Top 100 Irish America's Finest in Dance . Music . Acting
The Irish have had a long history in the entertainment business, from the days when actors Errol Flynn and James Cagney graced the silver screen, Gene Kelly danced his way into hearts, and crooner Bing Crosby brought joy to millions with his heavenly voice. So too, our Top 100 honorees, dancers, musicians, stars of stage and screen, light up our lives with their particular talent.
They have made us laugh, cry, sit spellbound in our seats, and gasp in awe at their enormous talent.
Daniel Day-Lewis's intense portrayal of Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood has had critics and fans purring with admiration - and on February 24 brought him an Academy Award for best actor. The level of intensity, talent, and willingness to absorb every fiber of the character he plays sets the English-born Irish citizen apart from any other actor working today.
But this commitment and enormous energy Day-Lewis embodies is of no shock to those who follow his career. (In fact, the all-encompassing passion he brings to his craft may explain why he works so infrequently). From My Beautiful Laundrette to his other Oscar-winning turn as Christy Brown in My Left Foot, the son of Irish-born British Poet Laureate Cecil Day-Lewis has turned in consistently superior performances.
And then there is his love affair with Ireland, which far outweighs the several Irish-themed movies he has made. Day-Lewis has held an Irish passport since 1993 and lives in County Wicklow with his wife Rebecca Miller and sons Ronan and Cashel (the actor also has a son, Gabriel, with actress Isabelle Adjani). He was once quoted as saying, "From the day we arrived here, my sense of Ireland's importance has never diminished.
Everything here seemed exotic to us. Just the sound of the west of Ireland in a person's voice can affect me deeply." With Oscar, Golden Globe and BAFTA awards in the bag for his role in There Will Be Blood, another great part surely beckons. - DOK
Incredibly popular in Ireland and with a growing profile stateside, comedian Des Bishop is a man on a mission - to make you laugh. New York-born and reared until he turned 14 and was shipped off to an Irish boarding school by his Irish parents, Bishop has forged a successful comedic career out of being an American transplanted to the auld sod, mining laughs from all the foibles and eccentricities he's encountered while living there.
Bishop began his career at The International Comedy Club in Dublin where he quickly made a name for himself. The 30-something's career really took off with the 2004 TV show The Des Bishop Work Experience, where he spent a month working minimum-wage jobs around Ireland.
A regular on Irish chat shows, Bishop's latest project is called In Name of the Fada - which chronicles the comedian's year spent living in the Gaeltacht and learning the Irish language. Bishop recently conducted some interviews in Irish in New York, where he did a fundraising gig for the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform. Smart, ambitious, and seriously funny, let's hope this prodigal son will return to these shores soon.
The Downeys, Robert Sr. and Robert Jr.
Hollywood loves a family act, and the father-son team of Robert Downey Sr. and Robert Downey Jr. have delivered when it comes to perseverance and creativity in the business.
Robert Downey Sr. was born to an Irish-American mother, famous cover-girl Betty McLoughlin (pictured below), and a Jewish father. Before becoming a successful filmmaker Downey Sr. served in the army (he changed his name upon enlisting from Robert Elias to Robert Downey after his stepfather.) Once discharged, he joined the minor leagues and pitched against the then-unknown Yogi Berra and struck him out. By 23, he was producing films.
In the 1960s, Downey Sr. released a string of independent low-budget absurdist films that gained an underground following. With his 1969 release of Putney Swope, Downey achieved mainstream success - the film was ranked in 1969's Top 10 films by New York magazine. His 1970 release, Pound, included his son, Robert Downey Jr.'s, first film appearance.
It may seem easy to make it in Hollywood when your father is a filmmaker and you've been onscreen since age five. But Robert Downey Jr.'s trip to the top of the Hollywood hill was long and arduous, and he fought for every bit of fame he has won. After his debut as a youngster, Downey Jr. joined the cast of Saturday Night Live for one season in 1985 and then went on to appear in Hollywood films. He became a break-through star in 1987 with The Pick-up Artist in which he played opposite brat-packer Molly Ringwald, and went on to be nominated for an Academy Award in 1992 for his performance in Chaplin.
He also became a hit on the television show Ally McBeal, for which he won a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series. Today, Downey Jr., who is married to Susan Levin Downey, continues to act, appearing in films such as Gothika and Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang; he gave especially memorable performances in Wonder Boys and Good Night, and Good Luck.
