OnTheTown/Denis Clifford:Directed by Tom Collins and starring Colm Meaney, the film Kingswas announced as the winner of the Directors Finders Series 2007 in a ceremony at Dublin's Clarence Hotel during the week.
Organised by the Screen Directors Guild of Ireland (SDGI), the event preceded a special screening in Los Angeles with a view to securing a US distribution deal for the film.
Host Jim Sheridan stressed the importance of foreign distribution deals for the Irish film industry: "It's very important for Irish films to secure foreign distribution deals. In modern film, if you don't get a release in America, you don't exist, even in your own country. The release of Once was a bit of a disaster here - it just proves once again that you shouldn't come out in your own country before you come out in America." Receiving his award for the Irish-language film, Tom Collins said that "it's just great to get an award. I had a great cast - if you see the film you'll see that - and I had a great crew."
Jimmy Murphy, who wrote The Kings of the Kilburn High Road, the play on which the film is based, said: "I wrote the play eight years ago and it was produced seven years ago. When it went to London, Tom Collins saw it there and was keen to get it made. It's very exciting, looking at it as a cinema-goer. Even though I know what's coming next, I still enjoy seeing how it's portrayed and how the actors interpret it."
"All of the judges were very taken by Kings," said Conor Horgan, chair of the judging panel for the Directors Finders Series. "They felt it had powerful performances, something that had been taken from the stage and had been absolutely turned into a film. I just thought it was a very filmic treatment of the material and I thought it was very well done. I think the film selected is a good reflection of the Irish film business."
SDGI executive director Birch Hamilton said: "This event showcases the director and highlights Irish directors internationally. A number of directors have gone on to get distribution from this. Tonight is about celebrating all directors - Tommy Collins is the winner, but we'd love to be sending over lots of other directors." Among the film-makers at the event were Michael Kinirons, Trevor Curran, Cormac McCarthy, Fiona Ash, Graham Cantwell and Damien De Burca.
Creative energy drawn from the Burren
During a break from the Merriman Summer School proceedings in Lisdoonvarna, Co Clare, delegates took the opportunity to visit local areas of interest.
At the Burren College of Art, Ballyvaughan, they viewed the Wild Honeyexhibition curated by Michael Dempsey, head of exhibitions at the Hugh Lane gallery. Also at the college, Carol Gleeson, Clare County Council's project manager for the environmental protection of the Burren, gave a talk on her work.
"The academic level is so high and there is a lot of fun. It also contributes a lot locally," she said of the school.
Summer school director Doireann Ní Bhriain said it had been a fantastic week. "It has surpassed expectations in terms of attendance. You always worry early on. There has been a great mix of people."
One of the speakers, architect Seán Ó Laoire, said: "Culturally, it is an institution, and if you look over the years, the great and good of Irish society and beyond have been here. Certainly the friendship and camaraderie of it are unique."
Diarmuid Breathnach, RTÉ's former chief librarian, along with Máire Ní Mhurchú, former RTÉ reference librarian, this week launched Beathaisnéis 9, the ninth volume of their biographical dictionary of writers who have promoted Irish over five centuries.
"We have been writing now for 27 years. A unique partnership of that kind is unknown," Breathnach said.
Merriman committee member Mary O'Flaherty worked on the production of a CD, also launched this week, of the specially commissioned Maeve Binchy short story read at the school in 2005. Both she and Burren Art College president Mary Hawkes-Green are members of the Lismorahaun Singers, the locally based, 100-strong choir group which gave a concert for the school this week.
"The choir is another manifestation of the creative energy that is in the Burren," Hawkes-Green said.
- Éibhir Mulqueen
Hurling hangover cured by Cork folk
There is a silver lining to Cork's failure to make it to the All- Ireland hurling final. It has saved the organisers of the Beamish Cork Folk Festival the headache of having to put up large screens for those attending the Céilí Mór in Pana on Sunday, September 2nd. So whispered Beamish Cork Folk Festival chairman Jim Walsh as he prepared to take on the role of Fear a' Tí and introduce the various guest speakers at the launch of the festival in the hospitality suite of the Beamish and Crawford Brewery on South Main Street this week.
The Lord Mayor of Cork, Cllr Donal Counihan, paid tribute to all involved in keeping the folk festival going over the past 28 years. Among the local politicians to show their support were the newly co-opted Fine Gael MEP, Colm Burke, and Labour TD Kathleen Lynch.
Beamish was well-represented by Brendan Coughlan, George Frost and Thomas Brady, who had travelled down from Dublin, while several of the hosting publicans, such as Johnny O'Connor, of An Spailpín Fánach, and James Donnelly, of Counihans, were also present.
Walsh revealed that this year's folk festival, now in in its 28th year, will include 15 folk bands from 15 different European regions who are being brought to Cork by RTÉ Radio, host of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) Folk Festival for the first time in Ireland.
RTÉ Lyric FM producer Eoin Brady was among the guests, while Cork Film Festival director Mick Hannigan was showing some festival solidarity. Others to lend support included PR gurus Jean Kearney and Ivor Melia and singer Seán Ó Sé.
The EBU concerts will be the first to take place in the soon-to-be-opened Cork School of Music and among those looking forward to the opening were lecturers and musicians Evelyn Grant and Gerry Kelly and former Evening Echo folk columnist Paul Dromey.
Also present was newlywed box player Tommy Cunniffe, and there were smiles all round when his new bride and festival committee member Michelle Finnerty was presented with a bouquet of flowers by Céilí Mór organiser Hammy Hammond to mark the happy event.
The 28th Beamish Cork Folk Festival runs from Tue, Aug 28 until Sun, Sept 2. For further details, contact Jim Walsh on 087-2759311 or see www.corkfolkfestival.com
- Barry Roche
Harmonising the relationships
Opera Theatre Company (OTC) likes to think of its new sponsorship deal with KPMG as a marriage, but the accountancy firm is clearly afraid of this kind of commitment. Announcing the deal at Dublin's Brooks Hotel during the week, KPMG managing partner Terence O'Rourke joked that the relationship was "more than a one-night stand".
Irrespective of its duration, the partnership will facilitate the OTC in bringing its production of Handel's Orlando on a national tour, which will take in the main cities as well as a number of smaller towns.
Virginia Kerr, chair of the OTC board, said: "We want to bring opera to places that wouldn't normally get it, with full-scale productions in places like Tralee and Navan. There are some great venues in towns around the country. It's a great marriage for us to go to all these places, and we have a good audience."
OTC artistic director Annilese Miskimmon said she chose Orlando because of its contemporary resonances. "I wanted something that was immediate and modern. I feel the subject matter of this soldier who goes to war and comes back with post-traumatic stress disorder, and goes bananas when he finds out his lover, Angelica, has left him, seems so real and so relevant."
She added that the production features two countertenors: "I love the countertenor voice and quite a lot of people in Ireland have never heard that type of singing, so I think it's a real novelty. It has real richness and depth. Countertenor voices were specifically used in the baroque era, they replaced the castrati."
The part of Orlando will be played by William Towers, who, Miskimmon assured guests, is "completely intact". The countertenor performed Forgetfulness Drowns Me, while soprano Natasha Jouhl, who will play Angelica, sang If I Have Found You.
O'Rourke said the event "makes great sense from a business point of view. We invite clients along to these things. There are clients that want to go to rugby matches and clients that want to go to golf outings and other clients who love going to the opera." Also at the event were OTC chief officer Bernard Clarkson and cast members Mary Hegarty and Jonathan Best.