PROFILE/ANNA MANAGAN:The 84-year-old Irish actress has earned the respect of the greats and a Tony award, but her new non-acting role could win her an even wider audience, writes RÓISÍN INGLE
THE MEDICAL card debacle unleashed a seemingly unstoppable tide of "grey power", so it was only a matter of time before an official cheerleader for the pensioner generation was plucked from the ranks of this country's older people.
Straight-talking, feisty and energetic, veteran actor Anna Manahan has been appointed the first-ever patron of Active Retirement Ireland. It's a role that will be relished by the 84-year-old who, in one of her most memorable public performances, recently dismissed the Government as "the most dreadful, heartless bunch of people".
"I can't stand them and their smugness, the sight of them makes me sick," she fumed in radio interviews last month, declaring that she would be prepared to go to jail over the medical card issue if necessary.
"I hate cowards and I hate injustice. We must go to the barricades," she declared. "If the next general election was a few months off this wouldn't have happened. How dare they, how dare they attack the most vulnerable people in the country, people who have given so much . . . don't let them in again, I plead with you, don't."
There are around 450 active retirement groups spread across the country, with almost 25,000 members, and Active Retirement Ireland's CEO Maureen Kavanagh says Manahan is the ideal person to motivate other older people. "She shows by example that it is possible for an older person to live a fruitful, active life; she is living proof that people can maintain their dignity and independence as they get older."
Manahan has been involved in her local branch of the organisation in Waterford for the past six years, and had the idea for the three-day Golden Years festival for older people in the area five years ago. "We had the fifth festival earlier this week and Anna attended every function and gave inspirational talks to our members. She just has a great way of motivating people, she brings such a great wealth of experience to everything she does," says Kavanagh.
Manahan was born and brought up in Waterford; her father Paddy was a celebrated local comedian and the family's social life centred around visits to neighbours' houses, songs and chat and pots of tea. She left Waterford for Dublin to train as an actor in the original Gaiety School of Acting, run by Ria Mooney, and started working in Dublin theatres in the 1940s.
She met her stage director husband Colm O'Kelly towards the end of that decade, in the days when she was championed by Irish theatrical legends Hilton Edwards and Micheál MacLiammóir of the Gate Theatre. Less than a year after they were married, her husband died when he contracted polio after swimming in the Nile while they were on holiday in Egypt. "I was dancing with him on Friday and he was dead on Tuesday," she has said of the loss which happened when she was just 32.
Taking MacLiammóir's advice that an actor should never get involved in real estate, she took to the road touring all over the country, displaying the astonishing work ethic that would stand to her in leaner times. She worked on several productions with playwrights John B Keane - he wrote the play Big Maggiefor her - and Brian Friel, and starred in films with actors such as Laurence Olivier, Albert Finney and Brenda Fricker.
Her most controversial role came just over 50 years ago when she starred as Serafina in the European premiere of Tennessee Williams' The Rose Tattooin Dublin. There was uproar when some audience members thought, mistakenly as it turned out, that a condom was being used as a prop on stage. A court case followed.
"I was described in the case as wearing an improper slip, although in reality I was fully covered down to my feet," Manahan has said. "However, the reality didn't stop people asking my landlady to get rid of me, saying that I was an immoral woman. I had only been widowed a year at that point and don't know what I would have done if she had."
Manahan was rarely out of work, taking whatever jobs turned up to survive, whether it was pub theatre, cabaret or roles in dubious RTÉ comedies such as Leave It To Mrs O'Brienor, more recently, Fair City, where one of her storylines, funnily enough, involved campaigning for older people's rights.
Serious recognition from her peers only came when she was in her late 70s and scooped a Tony award for her magnificent performance on broadway as the Complan-munching widow Mag Folan in Martin McDonagh's play The Beauty Queen of Leenane. She had received a Tony nomination almost 30 years earlier in 1969 when she starred in Friel's Lovers.
Following the win in 1998 the actor got used to seeing herself on billboards around Broadway and made several lasting friendships in Manhattan. "When I knew we were going to do Beauty Queen, she was the first person I thought of to play Mag," says Garry Hynes, director of Druid Theatre Company. "I remember going down to see her at her home in Waterford and telling her 'you have to do this'. Little did either of us know she'd end up winning a Tony for the role."
The director describes Manahan as a "unique" talent. "This is someone who was working at the Royal Court Theatre in London in the late 1950s when it was the powerhouse of new English theatre, and since then she has just worked and worked and worked. I'd describe her as an indefatigable performer. She is a great character, fearless and of course great fun."
Hynes says the whole of Broadway "fell in love with her and she with them, she really became the Queen of Broadway" when she had the Tony win. When all the fuss had died down Manahan confessed that fame had never motivated her. "That didn't enter my mind. It seemed to be a desire to express myself in this way, to explore plays and texts and characters, but to share it with an audience," she said. She has been scathing of younger actors, motivated by being a "star".
"You hear very few of them who talk about it being a way of life, a journey, an enriching of yourself and the people who see you perform . . . we did it for love." Manahan has a playful take on actors, describing her colleagues in terms of Peter Pan. "If you don't like actors don't be around them because they're like children who never grew up," she said as part of Charlie McCarthy's Arts Livesdocumentary, All About Anna. Observers say Manahan herself exudes an endearing childlike quality.
When a worker on Fair Cityput fairy lights in her dressing-room as a surprise, she was said to be as "thrilled as a child getting her first present on Christmas morning".
Martina Stanley who plays Dolores, a friend of Manahan's character Ursula on the soap, also played her daughter on Leave It To Mrs O'Brien.
"She is just extraordinary, that's the only word to describe her," says Stanley. "Anna is a mix of paradoxes. She embraces everything, is very open to new ideas and has her finger on the pulse and yet she has this devout traditional faith which is such a strength to her. She is this feisty warrior woman with a passion for life and at the same time she has this real childlike quality, an ability to be thrilled by small things. She is a perfectionist down to her fingertips, I find her challenging to work with in the best possible sense of that word."
In interviews, Manahan makes no attempt to hide a healthy ego developed over decades toiling away with Phyllis Ryan's Gemini Productions, or on projects as varied as The Irish RM, Hear My Songand, more recently, the one-woman monologue Sistersby Declan Hassett, which marked her return to Broadway.
She has said that many people calling themselves professionals are nothing of the sort. "Meryl Streep came backstage in New York once. She said 'I am so anxious to meet Anna Manahan because she is a professional'. The American theatre wing believed, and they are the highest, that I am a professional and know my work," she told one interviewer.
Des Keogh, who worked with her in productions such as John B Keane's The Matchmaker, says she is one of the most resilient people he knows. "Like everyone, she had low ebbs in her career, but she kept going, she would tour the furthest-flung corners of Ireland with her one-woman show, she'd keep going no matter what. So, apart from her tremendous talent, her great spirit and energy is what has always marked her out," he says.
Keogh once worked with her on a record-breaking eight-month run of a play called Sweet and Sourin the now-defunct Eblana theatre in Dublin. At the time they both lived in Dundrum and he used to drive her home.
"She called me the Dundrum Bus," he laughs. "I actually don't think Anna has been seriously recognised for being one of the truly great figures of Irish theatre that she is. She is amazing and even after serious illness has had the ability to keep going. She is an inspiration to older people everywhere".
Indeed, when she was in New York a few years ago starring in Sisters, a friend says she finished the run despite a retired cardiologist friend in the city expressing concerns about her health. She came home only when the production had finished, had a heart operation and spent a few months recuperating before bouncing back in typical Manahan style.
DESPITE THE HECTIC CAREER and a string of awards - she's received several honorary doctorates, was recently honoured by The Arts Club and in 2002 was the 28th person to receive the Freedom of the City of Waterford - Manahan has remained a down-to-earth homebird, happiest in her garden as opposed to being on tour or in hotels where "there's never a place for a person to boil an egg or fix a spot of toast for themselves".
She never remarried and has no children, but family, friends and her beloved Waterford are the touchstones of her life, say those who know her.
She is never one to "sit quietly in a corner," according to Garry Hynes. Older people can expect to hear much more from Manahan as she endeavours both to represent and inspire them. She has no plans to retire - "actors die with their boots on," she has said - while her own take on ageing is something people, young and old, could follow.
"As you age, your mind gets broader, it can be a very enriching time," she has said. "But you need to hold onto some curiosity and a sense of childish wonderment . . . older people contribute hugely to society and this needs to be acknowledged."
CV ANNA MANAHAN
Who is she?84-year-old Tony award-winning actor.
Why is she in the news?She has been appointed the first patron of Active Retirement Ireland
Most likely to say:"Older is bolder."
Least likely to say:"I'm retiring."
And you can quote her on that:"I'm seething with anger for the rest of the elderly in the country, my heart is broken listening to them." - to RTÉ's Joe Duffy during the protest over medical cards.