New doors open for Limerick-born Máirtín in Irish soap Ros na Rún

AFTER a lifetime in front of a class, Limerick-born Martin Doyle is now making a name for himself, in front of a camera - and loving every minute of it.

“It’s great craic,” said the Janesboro man who is now better known as Máirtín O’Dubhghaill and who plays the role of Cóilí Jackie in the long-running Irish language soap, Ros na Run.

“I was teaching for over 40 years and you have to be a bit of a clown and an actor to stand in front of a class,” he joked, speaking from his Connemara home this week.

Máirtín was an extra on the series in the past but then, about two years ago, he was invited to audition and his character Cóilí was born. Initially, the role was fairly low-key, with Cóilí appearing in four or five episodes but since September, a new, strong story line has emerged with Cóilí at its heart.

He is the culprit behind a silage spillage into the local river but is trying to shift the blame on to someone else. A second story line sees him still with an eye for Frances, the estranged wife of publican Tadhg.

Máirtín describes his character Cóilí as a man who grew up the hard way, a man with a chip on his shoulder that he has lost out on life.

“He is a man without many friends, who tends to get a bit annoyed with people and who begrudges people who have done well in life.”

And in the best soap tradition, where filming is done months ahead of screening, he predicts a lot of Cóilí action in the weeks ahead.

But the notoriety of the small screen was far from Máirtín’s mind when he was growing up in Janesboro, although even then, he had a great love of Irish and an affinity with canúint Chonamara rather than Munster Irish. Small wonder then that he fell in love with and married a Connemara lass, Philomena, when the two were training to be teachers at Mary Immaculate College.

And from the very first day he met Philomena’s parents, it was Gaeilge agus Gaeilge amháin. From the beginning too, the couple’s Limerick home was lán-Ghaelach but after a number of years, during which Máirtin taught in Galvone, they decided to move to Connemara to be close to Phil’s parents.

There, Máirtín did a bit of acting with a local drama group before Ros na Ruan came calling.

However, he insisted, it is his wife Phil who has the true passion for drama in her blood. Phil, who teaches regularly at Mary Immaculate College,  has written a number of plays for schools, Máirtín pointed out. And she has passed the dramatic gene on to some of their six children, two of whom are involved in acting but all are also musical.

Máirtín  brought his love of hurling with him to deepest Connemara, however, and still coaches a camogie team in Spiddal.

Very shortly after moving to the Gaeltacht, too, he was asked to come training with Spiddal hurlers and after two sessions, helped them to a Junior C county victory. In total, he has three county medals for hurling and even after his knees gave up on him, he played in goals up until  he was 43.

During this year’s championship, he wore the Limerick colours with great pride during the Limerick-Galway final.

“I was up there with my green and white in among all the maroon,” he said.

As for the win?

“I am still up there in heaven after it,” he said.

Like so many other Limerick fans, he attended the 1973 win and he said: “I never thought it would take 45 years.”