Vincent O'Neill
Place of birth: Ireland.
What is your profession? Actor, Director, and Professor.
How do you celebrate your Irishness? Established the Irish Classical Theatre Company , Buffalo, NY in 1990 and as Artistic Director, have been promoting and producing professional theatre, mostly Irish plays, for over 30 years. Some of the many contributions that I have personally made to Irish culture include "Joyicity", a one man show on the works of James Joyce which I have performed on four continents, the production of a CD on the works of W.B. Yeats, and the adaptation of Joyce's "Ulysses" for the stage. My award winning dramatization of "Finnegans Wake" received a world premiere production which ran successfully for five weeks in Buffalo, NY. I trained as an actor at the Abbey Theatre School of Acting, Dublin and was a member of and toured internationally with the Abbey Theatre.
Name a hero you admire and why? Joseph M. Hassett who has written extensively on W.B. Yeats and James Joyce. A Ph. D in Anglo Irish literature from University College, Dublin, his books include "W.B Yeats and the Muses"; "Yeats Now, Echoing into Life"; and "The Ulysses Trials". He is internationally celebrated for his passion for Irish literature and culture and recently was recognized for his stellar contributions to Ireland with the "Presidential Distinguished Service Award" for the Irish abroad.
Something people would be surprised to know about me... When training to be a mime artist at Marcel Marceau's International Academy in Paris I had a chance encounter with the great Irish writer Samuel Beckett. When he discovered that I was training to be a mime, he laughed and said, "You are a walking oxymoron, a native of the most talkative nation in the world pursuing the art of silence".
Biography: Artistic Director Emeritus and co-founder of the Irish Classical Theatre Company, Buffalo, NY, Vincent was born in Dublin, Ireland, and studied at University College Dublin and at Trinity College. He studied Acting at the prestigious Abbey Theatre School and Mime under the legendary Marcel Marceau at his International Academy in Paris. As a member of the Abbey Theatre Company, he toured internationally to the Edinburgh Festival, London, Paris, Hong Kong, Moscow and St. Petersburg. His films credits include: Manna from Heaven; Tesseract; Queen City; Game Changers; Laff in the Dark; and The American Side. His one-man show based on the life and works of James Joyce, Joyicity, debuted at the Abbey Theatre as part of Dublin’s International Theatre Festival, and was presented in Australia, Japan, off-Broadway, and throughout Europe and the USA. Vincent is an ARTIE Award winner in the categories of: Outstanding Actor; Outstanding Director; Outstanding Production; Outstanding Playwright; and Career Achievement. Vincent also received Irishman of the Year, and Buffalo Citizen of the Year awards. He has been honored with the Irish Echo Community Champion Award and with a permanent Star in Buffalo’s Walk of Fame. He is also former Department Chair and Director of Theatre Performance in the Department of Theatre and Dance, University at Buffalo, where he has been a member of the faculty since 1990.
