Fred O'Donovan:FRED O'DONOVAN, who has died aged 82, was a showbusiness impresario and former chairman of the RTÉ Authority. He also was the first chairman of the board of the National Concert Hall, and a member of the Independent Radio and Television Commission.
"Impresario is just a very fancy word for a man who does a very unfancy job," he told Maeve Binchy in 1971. "Someone who knows showbiz inside out, who creates, produces and negotiates."
O'Donovan earned his bread and butter producing sponsored programmes for Raidió Éireann, and later produced numerous Christmas pantomimes as well as the long-running variety shows Gaels of Laughter, starring Maureen Potter, and Jurys' Irish Cabaret.
Other productions included Juno and the Paycockand Man and Supermanat the Gaiety, a television special The Bing Crosby Showand a film profile of Brendan Behan, Meet the Quare Fella.His variety show Ireland on Parade toured the US.
In the course of his career he had dealings with writers including Seán O'Casey and George Bernard Shaw. Visiting Shaw in London to ask him to reduce his royalty fee, he was instead bombarded with questions about Dublin. When he finally managed to make his request, the playwright refused to budge, insisting that he would not be short-changed.
Born in Dublin in 1927, Fred O'Donovan was the son of John and Kathleen O'Donovan. He attended St Joseph's CBS, Fairview, and later studied electronics at Kevin Street technical college. But, craving excitement, in 1944 he joined the RAF with his friend Cathal O'Shannon .
Stationed at Long Kesh, when the American singer and actor Paul Robeson visited to entertain armed forces personnel, he helped to stage the performance.
He later served with an intelligence unit, searching for both missing allied soldiers and Nazis in hiding. The unit located more than 11,000 of those they were looking for; many were dead, and most of the survivors ill or shell-shocked.
There followed a year in a Swiss sanatorium, where he received treatment for tuberculosis. The illness ended his hopes of becoming a professional footballer, and the RAF paid for him to be trained by the BBC as a radio producer.
Having worked with a touring repertory company in Britain, he returned to Ireland in the early 1950s for a holiday. He decided to stay and became an assistant stage manager at the Gaiety theatre, working with Cyril Cusack and Tyrone Guthrie.
He turned his attention to producing radio shows, subsequently joining forces with his chief rival, Eamonn Andrews. He became managing director of Eamonn Andrews Studios in 1957, beginning a working relationship that lasted 24 years. The company's interests included the Portmarnock Country Club, Gaiety theatre, Television Club, a share in the Dolphin hotel and a recording studio.
The association with Andrews ended abruptly, though there was a substantial financial settlement in O'Donovan's favour.
In March 1981 he was appointed as chairman of the board of the National Concert Hall. Stepping down from the position in 1986, he said the arts should be taken "by the scruff of the neck" and put in the hands of professional administrators.
Also in 1981, as Fianna Fáil was leaving office, he was appointed chairman of the RTÉ Authority. A party supporter, he was close to Charles Haughey, and some commentators saw the appointment as a "stroke" the outgoing taoiseach could not resist.
O'Donovan was embroiled in controversy in 1983, the year of the first abortion referendum. Declaring his opposition to a special Late Late Show to deal with the issue, he described the question as one of a debate about "death on demand". This led to widespread allegations that he had abused his role and shown partiality.
In 1985 the authority ignored minister for communications Jim Mitchell's instruction to defer the appointment of a new director general until a consultant's report on the station had been completed.
The authority, with O'Donovan's support, nominated John Sorohan for the job, but the nomination was rejected by the minister and the post eventually went to Vincent Finn.
In 1988 he was appointed a member of the Independent Radio and Television Commission, established to award Ireland's first commercial broadcasting licences. When in 1989 Radio 2000 was licensed to broadcast in Dublin it emerged that O'Donovan was a former director of E-Sat TV, a major shareholder in Radio 2000. The award of the licence was challenged in the courts by an unsuccessful applicant, but the challenge failed.
He served as a governor of Harcourt Street children's hospital, and with Dr Austin Darragh was a founder of the Conquer Cancer Campaign.
His role in saving the Gaiety from extinction by having the building listed was acknowledged at a ceremony last November; this was followed in January by a one-off production of Gaels of Laughterin his honour.
He was married in 1956 to Sally Tennent who, with their daughters Fiona, Sally Ann and Penny and son Freddie, survives him; his brother Bill, formerly head of RTÉ 2fm, also survives him.
Frederick Michael (Fred) O'Donovan: born May 27th, 1927; died May 14th, 2010