Goodbye, Old Friend

Malachy McCourt

September 30, 1931 • March 11, 2024

March 11, 2024 • Edward McCann

Writer, actor, bartender, and radio host Malachy McCourt died today at 92.

He was, of course, also a son, brother, husband, father, grandfather and rabble-rouser, and his accomplishments in life—on stage, screen, in publishing, politics and elsewhere—are well documented in Sam Roberts' fine obit in today's New York Times.

I want to tell you a little bit about my friend.

We met roughly fifteen years ago at a literary event in New York City, striking up an easy relationship we maintained through phone calls, emails, birthday greetings, and by his several trips to our Writers Read stage.

Malachy accepted my invitation to perform in our very first Writers Read event ten years ago, on Father’s Day weekend, 2014, at Nancy Manocherian’s the cell on West 23rd Street, sharing a moving passage from his memoir, A Monk Swimming:

That same summer, my partner Richard Kollath and I produced a press conference and reception celebrating a visit to the Hudson Valley by Ireland's ambassador to the United States. Malachy graciously accepted our invitation to speak at that event, and — after a long-winded welcoming benediction by a Catholic priest — Malachy took the stage and reset the temperature in the house, saying, "Well, I'm an atheist, thank God."

Richard and me, listening to Malachy address the audience in Kingston, NY

Several other performances followed over the years, including an especially memorable one at “Straight Outta Ireland,” our first Carnegie Hall spring festival event at City Winery in March, 2019. With his wife, Diana, looking on, Malachy shared a story he’d written about one of his proudest accomplishments — one that had nothing to do with show business.

In January 2020, Our “Gratitude” show at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center was our final show before the pandemic shut down all live performances. There, at age 88, Malachy read a piece entitled “Every Breath You Take,” a meditation on life and death from his perspective in what he called “the departure lounge.”

Malachy seemed to have an easy relationship with the idea of death, and joked about it often. I once introduced him to an audience with a recitation of his accomplishments; he walked on stage to applause, stepped to the microphone and said, "Thank you, Ed, for that obituary."

For the cover of his book, Death Need Not Be Fatal, he even climbed into a casket to mug for the camera — and thumb his nose at the grim reaper.

And this time last year, Malachy was kicked out of hospice for refusing to die:

For our 2021 Summer Reading Series event at Bryant Park, despite the day’s dangerously high heat and humidity, Malachy still traveled from his home on the Upper West Side to join the cast in the dappled shade of the London Plane trees and share a story. At my urging (not that he needed any), Malachy closed the show by leading the cast and audience in his favorite song, “Wild Mountain Thyme.”

"I am not a singer," he began, "and now I shall prove it to you."

Oh, the summer time is coming,
And the trees are sweetly blooming,
And the wild mountain thyme
Grows around the blooming heather.

* Will you go, lassie, will you go?
And we'll all go together
To pull wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather,
Will you go, lassie, go?

I will build my love a bower
By yon clear and crystal fountain,
And all around the bower,
I'll pile flowers from the mountain.

I will roam the country o'er
Through that dark land so dreary;
And all the spoils I find,
I'll bring to my darling dearie.

If my true love, she won't have me,
I will surely find another
To pull wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather.

Oh, the summertime is coming
And the trees are blooming
And the wild mountain thyme
Grows around the blooming heather.

Will you go, lassie, go?

Malachy had little patience for sorrow or sentimentality, and I’ll remember him for his kindness, warmth, honesty, and humor. All of us at Writers Read extend our sincere condolences to Malachy’s beloved wife, Diana, and to his children, grandchildren, and the rest of his family and friends.

I’ll close with this exhortation, always Malachy’s last words before leaving the stage: