Remembering the Life & Legacy of Irish Playwright of Brian Friel
January 9, 1929- October 2, 2015
December 7, 2015 at 4:00 pm (doors at 3:30)
At the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre
261 West 47th Street
Free and open to the public.
Please RSVP to Friel@IrishRep.org
The program will include remembrances, musical performances, and readings from colleagues and friends including Gabriel Byrne, Jim Dale, Joe Dowling, Loretta Brennan Glucksman, Barry Grove, Gregory Harrington, Doug Hughes, Geraldine Hughes, Irish Consul General, Barbara Jones, John Keating, Emily Mann, Lynne Meadow, Charlotte Moore, Paul Muldoon, Ciarán O’Reilly, Bill Whelan, and more.
Brian Friel is widely recognized as one of the greatest contemporary dramatists writing in the English language. A prolific writer, who produced more than 30 plays in a career spanning six decades, his best-known works were Philadelphia, Here I Come! (1964), The Freedom of the City (1973), Aristocrats (1979) Faith Healer (1979), Translations (1980) Dancing at Lughnasa (1990) Molly Sweeney (1993), Give Me Your Answer Do (1997) and The Home Place (2005). In these and other plays he showed a fascination with pushing the boundaries of theatrical possibility.
Friel once wrote: “For me the true gift of theatre, the real benediction of all art, is the ringing bell which reverberates quietly and persistently in the head long after the curtain has come down and the audience has gone home.”
The event is made possible by the generosity of the Manhattan Theatre Club, Lynn Meadow, Artistic Director, Barry Grove, Executive Producer.