Abbey Theatre, 1904

BRILLIANT IRISH ARTISTS – British Pathe.

Silent footage, from 1925, of Irish actors performing and in mufti. Gives a fascinating portrait of acting styles and the social presentation of the actor. Would be interesting to identify the performers and roles – Pathe gives only generic descriptions (“a man playing the role of an old fisherman smoking a pipe and looking grumpy” etc.).

NEW ABBEY THEATRE – British Pathe.

Pathe Newsreel from September 1963 of the laying of the foundation stone of the new Abbey Theatre. Contains film footage of the old Abbey, and of a wooden model of the old Abbey.

Back when we met on 14th January, Niall in NOHO pointed me in the direction of the on-line Dictionary of Irish Architects 1720-1940. A search for “Abbey Theatre” turns up the following entries for Marlborough Street, Nos.002-3:

Name: HOLLOWAY, JOSEPH
Building: CO. DUBLIN, DUBLIN, MARLBOROUGH STREET, NO. 002 (ABBEY THEATRE)
Date: 1904
Nature: Conversion of Mechanics’ Institute into theatre. Gift of Mis A.E.F. Horniman of London. Contractors: R. & E. Farmer.
Refs: Plans and drawings in NLI, AD 2171-2205; IB* 46, 13 Aug,3 Dec 1904, 505, 822

* IB = Irish Builder, a journal that appeared, under various names, from 1859 to 1979.

Name: PURSER, SARAH HENRIETTA *
Building: CO. DUBLIN, DUBLIN, MARLBOROUGH STREET, NO. 002 (ABBEY THEATRE)
Date: 1904
Nature: Ground floor windows, for Annie F. Horniman.
Refs: John O’Grady, The Life and Work of Sarah Purser (1996), 246-7

Name: SCOTT & GOOD
Building: CO. DUBLIN, DUBLIN, MARLBOROUGH STREET, NO. 002 (ABBEY THEATRE)
Date: 1934-1937
Nature: Alts. to foyer area including removal of arches inserted by Holloway.
Refs: Drawings, 1934-37, in IAA, Acc. 79/10.13/1-21; John O’Regan & Nicola Dearey, eds., Michael Scott Architect in (casual) conversation with Dorothy Walker (1995), 161

Name: SCOTT & GOOD
Building: CO. DUBLIN, DUBLIN, MARLBOROUGH STREET, NO. 002 (ABBEY THEATRE)
Date: 1934-1937
Nature: Alts. to foyer area including removal of arches inserted by Holloway.
Refs: Drawings, 1934-37, in IAA, Acc. 79/10.13/1-21; John O’Regan & Nicola Dearey, eds., Michael Scott Architect in (casual) conversation with Dorothy Walker (1995), 161

Name: SCOTT, MICHAEL JOHN
Building: CO. DUBLIN, DUBLIN, MARLBOROUGH STREET, NO.002-3 (ABBEY THEATRE)
Date: 1958-66
Nature: New theatre, with Ronald Tallon. Consultant Architect: Pierre Sonrel, Paris.
Refs: IB 101, 10 Jan 1959, 9; John O’Regan & Nicola Dearey, eds., Michael Scott Architect in (casual) conversation with Dorothy Walker (1995), 161-170(illus.),234

Clearly the Holloway plans and drawings are going to be the most important, but I thought it’d be no harm to look at the Scott & Good drawings at the Irish Architectural Archive. So, having made an appointment, I took myself off to 45 Merrion Square this morning to see what they’ve got.

The IAI lives in a fantastic Georgian building, with an impressive collection of physical architectural models in the lobby, and the two principal reception rooms, which together stretch from  the front to rear of the house, are laid out as airy reading rooms for the archive’s collection of reference works, portfolios of architectural drawings, and box files of photographs.  Lovely people; lovely place!

Simon Lincoln had set out the Archive’s collection of designs for alterations to the Old Abbey Theatre, 1934-37, by architects Scott & Good, and for €10 camera fee and €2 per item photographed, I was able to take reference photos of everything of interest.

