Bar-room memories of a wild man of Munster
By Brendan Gallagher  (Filed: 31/10/2002)

It started with a call from the Mexican jungle. I was sitting in a hotel bar in Bordeaux the night before Munster's Heineken Cup semi-final againt Toulouse, the day's work done, when my mobile lit up and a gravelly theatrical voice introduced himself as Richard Harris. A wind-up surely, but perhaps not. I'd been trying to nail Harris down for a rugby interview for years and in desperation had left a mobile phone number at all his known haunts ahead of Munster's big game .

"Hi Richard, how's the form?" I replied, desperately trying to appear unimpressed.

"Not good," said he. "I'm stuck in the middle of nowhere, filming I know not what. I'm going mad down here. I need news of the big match. How is Peter Clohessy, the Claw, Is he fit? He's a legend, Young Munster's finest. Micky Galwey, is he in good form? How is Keith Wood? God bless Keith Wood, a national treasure."

And so on for 20 entertaining minutes. He was back on the next morning for further updates - God knows what time it was in Mexico - and the phone rang regularly throughout the game for score-checks, his excitement as Munster stormed to a famous win crackling across the airwaves. Afterwards he persuaded me to parade the phone around the Munster changing-room so he could talk to his heroes.

Therafter he would phone at the strangest of times, always without warning, invariably eager for the news and the gossip. On one occasion he wanted to take Peter O'Toole to the Heineken Cup final at Twickenham when Munster were playing Northampton. Could it be arrranged?

An unforgettable day culminated a couple of hours after the final whistle as the old devils, having visited both teams in their changing- rooms, found their way on to the deserted pitch, the weather murky and the wind cold. A newspaper blew across, Harris caught it with surprising dexterity for someone at least 10 pints into the day and crunched it up into an imaginary ball. O'Toole immediately picked up his friend's chain of thought. Showtime. It was the eighth minute of injury time, Ireland were level pegging with England and had just been awarded a penalty 50 yards out. It was a gamble but O'Toole indicated to an imaginary referee that he would kick at goal.

ACT ONE: Harris tests the wind by licking a finger and suggests to O'Toole that he hold the "ball" steady in the time-honoured, finger-tipped, fashion. He slides to the muddy ground and positions himself expertly. His concentration is intense. This really matters. All Ireland is holding its breath back home.

ACT TWO: O'Toole nods his approval and steps back in a measured fashion. It could be Eric Elwood or Ronan O'Gara. Hands rubbing gently on his shirt, repeated looks up, hands then swing in unison, head down, he makes perfect contact.

ACT THREE: Two pairs of famous, anxious, eyes follow the ball's imaginary trajectory towards the posts under the North Stand, willing it home. Slowly the touch judges raise their flags and the duo celebrate with the most unlikely high five in Twickenham history. They troop off arm in arm. A Twickenham security guard talks into his radio: "Lawrence of Arabia and a Man called Horse have just left the ground."

And so to late May this year and another Munster final. There had been phone calls between times but it was time to meet Harris again and put together, with luck, a definitive piece on his love of rugby and Munster. Initially the project was doomed. On the first occasion I was on the train to London when he reported ill, in retrospect an ominous sign. Then there was a comical misunderstanding which resulted in me sitting in the Savoy lobby all day, while he was away visiting friends in Kent. Next, by his own admission, he missed our appointed meeting after going AWOL on the lash and finally at the fourth time of asking, we safely docked at the American bar at the Savoy, though we soon sought refuge in a side room.

Time was pressing, the deadline imminent. I had taken the precaution of drafting a first-person piece based on all our previous conversations. Recognising the urgency of the situation he read intently and in complete silence for nearly half an hour, like an archivist studying an ancient historical document for flaws. The tension was killing me. He doesn't like it, in fact he hates it. Say something.

Eventually he lowered the print-out and looked over his glasses. "Marvellous, bloody marvellous. I could have written it myself," he proclaimed.

"Well that was the bloody idea, you clown," I ventured before we both exploded into laughter, papers and cigarette ash going everywhere.

"Time for a drink," he announced as we headed towards the Coal Hole, his local next to the hotel. Snug inside - he always sat at a table behind the fruit machine so as to be almost invisible to the drinking public - he reached deep inside his jacket pocket and produced a taped cassette.

"Sorry about the cock-ups, my fault entirely, very unprofessional," he said much chastened. "Thought I'd make amends. I've recorded a few thoughts for you - rugby, Limerick, life in general. I got up this morning at dawn to do it. I used one of those little recording machines I've got for learning my lines."

He held the cassette up high, and handed it over with a flourish into my outstretched hands. It felt like I was receiving the Holy Grail from King Arthur himself, which of course I was from the man synonymous with Camelot.

The pints - lager not Guinness, contrary to Harris legend - slipped down effortlessly. Late morning became early evening. He had been blessed with a marvellous life and there were no regrets. The only movie part he now craved was in the re-make of Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea. He didn't know or understand a thing about Harry Potter but his little grand-daughter insisted he took the part of Professor Albus Dumbledore. There were stories about playing rugby with Keith Wood's dad, who was also a British Lion, and his love of poetry and poets.

The only "modern" really fit to join the pantheon of Burton, O'Toole, Albert Finney and himself as actors and hellraisers was Russell Crowe: "Top bloke, loves his rugby, doesn't give a stuff, brilliant actor, a much loved new friend. He will carry the baton on. He irritates the hell out of the Hollywood bigwigs, but he's much too good for them to ignore."

I asked him to recite Sanctity, the Patrick Kavanagh poem, which to Crowe's fury, the BBC had edited out of their coverage of the BAFTA awards earlier in the year. He had taught Crowe the words the previous evening during a late night session in the Australian's hotel suite. On this occasion Harris spoke with feeling, a personal anthem perhaps?

To be a poet and not know the trade,
To be a lover and repel all women;
Twin ironies by which great saints are made,
The agonising pincer jaws of heaven.

Back to the rugby, more stories, how he still dreamed, at the age of 70 plus, of playing for Ireland. In those dreams he was always 19 or 20 before the tuberculosis struck. Still he insisted he wanted to buried in his Munster shirt, which he wore so proudly back in 1948 when he was 'capped' by Munster Under-20s.

On reflection O'Toole was his favourite acting buddy. Sean Connery was also mentioned in dispatches. "O'Toole and myself had a ball when we were roistering. I remember once in London we both admired a beautiful Canadian girl. Anyway, the two of us spent all night drinking in a pub and her name wasn't mentioned once before we said elaborate goodbyes, only to bump into each other 20 minutes later at said maiden's block of flats. The game was up, we struck a deal. Peter would try and smoothtalk his way into her bedroom using the intercom and his abundant charm. I would climb up the drainpipe to her sixth floor room and try to attract her attention that way. First come, first served, as it were.

"I nearly killed myself with my mountaineering efforts but eventually reached her balcony and peered in. Peter had literally, that moment, walked into the room to claim his prize. As they headed to the bedroom he looked back and saw my dishevelled figure and winked. I nearly fell down just from laughing."

It really was time to go now. Shamelessly I asked him to repeat the poem one more time. He gave me the look Latin teachers reserve for the classroom dunces who can't decline the simplest verbs but relented. Reciting the words was obviously a pleasure that had not yet dimmed. "To be a poet . . ."

We shook hands and I headed, a little unsteadily, for the door. I glanced back and he shook his fist by way of salute: "Come on Munster. And take care not to lose that tape. Listen to it when I'm dead and gone or something."

I will.