Ray McAnally, 63; Irish Actor Relished Anonymity

Ray McAnally, the classically trained Irish character actor who portrayed a cardinal caught in a vise of conscience in the critically acclaimed 1986 film “The Mission,” has died at his home in Ireland, it was learned Friday.

Dublin police said he died Thursday night, but gave no cause to either the Reuters news agency or Associated Press. Irish newspapers said the 63-year-old veteran of 250 plays, 50 films and more than 200 television appearances had undergone a heart bypass operation several years ago, and collapsed at his cottage in County Wicklow shortly after voting in Thursday’s general election.

McAnally, seen most recently in this country as Harry Perkins, the shrewd but honest prime minister in “A Very British Coup” on PBS television, suffered from the perfection of his craft.

He was considered an actor so successful at immersing himself in a role that he lacked the public identity common to less experienced stars.

Actress Vanessa Redgrave reiterated that judgment after his death, saying in a statement Friday that “he sank himself into the character he was playing. Because of that, he played whatever character it was with tremendous belief and conviction and extraordinary detail.”

McAnally gloried in the anonymity, he told The Times in January.

“Maybe at a certain point somebody will say, ‘Wait a minute, isn’t that the chap who played that other role, the cardinal or whatever it was?’ But even then, perhaps they’re not quite sure. . . . I like not bringing a lot of baggage to a new part. I prefer being the enigma.”

Born in a seaside village in County Donegal, he studied for the priesthood before turning to acting and becoming a familiar figure at Dublin’s legendary Abbey Theater. When in his 50s, he began to gain a wider audience through motion pictures and television.

He was the cultured Cardinal Altimirano in “The Mission,” about Christian missionaries in 18th-Century South America; the hard-edged Protestant work boss in the movie “Cal,” about Northern Ireland’s ongoing conflict, and the dissolute Englishman Rick Pym in the TV serialization of John le Carre’s “A Perfect Spy.”

In 1987 he won the Evening Standard Film Award for best actor in both “The Mission,” in which he stares imponderably into the camera as the film fades to black, and “No Surrender,” a dark comedy about elderly, feuding Northern Irish.

Both “A Very British Coup” and ‘A Perfect Spy” were seen last season.

Last year, he brought George Bernard Shaw to life on the London stage, playing the playwright opposite Sir John Gielgud in “The Best of Friends.”

He recently filmed “Venus Peter,” about a 1950s Scottish village, and a television serialization of Charles Dickens’ “Great Expectations.”

McAnally made his stage debut at 18, acted in numerous Shakespearean parts, and played more than 150 roles at the Abbey from 1947 to 1963. He also spent time with the Royal Shakespeare Company in London.

Entering movies in 1938, he played supporting roles in “Billy Budd” and “Shake Hands With the Devil,” but only with “The Mission” did he begin to make his name internationally.

Robert Carrickford, president of the Irish actors’ union, called him “one of the finest character actors Ireland has ever produced.”

He had just returned from Canada where he had been filming with Robert De Niro and Sean Penn in a remake of the 1954 Humphrey Bogart movie “We’re No Angels.”

He is survived by two sons and two daughters who were with him when died.