The highlights, for our purposes, are:

79/10.13/1 “Site Map – Proposed alterations to vestibule of Abbey Theatre” (dated 31/8/34)

79/10.13/2 “Map showing Abbey Theatre Property” (dated 20/9/34)

79/10.13/3-5 “Abbey Theatre” (Views of vestibule of theatre; /3 is undated; /4 is dated 1935; /5 is dated 1934)

79/10.13/6-12 A series of plans and sections relating to the proposed alterations to the Vestibule of the Abbey Theatre; dating from between August 1934 and May 1935.

79/10.13/13 “Proposed Canopy for the Abbey Theatre” (dated 3/11/36)

79/10.13/14 “Abbey Theatre, Balcony Railing” (undated; plan, section, elevation of balcony railings.)

79/10.13/15 “Proposed reconstruction of Abbey Theatre” (undated; long section of theatre)

79/10/13/16 “Survey of Abbey Theatre Auditorium” (dated 12/7/35)

79/10.13/17-19 “Proposed Reconstruction of Abbey Theatre” (general, ground floor and balcony level plans; dating between Jan. 1936 and Jan. 1937)

The reference collection of the IAI also includes an intriguing volume: Ryan, Philip B. The Lost Theatres of Dublin (Badger Press, 1998). The pages on the old Abbey contain a couple of useful interior photographs (the staircase from foyer to Balcony, and a rehearsal in progress as seen from the Balcony). But, together with the varied fare of theatrical entertainments that Joseph Holloway documents in his Dublin Playgoer’s Impressions, Ryan’s volume also put me in mind to think more carefully about the place of the old Abbey within the theatrical geography, and culture, of the city as a whole. In addition to the Abbey, Ryan has chapters on: the First, Second and Third Theatres Royal; The Leinster Hall, The Queen’s Theatre; The Tivoli Variety Theatre; The Coliseum; The Capitol Theatre; The Torch Theatre; and Dan Lowrey’s Music Hall.

On the opening of the new Abbey Theatre, a glossy, illustrated booklet, Abbey Theatre – Dublin 1904-1966, was published; the IAI holds a copy. It includes numerous early production photographs, including one of Cathleen ni Houlihan with Lady Gregory in role as Cathleen, playing opposite Arthur Shields as Michael Gillane; as well as a 1904 photograph of the old Abbey vestibule, and the old Abbey stage in the aftermath of the 1951 fire.

Finally, I went through the box-file for Abbey Street and found, in addition to a useful collection giving a good sense of the character and history of that part of town, a couple of useful photos of the exterior of the old Abbey; one, in particular, giving a wider view of its urban setting than the views usually published show.

I’ll need to return to look at the Marlborough Street box file, which was in use elsewhere in the Archive.

Shortly after Christmas, Steve Wilmer mentioned to me that, in 1961, distinguished Dublin city architect and town planner Daithi P. Hanly succeeded in saving the stones of the old Abbey Theatre, which were being dismantled and prepared for dumping, in preparation for the building of the new Abbey on the site. The old Abbey’s front façade and vestibule on the corner of Marlborough Street and Abbey Street, undamaged by the fire of 17th July 1951, had continued in use until 1961 as the ticket office of the Abbey players during their exile in the Queen’s Theatre. At Hanly’s request, the contractor, Christy Cooney, had the stones numbered and transported, along with the old theatre’s canopy, railings, windows, vestibule fittings, and billboards to Hanly’s garden and a former boathouse in Vico Road, Dalkey, where they lie to this day (Sunday Independent, August 7, 1988).

Charles Duggan, Dublin City Council’s Heritage Officer, on learning of the “Abbey Theatre, 1904” project, sent Niall Ó hOisín of NOHO a PDF of documents and press cuttings relating to Hanly’s visionary deed of cultural preservation and his subsequent efforts to find a proper home for the old theatre’s façade. From the mid 1980s until his death in July 2003, Hanly, backed by a cast of Irish theatre notables, from Cyril Cusack to Vincent Dowling, succeeded in generating a great deal of interest in the story both in the media and among potential stakeholders in the proposed reconstruction. While Boston College expressed an interest in acquiring the stones should no home be found for it in Dublin, and exploratory, but ultimately fruitless, discussions took place with Trinity College Dublin about the potential incorporation of the granite façade, measuring 25 feet high and 34 feet wide, into The Lir, National Academy of Dramatic Art, Hanly’s preferred outcome was to have it re-erected close to its original site as an entrance to a proposed National Theatre Gallery or Museum.

It would be a joy to be able to see this “original Georgian façade, with the name ‘The Abbey Theatre’ in dark green letters above the main entrance” (“Where Stands the Abbey?” Dáithi P. Hanly letter to the Irish Times, 30 May 2002), as well as the several other fixtures and fittings preserved by Hanly, and to incorporate them, as virtual objects and textures, in at least a digital rebuilding of the old Abbey Theatre. Perhaps this effort could help to draw attention, once again, to this precious survival and the question of its future.

I met up with lighting designer, Zia Holly, at 3pm this afternoon in the Science Gallery Cafe. Holly wrote a recent BA dissertation on the history of lighting design at the Abbey from 1904 to the present day.* She conducted research in the Abbey Archives, as well as interviewing Leslie Scott who, as the Abbey’s Chief Electrician, oversaw the transfer from the Queen’s Theatre – the company’s home following the 1951 fire – to the new Abbey Theatre in 1966.

Zia gave me a her chapter on the early days of the Abbey, as well as documents describing the various technologies in use during the period with which her research was concerned. She notes that, with Yeats’s emphasis on the primacy of the spoken word: “spectacle was not one of the key concerns of the Abbey in its infancy and it would be some time before the Abbey would seek to encourage or even credit design elements in its productions.” (unpubl. ts. p.7)

Hugh Hunt’s volume The Abbey: Ireland’s National Theatre, 1904-1978 (Dublin: Gill and Macmillan, 1979), carries actress Maire Nic Shiubhlaigh’s recollections of the theatre’s opening night, which gives a vivid impression of Abbey actors frantically doubling up as stage technicians:

“Back stage, Willie Fay, dressed for his part in one of the new plays, a wild wig slipping sideways over his elfin face, swung unexpectedly from a baton high in the flies, arranging the lighting.” (Hunt 1979, p.62)

This additional theatrical role of William Fay was not entirely arbitrary: Holly notes that, before being employed by the Management Committee to advise Joseph Holloway and supervise the renovations of the theatre, Fay had worked as an electrician (unpubl. ts., p.8). But the scene Nic Shiubhlaigh records tends to confirm the impression that the early Abbey was not very much concerned with stage lighting beyond what was required to illuminate the actors.

Indeed, the “modest and unpretentious” space of the proscenium-framed stage, just 21 feet in width by 16 feet in depth (Hunt 1979, p.58), would in any case have afforded limited scope for spectacular effects.

Photographs confirm that footlights were not in use at the Abbey at this time. Actor Udolphus (Dossie) Wright, like Fay, also served in multiple roles including, until 1952 as “master of the switchboard” (Hunt 1979, p.192), “in which capacity he indulged his passion for flooding the stage with amber light” (Hunt 1979, p.68, in Holly unpubl. ts. p.10) – an impression of the Abbey’s approach to lighting which, Holly notes, is borne out by production photographs of the period.

Holly concludes:

“Lighting as an art form relies on attention to detail and at these early stages of development, where design implementation relied on an understanding and mastering of complex and cumbersome technologies for its expression, it was essential, if art was to be the outcome, for its facilitator to have an enthusiastic and focused artistic desire coupled with technical know-how. The practical necessity of role-juggling, inevitably led to lighting being neglected beyond the standards of sufficiency.” (unpubl. ts. 10)

Many thanks to Zia for her kindness in time and access to her dissertation!

* Holly, Zia “Technology and the Rise of Lighting Design in the Abbey” BA Dissertation, Department of Drama, Trinity College Dublin, May 2010.