Pictured above, left to right: Ireland’s Consul General Fionnuala Quinlin, Abbey Theatre Director and CEO Fiach Mac Conghail, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, Pyramid Hotel Group CEO Rick Kelleher, and O’Neill and Associates CEO Tom O’Neill

On Tuesday, April 26, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh and Ireland’s Consul General Fionnuala Quinlin, along with many of the city’s most prominent business, cultural and community leaders, gathered at the Boston Harbor Hotel to welcome Fiach Mac Conghail, director and CEO of Dublin’s renowned Abbey Theatre.

Along with Mayor Walsh, Tom O’Neill, the inaugural chairman of the Abbey Theatre Association’s Boston chapter, joined together with co-chair Rick Kelleher to officially announce the Abbey Theatre’s upcoming fall residency at the American Repertory Theater with its production of Sean O’Casey’s The Plough and the Stars. The Abbey Theatre will also begin a cultural partnership with the Boston Public Library to create special cultural and educational programming.

The Abbey Theatre – the national theatre of Ireland – has stood at the heart of Irish culture for over a century. Founded in 1904 by W.B. Yeats and Lady Gregory, the Abbey Theatre seeks “to bring upon the stage the deeper emotions of Ireland.” This mission serves as the theatre’s central guiding principle. In 1925, the Abbey became the first state-subsidized theatre in the English-speaking world.

To learn more about the Abbey Theatre event at the Boston Harbor Hotel, visit the Boston Globe’s website. For more information on the Abbey Theatre and its production of The Plough and the Stars, click here. Visit the American Repertory Theater website for details on the Abbey’s September performance.