Dec 24, 2024
Dec 22,2024
One can only wonder what direction Irish broadcasting might have taken had he been appointed!
A clipping of an article from The Evening Mail of May 4th, 1928, illustrates, how from early on, there was regular movement between the broadcaster - based in the GPO in O’Connell Street for nearly half of its existence - and the Abbey, just across the way, in nearby Abbey Street.
The article is about actress Sara Allgood, for whom it is generally agreed, Lady Gregory had a special regard. Its caption reads: 'A Visit by the star to Dublin’, and goes on:
‘Miss Sara Allgood, who has just returned from a successful tour in the United States, will be staying in Dublin for a short time… and in view of the Ibsen Centenary, contemplates producing an Ibsen play in the Abbey Theatre, on the 27th of May… Listeners will be pleased to learn that Miss Allgood will broadcast for a quarter of an hour from the Dublin Station at 8.45pm on May 11th. Listeners should not miss the opportunity of hearing the voice of this well-known artiste over the radio.
Many of our Dublin listeners have, of course, heard her in the Abbey Theatre, but a very large number are not aware that in addition to possessing a most musical speaking voice, which has captivated dramatic critics in other countries as well as ours, Miss Allgood sings Irish Folk Songs with a delightful native charm. Her programme will include some of these, as well as recitations in serious and in lighter mood...’
And finally, there is Marconi itself, the radio, in the kitchen of the Mundy sisters, the radio that released the sisters out of themselves so magnificently, so heartbreakingly in Brian Friel’s play Dancing at Lughnasa, and premiered on the Abbey stage.
The title Spreading The News salutes co-founder of the Abbey, Lady Gregory’s play of the same name, performed on the opening night of the theatre in 1904. It celebrates and honours the notion that the Abbey Theatre was established as an experiment, a fundamental idea that continues to inform its work today.
It includes writing in order of its first appearance in the event by Lady Gregory, Sean O’Casey, Tom Murphy, Stacy Gregg, Brian Friel, Brandon Jacobs Jenkins, Conor McPherson, Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, John Millington Synge, Enda Walsh, Anna Mullarkey, Mark O’Rowe, Barbara Bergin, Frank McGuinness, and Marina Carr.
The performers in order of their first appearance in the event are Caitríona McLaughlin (reading from the diaries of Lady Gregory, Co-Director and Artistic Director of the Abbey), Peter Coonan, Domhnall Herdman, Seán McGinley, Patrick Martins, Stephen Rea, Kate Gilmore, Bríd Ní Neachtain, Eileen Walsh, Kate Stanley Brennan, Barbara Bergin and Sexy Tadhg.
Find out more about the Abbey Theatre and Spreading The News here.
