The latest issue of Ireland’s Own includes an account of 16-year-old Orson Welles’ visit to the Emerald Isle.
Martin Gleeson writes of Welles’ arrival in August 1931 on the SS Baltic in his article When Orson Welles Took a Donkey Around Connemara in the magazine’s February 14 issue (No. 6015).
Having heard Pádraic Ó’Conaire’s story, M’ashal Beag Dubh (My Little Black Donkey), the recent Todd School for Boys graduate decided to emulate Ó’Conaire’s tour of the Connemara countryside on a donkey and cart.
Welles hired a donkey named Sheeogh and a cart. He spent a month on a sketching tour of the west of Ireland, painting beautiful landscapes by day and sleeping at night under the stars, often kept warm by a turf fire.
His travels took him to the three Aran Islands in Galway Bay. At Inisheer, the smallest of the three islands, the young Welles enjoyed watching the girls dancing. He joined them at a céilí and for many years afterwards the Aran Islands residents remembered his enthusiasm for Irish dancing. He was said to be intrigued by these Irish-speaking islanders who wore home-made clothes, knitted from the wool of their own sheep.
In September, Welles returned to Galway, and leaving the donkey and cart behind, traveled to Dublin.
After attending a performance of a play at the Gate Theatre, he persuaded its manager, Hilton Edwards, that he was an experienced U.S. actor of 18 years and landed a part in the Gate’s next production, Jew Süss.
Of his performance, The Irish Times wrote, “A new actor, Mr. Orson Welles, made an excellent Karl Alexander. It will be necessary to see him in other parts before it can be said that he is the accomplished actor that he seemed last night in a part that might have been made for him.”
The performance marked the start of Welles’ career as a professional actor.
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