The Quartet:
Stories, Poetry, and Dreams
Featuring author Michael Murphy and his RTÉ friends

March 15 & 16 | 7:30 PM

“It’s one thing to read [Murphy’s] haunting words. It’s quite another to experience them jump off the page as they are read on stage. There are tears. But there is laughter and great humour too…a very unique cross between a book reading, and a theatrical experience.” – The Irish Examiner

For forty-five years Michael Murphy presented the news on RTÉ, Ireland’s national broadcaster, where he made friends with four esteemed colleagues, also newsreaders: Eamonn Lawlor (RTÉ European Correspondent), Emer O’Kelly (Sunday Independent columnist), Eileen Dunne (Nine O’Clock News presenter), and Ciana Campbell (former RTÉ  reporter and Ennis Book Club Festival founder). They called themselves “The Quartet” and would meet every few months for joyful get-togethers over dinner in each other’s homes.

Years later, these five extraordinary newsreaders reunited to bring together their voices and stories on stage for a most unusual and inspiring event that has entertained and moved audiences across Ireland – and now comes to our Donaghy Theatre for a special engagement.

Assuming the characters in Murphy’s books, At Five in the Afternoon: My Battle with Male Cancer, The House of Pure Being, and his best-selling collections of poetry The Republic of Love and Chaplet of Roses, the quartet share deeply insightful reflections on love and sex, friendship and family, and celebrate the happy though fragile human spirit triumphing against the odds.