This May, Iron Man, based on the hit comic book series of the same name, will be Downey Jr.'s biggest budgeted movie to date. Always looking for new ways to perform, Downey Jr. (whose mother Elsie Ford was a singer and dancer) revealed his singing talent on Ally McBeal and in 2005 released The Futurist which featured eight of his own pop-ballads and "Smile," a Charlie Chaplin composition.
Robert Downey Sr., who is married to Irish-American writer Rosemary Rogers, has also continued his film career, with films such as Up the Academy, America, Rented Lips, and Hugo Pool. He is currently working on a documentary about the music of Kurt Weill, which features Fiona Apple and her sister, Maude Maggart, and is also doing a remake of Putney Swope in which Downey Jr. appears. We can only hope that Jr. will be willing to play a puppy again in a remake of Pound.
Born in 1971 in Dublin to a family of musicians and singers, John Doyle was surrounded by traditional music from his earliest years. His father Sean is a remarkable singer and collector of songs, with a vast repertoire of traditional ballads committed to memory. Tommy Doyle, John's County Sligo grandfather, taught him his first instrumental tunes. Two of his three brothers are musicians, as are various uncles, cousins, and other family members.
John was playing professionally by the age of 16, and soon moved to New York City where he began playing with Eileen Ivers and Seamus Egan. He first rose to international prominence with Solas (Gaelic for "light"), the all-star Irish/American band whose emergence heralded the arrival of a new generation of bold, inventive traditional musicians.
The mighty original Solas lineup of Doyle (whose guitar playing was both the harmonic and rhythmic foundation of the band's relentlessly high-energy sound), John Williams (accordion), Winifred Horan (fiddle), Karan Casey (vocals), and Seamus Egan (banjo, flutes, pipes) recorded four immensely influential albums before Doyle left the group to seek a solo career. His latest album, Wayward Son, Doyle's second solo release on Compass Records, showcases the guitarist's genius for arrangement. Now an accomplished producer as well, Doyle has worked with such artists as Liz Carroll and Heidi Talbot.
Doyle, who currently lives in Asheville, North Carolina with his wife Cathy Peterson, continues to innovate, finding the seeds of his contemporary approach within the tradition itself. - PH
egendary ballerina Suzanne Farrell retired from the stage in 1989 but her recent work with the Suzanne Farrell Ballet company marks an achievement in the male-dominated world of ballet direction and choreography.
Farrell joined George Balanchine's New York City Ballet in the fall of 1961. Her grace and flair for drama quickly made her Balanchine's "inspiring angel." She went on to become an icon for the era and is often proclaimed to be one of the greatest dancers of the century.
In 1990 Farrell wrote an autobiography titled Holding On to Air. She has honorary degrees from Harvard, Yale, Notre Dame and Georgetown University. Farrell is also the recipient of a National Medal of the Arts (2003), the Nijinsky Award (Monaco Dance Forum 2004), a 2005 recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors and the Kennedy Center's Capezio Dance Award (2005). In 2004 she was featured in the documentary Balanchine.
In July 2007, the Suzanne Farrell Ballet returned to the Kennedy Center, and received rave reviews, with two programs that included Divertimento Brillante (Glinka) and Concierto de Mozart (Balanchine), newly restaged works that had not been seen in 40 years.
Not only is Will Ferrell the King of Comedy but he is also a fiercely proud Irishman! The students of University College Dublin (UCD) got a special treat on January 22 when its Literary and Historical Society honored Ferrell with the James Joyce Award for his outstanding contribution to comedic acting. Arriving in full Irish rugby kit and black slip-ons, Ferrell was greeted with overwhelming fanfare and laughter.
Ferrell, famous for his work on Saturday Night Live and in movies such as Elf and Anchorman, spoke for 40 minutes to an audience of 1,200 students. "As I look out at the crowd, I see the future of Ireland, the future of Europe. And let's face it - the future looks pretty bleak," he commented.
Ferrell also mentioned his new devotion to Ireland, telling the audience, "I'm so committed to my Irish roots that I intend to continue wearing this outfit upon my return to the U.S. I will also continue to drive on the left-hand side of the road."
The actor/comedian had been on vacation in Ireland with his brother, Patrick, and his father, Roylee. Although they traveled all around the country, the Ferrells spent most of their time in Co. Longford retracing their family roots.
When asked about the experience, Roylee Ferrell said, "We had a great time. You know, when our folks came over [to the U.S.] they didn't know how to spell so they spelled it F-E-R-R-E-L-L and most everybody there spells it F-A-R-R-E-L-L. So everybody in Longford who had that last name came to see us, I think."
