The actor who played the iconic part of Benjy in ‘The Riordans’, one of Ireland’s most fondly remembered TV soaps, recalls the impact it had on Irish society
‘WE STARTED rehearsals for The Riordans on 28th September, 1964. I was a graduate of Deirdre O’Connell’s Stanislavsky Studio and was obsessed with a desire to master the craft of the actor. We recorded 14 episodes, transmitted every week from January 1965.
I was deeply disappointed with my performance as Benjy in those early programmes. My inexperience was there for all to see. The embarrassment of it drove me to disguise myself in public.
RTÉ decided to continue the series and shooting was resumed in March 1965 with a new writer, Wesley Burrowes, and new director Lelia Doolan. Between them they transformed the show.
Wesley went to live in rural Kilkenny (where The Riordans was set) and absorbed the life around him. Lelia was an insightful and demanding director who got the best out of cast and crew. I began to feel more confident and, in time, started to enjoy myself picking up the skills of a farmer’s life. I had to learn how to drive a car, tractor, motorbike, muck-spreader, fertiliser spreader, beet sower and combine harvester. I learned how to plough and harrow and to reverse a tractor and trailer through a gate. Not to mention milking cows by hand and machine, and to dip, shear and inject sheep and cattle.
Frank O’Donovan, who played Batty, said to me one day as we injected sheep against such dangers as braxy: “Do you realise we’re turning these poor animals into drug addicts?!” The script had Benjy having a cigarette – so I also learned how to smoke.
At the start, none of us knew how long the show would go on. Ireland in the ’60s was starting to free itself from the shackles of the ’40s and ’50s, and Telefís Éireann was the only TV station available. The Riordans had a captive audience and became a huge success not only with the rural population, but in towns and cities as well.
A quote from the Limerick Weekly Echo in 1971 said: “The Riordans returned to our screen with a bang, and nowhere else was that bang felt greater than in the parish of Caherline. Even the church could not compete, so Father D Keogh PP, Caherline, had to announce that evening devotions in the future will be timed for 7.15pm to avoid clashing with the popular TV programme The Riordans.”
I remember many stories about Mass times being altered, bingo times being changed and TV sets being installed in bingo buses.
Many of the storylines in The Riordans caused a national furore. The “behind the bushes” episode, (in which Benjy was seen coming out from the bushes with Colette) resulted in a prominent town council expressing its concern!
The episode about contraception, when Maggie and Benjy were told they could not have any more children, sparked a lot of comment. I never received any personal abuse from people over any of the storylines. My big problem was simply getting down the street as I was recognised everywhere I went, so I developed a quick walk.
In the early years the Department of Agriculture had an input into the programmes and I ended up being part of its propaganda machine, promoting new farming methods. On screen this was a cause of great friction between me and my screen father, Tom Riordan, who resisted modern farming methods.
I feel the success of the series was due to Wesley’s scripts (there were also wonderful scripts from Eugene McCabe), and a talented company of actors led by the great John Crowley (Tom Riordan).
The storylines were mostly character- rather than plot-driven. Most important of all it was often funny, without losing credibility. The rural population was captivated by it, and enjoyed being portrayed on screen. An old man said to me once, “I’d watch it just to see Batty walking across the yard.”
During my 14 years with The Riordans I was determined to work in both television and theatre. In the early years I worked at Deirdre O’Connell’s Focus Theatre, at the Project Art Theatre and the Peacock and I toured with the Irish Theatre Company.
However, after 14 years on both fronts and with theatre roles becoming more demanding it became clear to me that I had to leave The Riordans. So with some sadness I left in 1978, a year before its demise. Benjy went to Africa as a lay missionary, leaving Maggie and Brendan behind. When the series finished the following year Benjy was still in Africa. I often wonder what became of him.”
The Riordans: Tea, Taboos Tractors airs on Tuesday night on RTÉ One at 10.15pm
Riordans today
IT IS 30 years since The Riordans came to an end. Centred around a fictional farming family in Leestown, Co Kilkenny, it delivered high drama, comedy, and farming advice – and tackled sensitive topics such as contraception.
John Crowleywho played Tom Riordan worked mainly in films after The Riordans. He played the auctioneer in John B Keane's
The Fieldwith Richard Harris, and died in 1998.
Moira Deady, his screen wife Mary Riordan, went on to act in
Glenroe, the spin-off show that followed
Bracken, which was the spin-off from
The Riordans.
Tom Hickey, Tom and Mary's on-screen son Benjy, went on to become an acclaimed stage and film actor.
Biddy White Lennon, Tom's wife Maggie Riordan, is a successful cookery book author.
Tony Doyle, the local priest Fr Sheehy, became a successful TV actor with the BBC, starring in Ballykissangel among other shows. He died aged 58.
Wesley Burrowes(writer of The Riordans) went on to write
Brackenand
Glenroe. His film credits include
Ratand
Mystics.