Bottom's Up for Actor Mahoney
By George Houde
Irish American Post Chicago Bureau

The summer will be warm and sweet, with Shakespeare under the stars and American pop fiction under the lights and John Mahoney relishing every moment. 

Born of Irish and Scottish blood, raised in England, and self-modified into an American who has one of the most endearing roles on television, Mahoney remains a performer of modest pronouncement and high achievement.

"It's been a great summer," he said.

That is an understatement. After finishing another successful year on television's Frasier, Mahoney has been cast as Bottom in the Ravinia production of Midsummer Night's Dream. The July 14 production is a cooperative effort by the Lyric Opera, the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre and the Chicago Symphony.

It's another feather in the acting cap of Mahoney, who seems tickled about the part and about his life in general.

"Bottom is one of the mechanics who puts on the play (within the play) and he's a big know-it-all," said Mahoney. "It'll be fun."

With a paying job in a successful network television series — Frasier just finished its eighth season — one might think Mahoney would take the summer off and hang around Oak Park, frequent his favorite watering hole and maybe relax, now that he has turned 60. But no, he is off on a summer acting adventure across town and countries.

From Shakespeare at Ravinia, he heads to the Steppenwolf Theater in Chicago, where he will perform in an adaptation of Elmore Leonard's gritty fiction, American Noire, on July 23. He will take then the show on the road to one of his favorite events and places: the Galway Arts Festival.

"I spend a lot of time in Galway and Clare and Donegal," the Illinois-based actor explained. "I get to Ireland every year," he added happily.

For Mahoney, it is like going home again and again and again. He wants to retire in Ireland. "I feel comfortable and at home there, and the people are so friendly," he pointed out. "The west coast of Ireland is THE place."

But it has been an odd journey that led him — an Irishman — initially to England, then to the United States and finally to Ireland with actress Joan Allen, first setting foot on the Green Sod when he was an adult.

"We flew to Dublin and drove right to Galway and meandered around, up and down the coast," said Mahoney, who still recalls that trip with great fondness.

Life was not always so dreamy. As a child, Mahoney grew up in war-battered Manchester, where his father, John, had found employment and Margaret, his mother, bore nine children.

"My mom's family is Scottish, so I'm all Celt," noted Mahoney.

Things were not good in Manchester during the war. There were years of air raids and blackouts. There were bombed-out buildings, casualties and very dark days.

Mahoney remembered life being ugly. "Growing up in the rubble and playing in air raid shelters. Everything was rationed. It was not the ideal situation." 

When he was 11, one of those life-changing events happened. He visited the United States. The year was 1951 and the Korean War was going full blast, but the United States was on the rebound from the years of World War II and the country was booming.

"We visited my sister, who had become a war bride and married a farmer in western Illinois. My whole family came over," said Mahoney. "I thought, 'This is it.' You can imagine what it was like to leave war-torn Manchester and you came here and there was food and everybody was bright and cheery. Everybody had a car."

From that moment, Mahoney knew his ultimate destination would be the U.S. So when he was 19, he left Manchester and came to America. There he was, an Irish-Scottish guy with a Cockney accent, just like the Beatles. He did what any red-blooded American would do: he enlisted in the U.S. Army. "If you applied for permanent residency, you could join," said Mahoney, figuring that it would be a good step on the way to becoming a citizen and getting the military obligation out of the way. The draft was still underway, with the Iron Curtain and the Cold War becoming household words.

Mahoney felt that he wanted to fit in, become an American, talk like one, walk like one and act like one.

"I set out to lose my English accent. I didn't want to be an Englishman in America," Mahoney said. "I sounded like I was from the north of England and took a lot of grief, but it was good-natured. So I would ask how do you say words like 'banana' or 'calf,' and they would tell me and I would write it down on note cards." 

It took some practice and more ribbing from the Yanks, but Mahoney spent three years in the Army and came out as a red-white-and-blue American.

"By the time I got out of the Arm, nobody could tell I was from England," he said. "That's how quick I did it."

He served as a clerk-typist and spent a year at Fort Leonard Wood, Mo., and two years in Germany. "It was a good time to be in," he recalled. "Nothing was going on, except that the Berlin Wall went up."

Back from Europe and finally out of the military, Mahoney enrolled at Quincy College, eventually receiving his master's degree in English literature, and then taught at Western Illinois University for a year. He had worked his way through college as a hospital orderly and landed a job as the editor of a medical journal in downtown Chicago. His offices were in the Hancock Building, but it was not exactly the life he had envisioned. He was 37 and reviewing his career and his future. 

"I thought back on what was exciting in my life. In Manchester, I had belonged to an acting company and I thought before I get one day older I'm going to try that," said Mahoney. He subsequently took acting lessons at Chicago's St. Nicholas Theater which was co-founded by noted writer David Mamet . He was then invited to Steppenwolf by actor John Malkovitch and has appeared in more than 30 productions there. 

With the famed playwright and the famous performer getting him started, his career soared quickly upward. In addition to numerous television roles, Mahoney has also appeared in such films asSuspect, Primal Fear and Eight Men Out. Moving on to other venues, he won a Tony award for The House of Blue Leaves on Broadway and a Theater World Award for a role in Orphans. He recently received the Commitment to Chicago Award from the Chicago Film Critics Association.

 In August, Mahoney will return to Los Angeles to begin work on the ninth season of Frasier. It is a quality show with good writing, Mahoney said, indicating he would leave it if it wasn't. When he's not on the road or on location or doing a show at Steppenwolf, he's at home. Married once and divorced, with no children, he remains single. But not aloof.

"I pretty much hang out in Oak Park, have a couple of drinks, go to the beach, said Mahoney. "It's been quite a life so far."
 
 

If you go Tickets for the July 14 concert presentation of A Midsummer's Night's Dream" are $40, $30 and $20 for Pavilion seats and $10 lawn seats. For more information on Ravinia's 2001 season, check the facility's Web site at www.ravinia.org or call 847-266-5100. Ravinia is located 25 miles north of Chicago at Lake Cook and Green Bay roads in Highland Park. The July 23 showing of American Noire at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre is sold out but call for more information at 312-335-1650. The Steppenwolf is located at 1650 N. Halstead Ave., a half block north of North Avenue. A parking garage, which opens two hours before curtain time, is located just south of the theater.