Ferrell, who is currently on the big screen in Semi-Pro, has another screwball comedy, Stepbrothers, in which he stars with fellow Irish-American John C. Reilly, coming out in the summer.
Fionnula Flanagan who has given critically acclaimed performances in such movies as Waking Ned Devine, Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood, and Transamerica, in which she played the estranged mother of a pre-op transgender man played by Felicity Huffman, has had another busy year on and off the screen. Highlights included a guest starring role in the critically acclaimed ABC series Lost, where she played one of "The Others." She also reprised her role as Rose, matriarch of the Caffee family, in the second season of Showtime's Irish-American drama Brotherhood.
The actress, who was brought up in Dublin speaking both Irish and English, had her breakthrough in Ireland in 1965 with an Irish-speaking role in An Triail. Not one to let her Irish language skills grow rusty, Flanagan, last year, starred in the Irish language series, Paddywhackery, playing the ghost of Peig Sayers (the iconic Irish-speaking storyteller) who visits a young man trying to open several Gaelic-speaking business ventures to avail of language grants from the government.
Off-screen, Flanagan continues to support the plight of the undocumented Irish in America. So strong is her commitment that Flanagan pulled out of the US-Ireland Alliance pre-Oscar party, due to comments made by the organization's president, Trina Vargo, who suggested that a special deal for Irish illegals amounted to "putting lipstick on a pig."
Speaking to Irish America, the actress made it clear that she supports fair and reasonable immigration reform for all immigrants, not just the Irish.
Flanagan, who will receive an honorary degree from University College, Galway later this year, also starred in Some Mother's Son, a movie about the 1981 Hunger Strike. She has been outspoken about the need for peace with justice in Northern Ireland for many years, and was the first of the Hollywood elite to welcome Sinn Fin President Gerry Adams to Los Angeles. Flanagan is married to Dr. Garrett O'Connor, who is the medical director of the Professional Recovery Program at the Betty Ford Center.
hen Brian Mulligan first started singing in high school musicals in his hometown of Endicott, New York, his Irish parents thought it was just a phase. The high school honor student also saw singing as a hobby but it turned out to be a valuable asset when it came time to earn the money for college.
Now, ten years later, Mulligan is a member of the Metropolitian Opera, where he has received praise from Opera News for his "velvety, evenly and effortly produced baritone and nuance-rich phrasing." Most recently he appeared as Marcello in the Met's production of Puccini's La Boheme.
Brian, whose parents are from County Leitrim, attributes his musical versatility to his growing up in a typical Irish family where music is handed on from generation to generation. In a recent interview he told Cahir O'Doherty of the Irish Voice that he would revel in the opportunity to sing sentimental Irish songs like "Danny Boy."
"I may sing at the Met but I'm an Irish-American.
These songs are my heritage too."
The Dropkick Murphys
In 1995 a group of friends in South Boston looking to play music for fun started practicing in the basement of a friend's barbershop with a goal of combining the punk rock, Irish folk, rock and hardcore influences they had grown up with. From out of these sessions the Dropkick Murphys were formed.
The group has come a long way since then: in 2004 their version of the Boston Red Sox's anthem became the theme song to the Sox's World Series run, and in 2006 their music was featured in the Martin Scorsese film The Departed. Building a name for themselves by touring nonstop around the world, the Dropkick's sell-out St. Patrick's Day weekend shows in Boston are now the stuff of legend.
The Dropkick's first full-length album Do or Die was released in 1998 and the group has had numerous albums since then. 2007 saw the issue of Dropkick Murphy's sixth album and first major label debut The Meanest of Times.
The band is in the midst of a tour that started on January 31 in Dublin and will play dates all over Europe and the States before culminating with a gig in Perth, Australia on May 31.
In 2008, Marc Orrell announced that he is leaving the band and that Tim Brennan will replace him as full-time guitarist. Despite these changes there are sure to be great things ahead for the Dropkick Murphys and many more Irish-American rock anthems to come.
From Shakespeare, to musical comedy, to opera - Jack O'Brien is as versatile in his career as he is as a director. But these days, he is known around New York City for directing two trilogies at Lincoln Center, back to back.
O'Brien spent the fall of 2006 and winter and spring of 2007 at Lincoln Center.
First, he directed Tom Stoppard's trilogy of plays The Coast of Utopia for Lincoln Center Theater, and then Giacomo Puccini's trilogy of operas Il Trittico for the Metropolitan Opera.
He received a Tony Award for The Coast of Utopia, which he can add to a very long list of awards and nominations including eight Best Direction Tony Awards.
