financed by the Irish-American actor Tyrone Power and was comprised of three short films, all of them with an Irish theme. The first was virtually a two-hander (for Cyril Cusack and Noel Purcell), adapted from a story by Frank O'Connor. The second was a farce with Jimmy O'Dea and Maureen Potter among many others, entitled 'A Minute's Wait' and set at a railway station, somewhere in the Irish Midlands. The third part was an adaptation of Lady Gregory's one-act play 'The Rising of the Moon', about the springing of a Republican prisoner from Galway Jail during the black-and-tan war. Donnelly had a substantial part as one of the rescuers and this section of the film is of historic interest in that it was filmed in the Galway prison, shortly before it was demolished to make way for the huge cathedral which now stands on the site, close to the River Corrib.

In the following year, Donal Donnelly had a supporting part in another film also made in Ireland, and also set during the War of Independence. The stars were from Hollywood - James Cagney, Dana Wynter and Dan Murray and the supporting cast included young Irish actors including Donal Donnelly, Ray McAnally and Richard Harris, the latter two tending to overshadow Donnelly in his admittedly minor role.

In 1965 John Ford came to Ireland again to make a film about the early career of the Dublin dramatist Sean O'Casey. Ford is said to have favoured Donnelly in the title role, but Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, which was bank-rolling the movie 'Young Cassidy' wanted a bankable star name to guarantee American audiences. The part went to the Australian actor, Rod Taylor and Donal Donnelly's was down-sized to the role of an undertaker's assistant who refused to handle O'Casey's mother's funeral, until there is cash in hand. Ford collapsed with a heart attack a few days into the filming, and the picture was finished by Jack Cardiff. Ford recovered from his illness, but was to make only one more film. Had he lived longer, it is possible that Donal Donnelly would have moved on to bigger screen parts.

In the same year of 1965 Donnelly appeared in a British comedy entitled 'The Knack', a characteristic product of the mid-sixties, set in 'swinging London' and directed in quirky style by Dick Lester, who had recently made the Beatles movie 'A Hard Day's Night'.

In 1970 Donnelly took time out from his stage work to appear in the Russian-Italian epic 'Watermelon', directed by the celebrated Russian director Sergei Bondarchuk. Rod Steiger played Napoleon and Christopher Plummer was Wellington. Donnelly had a cameo role as an Irish foot soldier who produces a live pig from his knapsack in the presence of the Duke, as if to give substance to Wellington's alleged comment about the Inniskilling Fusiliers, "I don't know about the enemy, but they scare the hell out of me."

John Huston's last film was an elegiac screen version of James Joyce's story 'The Dead', one of the most faithful adaptations of a iterary classic ever accomplished. Many of its distinguished cast have passed away since the picture was made in 1987: Donal McCann, Marie Keane, O'Herlihy, Frank Patterson and now, Donal Donnelly. Donnelly played the part of Freddy Malins, a somewhat dissolute guest at a genteel social dinner set among a set of brittle middle-class types in a big Dublin house in the early 1900s. Donnelly more than held his own in this sterling cast of players.

About this time Donal Donnelly appeared as Rashers Tierney, in an elaborate stage version of James C Plunkett's 'Strumpet City; at the Gaiety Theatre in Dublin. The play was called 'The Risen People' and was a very expensive production, which had difficulty in covering its costs.

Francis Ford Coppola's 'Godfather III' (1990) featured, amongst a big cast, Donal Donnelly as a Machiavellion archbishop, very much at home in the Vatican's marbled halls, and not above engaging in some shady financial transactions. He seemed always to have a cigarette in his hand.

[JackFavell]

MissG-

Have you seen The Rising of the Moon?

[moira finnie]

Thank you for bringing to light the death of the beloved actor, Donal Donnelly. I had the privilege of seeing him in his one man show based on the writing of George Bernard Shaw My Astonishing Self many years ago. He is one of those unassuming actors whose public life is about the work, which he performed so well. I wish that I could have seen him in the stage revival of Don Juan in Hell that he did in 2006 as well.

Happily, he had two sons and a long marriage to his wife Patsy. I was always very touched by one interview I saw with him about twenty years ago, when he was asked about his daughter, Maryanne, who was killed in a riding accident in the mid-80s. I don't think that the man was ever quite the same, though he went on to do splendid work, especially in John Huston's last movie, The Dead.

