Dear Ian,
You never knew this but you were my guide when I first attempted to direct for television. I’d come from theatre and radio and quickly realised that I hadn’t a clue when a good friend told me “you make an awful lot of noise in the directing box”. I confessed immediately and asked what I should do. ” Check out how Ian McGarry works”, she said. I did, and was amazed and delighted to witness your quiet, very much in control way of dealing with the crew, how on music programmes you consulted and knew the score and counted down the beats for each shot. Your visual interpretation of the dynamics of the music was always spot on – you never just did coverage but offered an exact interpretation to the viewer in which vision and sound were united so well that your skill in blending them together was invisible. I learned so much from watching you at work but knew I could never compete. You are always the master, the maestro.
You were a pleasure to deal with even though on one occasion you had every reason to murder me. In the early 1980s you were one of the few people in RTE who had a VHS machine. In those days a VHS machine was a prized possession. I called into your office to ask if I could borrow it for a short while. You weren’t there, so as it was lunch time I did the unforgivable and took it into my own office and started viewing. A few minutes later you came in looking distressed, disturbed and crestfallen, and as you were telling me that someone had stolen your VHS machine you realised that I was the thief. It was a moment straight out of situation comedy. When we both recovered our wits and I made a grovelling apology, you sighed and said, “oh man, don’t do this to me again … when your are finished will you bring it back, thanks”. I did, and we never mentioned my criminality again, but I have never forgotten your decency and kindness in this and all my dealings with you.
When I was producing The Live Mike we collaborated on a crazy sketch in pre- Riverdance times about Irish dancing and you did a brilliant directing job with Fran Dempsey in a gymslip dancing frantically to a ceili band which got faster and faster. Chaos everywhere with dancers out of step and music out of tune. Not what would be expected on a programme directed by the great Ian McGarry!
All my love, Ian,
John Lynch.
- John Lynch