Next on the plate for O'Brien, who recently left his post as Artistic Director of San Diego's Old Globe Theater after 26 years, is converting the screenplay Catch Me If You Can into a musical comedy with songs by Marc Saiman and Scott Wittman of Hairspray fame.
O'Brien, whose Irish roots lie in County Tipperary, was born in Saginaw, Michigan.
Rosie O'Donnell's second memoir, Celebrity Detox: The Fame Game was released in 2007. In the book, Rosie equates fame to drug addiction and discusses her departure from The View. The book debuted at #5 on the New York Times bestselling list.
The New Yorker from Bayside, Queens, whose dad was born in Belfast, lost her Irish-American mother to breast cancer when she was 11 years old, after which her father took Rosie and her four siblings to Northern Ireland to live for a time.
Rosie began her career in comedy clubs in New York, and had her first TV break in 1984 on Star Search. From there it was on to movies such as A League of Their Own and Sleepless in Seattle.
In 1996, Rosie landed her own television show, The Rosie O'Donnell Show, which was a huge hit. She left the show in 2002, and after a brief stint in the magazine publishing world, returned to The View in 2006 - where she had a famous run-in with Donald Trump before leaving the show. Rosie, married her partner Kelli Carpenter in San Francisco in 2004, the couple are parents to four children and one foster child.
Considered one of Broadway's brightest ingnues, singer and actress Kelli O'Hara has been nominated for two Tony Awards, for her performance as Clara Johnson in The Light in the Piazza and as Babe Williams in The Pajama Game, in which she starred alongside the likes of Harry Connick Jr. and Michael McKean.
A native of Oklahoma, Kelli graduated from Oklahoma City University with a Bachelor of Music in vocal performance/ opera. After winning the state Metropolitan Opera Competition, O'Hara made the big move to New York City, enrolling in the Lee Strasberg Institute.
An appearance in Jekyll and Hyde marked Kelli's Broadway debut, quickly followed by roles in Sondheim's Follies, Sweet Smell of Success and Dracula. Most recently, Kelli has just finished taping two pilots for NBC's Blue Blood and All Rise. She also played Dot/Marie in the Los Angeles reprise of Sunday in the Park with George.
O'Hara will also appear in Industrial for Cava Freixenet directed by Martin Scorsese. Kelli's New York fans can look forward to her return to Lincoln Center this spring when she will star as Nellie Forbush in South Pacific.
O'Hara resides in New York with her husband, Greg.
Sheridan is one of Ireland's leading pianists and composers, whose many albums include The Art of Turlough O'Carolan, in which the famous airs and laments of the blind Irish harpist and composer are presented in magnificent new piano arrangements.
The son of professional musicians, J.J. began studying the piano at age 5, and in his late teens was accepted on scholarship to the Royal Irish Academy of Music in Dublin.
At 18 he composed "Saint Canice's Mass" which brought him national attention. One year later he won the Esposito Medal at Dublin's Feis Ceoil (Ireland's premier piano competition).
J.J., whose many albums include Irish Piano Classics, The Andrew Lloyd Webber Piano Album, and An Irish Piano Christmas, has appeared in Carnegie Hall and Boston Symphony Hall. He currently lives in Atlanta, Georgia, and performs his one man show, "The Art of Turlough O'Carolan," at various venues throughout the world.
New York-born Irish teenage actor and Oscar nominee Saoirse Ronan is a lady with her head set squarely on her talented shoulders. "Hollywood is okay, but I wouldn't want to live there. As I said to my Mam, I might buy a house there for my work but that's it.
Maybe it's because I'm Irish, but I'd much prefer to live in Carlow rather than in Los Angeles. I'm sure it's a very nice place, but my home's better," she recently told Cahir O'Doherty of the Irish Voice. But after an amazingly creepy performance as Briony in Atonement, the Motion Picture Academy has recognized her talent and she is now an actress in demand in Tinseltown.
Currently in New Zealand filming The Lovely Bones with director Peter Jackson, Saoirse is about to wrap her sixth movie in just two years. Her father Paul (pictured above with Saoirse) is a well-known actor in Ireland and the family spent the early part of Saoirse's life (Saoirse is Gaelic for Freedom) in the Big Apple while Paul pursued his career. Now the family calls Carlow home, not that Saoirse has seen much if it lately!
"Unless something really special like Atonement comes up, I'm going back to school in Carlow for a while now. I mean, I'm after starting high school and I haven't even been there yet! I can't wait to get back," Saoirse revealed. No ordinary schoolgirl.