Btw, based on the O'Casey memoir, Drums Under the Window and Pictures in the Hallway, Donnelly would have been perfect for the role of Sean O'Casey's alter ego in Young Cassidy.

[MissGoddess]

MissG-

Have you seen The Rising of the Moon?

Yes, Jackie----I found a copy of it online. It's an eclectic little anthology of Irish short story adaptations, introduced by Ty Power, and I remember Donnelly's puckish face standing out (our favorite, Jack MacGowran appears as well).

Hi Moira! Trust you to know and appreciate the man's work. That show must have been something. I like what little I've read of Shaw, so I bet I would have enjoyed seeing Donnelly's depiction. It's nice to know he had a happy home life to come to at the end of the day's work.

It's very tantalizing to know Donnelly might have made an ideal O'Casey. Ah, the money men in the movies---always insisting on what's "bankable", as if art were a balance sheet.

[JackFavell]

MissG - That's why I was asking - because of our Jack... I really need to see this film.....

I think I looked it up online before, but decided it was too pricey. I just went to learnmedia, and they have it for 24.99, but don't specify whether it's VHS or DVD. I went through the entire checkout and still they have no place to type in which format you want, so I canceled out of it. I can't take the risk that it will show up as a VHS tape...

And Moira - I bow to your immense knowledge and envy you your experience of seeing his one man show. I adore Shaw and I bet it was a fun and fascinating evening all around, with Shaw's wit and Donelly's acting.

[MissGoddess]

I can't remember the website where I bought it, but it was a DVD....I think it may have been a Canadian merchant. I know I paid about what you said it cost at that other site (could it be the same one?).

[JackFavell]

I'll have to do a little more checking around... I just clicked on the first link I found.

[Professional Tourist]

I too had the good fortune to see Donal Donnelly on stage, twice. The first time on Broadway in 1979, co-staring with James Mason and Clarissa Kaye in Brian Friel's play Faith Healer; the second time Off-Broadway in 1983, playing Shaw in My Astonishing Self. The obituaries I've found online report that he passed away last month, on Monday January 4. Here's one that shares some of his home life in Westport, CT.

Regarding his playing in Don Juan in Hell on Broadway in 2006, I can find no documentation of this. According to the Internet Broadway Database DJIH has not been seen on Broadway since 1973. But Donnelly did appear in an Off-Broadway production in 2000, at the Irish Repertory Theater. Here are a couple of reviews: The New York Times and New York magazine.

[movieman1957]

Finally got to see "The Informer" (again.) A year after a first rate discussion at TCM I finally can join in if there is anything left to talk about. It is hard to decide whether Gypo is tragic or just pathetic. I'm leaning toward the latter. Somewhere between the best intentions (for his girl) and the worst results comes a decision that throws so many lives into turmoil. 20 pounds sure went a long way. In a town of total poverty it is easy enough to see why he did it but that doesn't make it right. There is the crux of it all.

After he turns in Frankie the police have nothing but contempt for Gypo. They have their man but even they don't like the method. They can't even hand him the money. They push it to him with a walking stick. He is going to find no love from any quarter. Not really.

In the long run he had more to worry about from his own people than he did from anyone else. Their private court carries the weight. He cannot run. America waits if he will only go home until morning but he can't. He has to flash his money which now gives him a new status.

In the end all he can do is cry that he didn't know what he was doing. Well, he did. Most everyone knows it. All he can do is ask forgiveness. From his God, from Frankie's mother. He is absolved.

It is an atmospheric and dark film. McLaglen does a first rate job playing one who is really hard to like.

[klondike]

MissG-

Have you seen The Rising of the Moon?

I found a copy of it online. It's an eclectic little anthology of Irish short story adaptations, introduced by Ty Power, and I remember Donnelly's puckish face standing out (our favorite, Jack MacGowran appears as well).

Aaaarghhh!
April, how could you scoop me on that one?!!!
I've been stalking the post-mercantile jungles of Amazon.com & eBay for over 5 years now, desperately seeking a copy of Pappy's TROTM!
Oh how fickle are ye Gods!