(Pictured: Jared, Jamie, Marlowe and Damian Harris)
One of Los Angeles’s favorite film festivals came to an end on Sunday with the annual Steve Brennan Tribute Award presented by Brennan’s widow, Bernadette O’Neill, to Jared, (of the Emmy winning series “Mad Men” and soon to be seen in Sherlock Holmes 2) Damian, and Jamie Harris, the three sons of acclaimed Irish actor Richard Harris (1933-2002). Also on stage was Harris’s grandson, Marlowe. The ceremony was followed by a screening of Jim Sheridan’s The Field, for which Harris received an Oscar Nomination for Best Actor.
A lively Q&A followed the screening of The Field, moderated by director/actor Paul Quinn (This is My Father). Harris’s sons amused the audience with entertaining stories about their father including his achievement as a relatively unknown actor of negotiating third billing above the title for Mutiny on the Bounty alongside Marlon Brando and Trevor Howard; a memorable drive from Limerick to Dublin to make a flight back to America with many stops along the way and a delay of over week to return to the US; his passionate love of Ireland and how he often felt like a rejected lover but would have killed anyone who said a word against his country; his despair at his sons’ English accents even though his sons reminded him that it was he who had after all sent them to be educated at English public schools; their recollection of the astute observation made by Dublin producer Noel Pearson (My Left Foot, The Field, Dancing at Lughnasa) summing up their father’s personality: “He’s a circus of a man!”