Named Kathleen after her father's favorite Irish tune, "I'll Take You Home Again Kathleen," the cabaret singer and Broadway star decided to go by "KT" to distinguish herself from countless other Katys.
A winner of an MAC Award for best review, KT has starred in many Broadway and Off-Broadway roles. Sullivan's most recent cabaret show titled Autumn in New York marked her 10th solo appearance at the Oak Room of the Algonquin Hotel in Manhattan. The show received a rave review in The New York Times which called KT "a sexy, wide-eyed comedian with a semi-operatic voice" who turns the journey from Oklahoma to Broadway into "a thrill ride."
KT's great-great-grandfather came over from County Kerry during the famine, emigrating first to Boston, then to Birmingham, Alabama. On her grandmother's side, the Corbetts hailed from County Cork. KT stays true to her Irish roots not only by performing St. Patrick's Day shows and including Irish songs in her repertoire but in her personal life as well. The chanteuse is married to former Yeats Society president and prominent Irish-American Stephen Downey.
Molly Shannon's performance in last year's Independent movie Year of the Dog showed that the comedian who built a career out of the "crazy" characters she developed during her time on Saturday Night Live has depth and range as an actress. As an unmarried office worker who becomes unhinged when her pet beagle Pencil is poisoned (accidently by J.C. Reilly), she is as touchingly strange and totally believable as her slow dissolve is played out on the big screen.
Born in Shaker Heights, Ohio, Molly was raised by an Irish-American father who encouraged her comedic leanings. (Tragically, her mother, younger sister and cousin died in a car accident when Molly was four.)
Following small roles in Twin Peaks and In Living Color, Molly made a breakthrough in 1995, when she landed on Saturday Night Live. She went on to appear in films such as Never Been Kissed, Analyze This, and American Splendor, and on television in series such as Will and Grace, and recently, Pushing Daisies.
Molly, who received her BFA from NYU's prestigious Tisch School for the Arts, is married to artist Fritz Chesnut. They have two children, Stella and Nolan. Watch for Molly in the upcoming NBC project Kath and Kim a series that focuses on the relationship between a mother and daughter.
iaran Sheehan certainly knows how to bring a crowd to their feet. The Broadway actor and singer has
headlined sold-out Carnegie Hall shows three times in the last two years.
Born in Dublin, Ciaran moved to New York to study acting with Kathryn Gately and Bobby Lewis. Since then he has appeared on Broadway playing leading roles in Phantom of the Opera and Les Miserables, and on television in Law and Order, One Life to Live and Late Night with David Letterman.
Never one to stray too far from his Irish roots, Ciaran has also appeared in two PBS specials, From Galway to Broadway and Frank McCourt's The Irish and How They Got That Way. He has also starred in shows at the Irish Repertory Theater in New York.
Phantom of the Opera is considered by many Sheeran's breakthrough role. It garnered him critical acclaim: "Sheehan has the kind of soaring stage voice from which indelible Broadway moments are made," The New York Times said of his starring role - he made over 1,000 appearances as The Phantom and collected a large fan base along the way. He also graced the New York stage and regional theaters around the country in the musical The Molly Maguires which portrays the plight of the famine Irish who migrated to the coal fields of Pennsylvania.
Ciaran is married to New York City Ballet and Broadway star Alexia Hess. The couple has three children - Kyle, Hennessy and Brendan.
Trinity Dance Company
ver twenty years ago the Trinity Academy of Irish Dance established itself as the first and only American Irish dance team ever to bring home a gold medal from the World Championships in Ireland. Though their success at the World's is still unprecedented, for a while it was beginning to look as if Trinity would never see that kind of glory again, but the 2007 World Championships in Glasgow proved a lucky setting for Trinity and the academy brought home a gold medal in the Junior Girls Figure Dance choreography.
Trinity also captured two silver and one bronze medal, upping their world title count to an extraordinary 28 titles. Among the standout solo dancers was Jillian Oury of Downers Grove, Illinois who took home a second place silver medal in the Girls 16-17 category.
The school's success is thanks in large part to founder and artistic director Mark Howard who formed Trinity when he was only 17. He started out giving lessons in church basements and built the company into the largest Irish dance program in the world with 21 locations throughout Illinois and Wisconsin.
Howard borrows from Irish myth and legend to create intricate choreographies - long before Riverdance, he was choreographing award-winning dances that pushed the boundaries of traditional Irish dance.
In addition to appearing in films and talk shows and performing all over the world, the Trinity dance academy has also been the subject of two national PBS television programs and showcased in the ABC special The Dignity of Children.