Wednesday 25 February 2009

Death of Hugh Leonard

Hugh LeonardHugh Leonard, the playwright, died on February 12 aged 82. Hugh Leonard was the pseudonym of John (Jack) Keyes Byrne, who was raised in Dalkey, Co Dublin. He enjoyed enormous success on Broadway with his two plays, Da and A Life. "Da" ran for nearly two years on Broadway and earned Leonard a Tony Award in 1977. It was later turned into a film starring Martin Sheen. He published two hugely popular volumes of autobiography, Home Before Night (1979) and Out After Dark (1989). Until 2006, he wrote a regular humorous column, “The Curmudgeon”, for the Sunday Independent, in which he often dwelt on his love of cats. Mr. Leonard was also renowned for his adaptations of classic novels - Great Expectations and Wuthering Heights among them — for British television.

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