Actor Chris O’Dowd paid tribute to the “many head-the-balls masquerading as creative types” in Boyle, Co Roscommon as he officially opened the arts festival in his hometown.
Expressing gratitude for a “childhood enriched by creativity”, the creator of the new Sky dramedy Small Town, Big Story, which was partly filmed in Boyle, name-checked many of the hundreds of locals who turned out for the ceremony at King House on Thursday night.
“They say if you surround yourself with creative people you will never spend a day of your life bored. And it is true. You will never get a minute’s peace,” said the 44-year-old.
O’Dowd said one of his earliest memories happened a stone’s throw from where he was speaking back in August 1988, when throngs of people lined the streets “in their finery” to see actor Maureen O’Sullivan return to her birthplace on the town’s Main Street.
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He recalled asking his mother, Denise, “who is this lady, will we not scare her if we keep shouting at her?” She replied that O’Sullivan was a big Hollywood star.
“And I thought ‘hold on. She gets to go and make movies and she gets a parade. Jesus, I think I’ll do that’,” he added.
O’Dowd said earlier in the day he walked past a plaque dedicated to O’Sullivan, star of the original Tarzan films, and “it just brought me back there and I suppose being there at that time maybe brought me here. And what a lucky place to be.”
One man who agrees that Boyle is “a hotbed of creativity” is Brian Doherty who, according to festival chairwoman Patricia Golden, is one of a number of people who moved there because of the arts festival. Doherty and his partner David Brett were living in Dublin 20 years ago, but on a visit to Boyle they dropped in to King House and were surprised to see “the finest and most representative collections of contemporary Irish art that we had ever seen”.
Describing the exhibition, the centrepiece of the festival, as “mind-blowing”, he said: “You kind of feel your spirit would expand in a town like this that holds art and the artistic spirit in value”.
This year’s main exhibition, Visual Presence, has been curated by Paul McKenna and features more than 150 artists including Hughie O’Donoghue, Donald Teskey, Nick Miller, Daniel Nelis, Elizabeth Cope, Tommy Weir and Jenny O’Dowd Jessop, a sister of Chris O’Dowd.
The festival runs until July 27th and many of the town’s shop windows will, until then, be mini art galleries or, as O’Dowd put it, “like the Louvre there on Bridge Street”.
Other highlights include Booker Prize-longlisted writer Elaine Feeney in conversation with journalist Darragh Kelly, concerts by Regina Nathan, Stocktons Wing and Paul Brady, writing workshops, children’s events, a presentation by Irish Times journalists and authors Martin Doyle and Ronan McGreevy; and former RTÉ broadcaster Bryan Dobson will be in conversation with author and presenter Dawn O’Porter, Chris O’Dowd’s wife, on Saturday.
O’Dowd has promised to attend that event “to make sure Dobson keeps it clean”.
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