death

‘The audience knew they were in the hands of a master’

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A musical number, a chat with a Hollywood star. A debate on the ‘burning issue’ of the day followed by a poem from the woman in the third row, a wave from the man in the fourth and then something for, well, everyone in the audience.

His work ethic was legendary, at the height of his career he was producing and presenting the Late Late, as well as presenting a daily radio show on RTÉ Radio 1.

And that wasn’t all – in the 1980s, while most of the country was enjoying the last days of summer, Gaybo had already started his autumn term, presenting the Rose of Tralee live from the Dome in the Kerry capital.

Add in the ‘Calor Gas Housewife of the Year’ competition and it was no wonder he was known as ‘Uncle Gaybo’ – for some he was as familiar a presence in the home as members of their own families.

Despite his ubiquity however Gay never became complacent about his work and both his television and radio shows broke new ground.

The Gay Byrne Hour, which became the Gay Byrne Show on RTÉ Radio 1, pioneered listener engagement, with listeners writing in and later phoning Gay about the issues of the day or problems close to their hearts.

“Consumer issues, recipes for fruit cake, relationship woes – in the days before social media Gay Byrne was the conduit for all kinds of discussion and debates”

One of the show’s most memorable broadcasts featured letters inspired by the death in childbirth of teenager Anne Lovett in Granard, Co Longford, in 1984.

When news of the tragedy broke, Irish men and women from all around the country wrote to the show with their own stories of abandonment, neglect and fear, stories from the heart which were broadcast to the nation.

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Albert Finney: the most almighty physical screen presence

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Finney was the face of the vibrant new wave of working-class postwar British cinema, and maintained a fierce vitality in his distinguished later performances

From moon-faced youth to weatherbeaten later years, Albert Finney was an almighty force on screen: a clenched fist of physicality, a battering ram of uningratiating power, almost priapic with defiant confidence, with the battle-readiness of a prop forward or sumo wrestler. His presence was very different from the long-limbed spindliness or feline charm of contemporaries such as Peter O’Toole, Tom Courtenay and Terence Stamp, those other young lions of postwar British cinema who showed that regional and working-class voices had a new, real power. And, in retirement, Salford-born Finney lived long enough to hear his name invoked as a lost hero by those enraged that, in the 21st century, working-class actors were being marginalised in Britain once again.

Finney was a unique actor, although it was his fate to be compared, wonderingly, to other people. Ken Tynan famously reeled away from Finney’s Rada graduation show calling the teenager a new Spencer Tracy. Later in his theatrical career, he was dubbed a new Olivier. I would say that he was Britain’s Jean Gabin. But none of that is quite right. He was a brilliant and utterly distinctive actor, deeply rooted in a theatrical tradition but capable of naturalistic performances, a product of Britain’s vital new “kitchen-sink” cinema. And as a producer, Finney gave early breaks to Tony Scott and Stephen Frears, helped get Lindsay Anderson’s If… off the ground, and was a driving force behind Mike Leigh’s first feature, Bleak Moments.

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Edinburgh set to say farewell to local character David ‘Monkey’ Kelbie 

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To hundreds he was known simply as “Monkey”, at the vanguard of the Capital’s army of street drinkers, by turn amusing, annoying, frightening and, often as not, pitiful. 

A familiar face on city centre streets, Monkey was well known as much of a nuisance to authorities as to passers by, with a rap sheet of no less than 186 breaches of the peace against his name.

But now, as the man once thought too much of a handful for even the toughest of hostels is set to be buried tomorrow, the charity which gave him a roof over his head and a sense of purpose in his latter years, has asked that the story of the man behind the nickname, and the experiences that shaped him, be told. David Kelbie was born in 1948 in Arbroath, one of no less than 11 children to Daniel and Elizabeth Kelbie. The Kelbie clan were of a travelling background and moved around various parts of Scotland. Davie spent most of his childhood in the care of Aberlour Orphanage, with three of his siblings. At its peak, the orphanage was one of the largest establishments in Scotland with about 600 children living there. Long defunct, it is now the focus of allegations of historic child sexual abuse. [ . . . ]

Continue at Edinburgh New Edinburgh set to say farewell to local character David ‘Monkey’ Kelbie – Edinburgh Evening News