Many tributes have been paid to the actress Pauline Flanagan who died in the United States at the weekend, aged 78.
Playwright Tom Murphy, who directed her in his play Bailegangaire at the Peacock theatre last year - in which she played Mommo - last night described her as "an exceptionally fine actress, one of our greatest ever".
As well as "her own special talent" she had brought a wealth of experience to the role, going back to the days of Anew McMaster, he recalled.
She was "a superb woman, a lion-hearted woman", he said. He remembered her performances as Mommo in New York last year when Bailegangaire played there. She was suffering from cancer (not the cause of her death) and "in very great pain". People were "astonished at her determination, her will".
Michael Colgan of Dublin's Gate theatre said: "She was somebody who really was great." He remembered her generosity, "her big heart". She had lent the Gate photographs of herself and playwright Harold Pinter when both travelled Ireland with Anew McMaster for use in a programme to accompany the Gate's Pinter Festival. And there were her performances in the Gate's production of Beckett's Endgame.
He remembered when they toured Australia how, on entering the great marbled foyer of the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Melbourne, where they would stay, she remarked to him with tears in her eyes how it was "such a long way from digs. And aren't you great to think we deserve it". She had "a big laugh, a big heart and was a big talent", he said. "It takes such a long time in theatre to nurture that level of timing and talent," he said. She would be missed in the same way as Donal McCann, Ray McAnally and Tony Doyle, were still missed, he said.
Ben Barnes of the Abbey theatre felt her death was "a great loss to Irish theatre". He extended sympathy to her family. The Abbey had been "very fortunate" in her latter years to have her "wonderful" talent available for roles in Tarry Flynn and Dolly West's Kitchen.
Pauline Flanagan came from Sligo where her father P.J. was mayor in 1939. Her mother, Elizabeth, was the first woman mayor of Sligo in 1945. In 1949 Pauline began acting with the Garryowen Players in Bundoran for £4 a week. She joined Anew McMaster's company soon afterwards and spent most of the early 1950s touring with them. When visiting a sister in the US in the mid-1950s, she was offered a job as an understudy in a play, for $125 a week. It was the beginning of a long career there.
Her career in Ireland resumed about 10 years ago. As Rima in Dolly West's Kitchen, by Frank McGuinness, she won the Samuel Beckett and Olivier Awards for Best Supporting Actress in London. She is survived by husband George Vogel, two daughters, and a grandchild.
