DEBBIE McCANN: As Oscar-winner and national treasure Brenda Fricker is laid to rest, here's my personal recollections of the lady who became my new neighbour when I moved into the Liberties in Dublin and the one reason we bonded so quickly

Published: 23:33, 5 August 2026 | Updated: 23:33, 5 August 2026 It was 2012, and my now-husband and I had just moved into a small cottage in the heart of the Liberties in Dublin when I first met my new neighbour, the Oscar-winning My Left Foot star Brenda Fricker. Our paths crossed over a shared love of dogs.  I had written a story in the Mail about a rescued puppy called Belle, who then joined our family. After moving into our Coombe cottage, Belle soon attracted the attention of Brenda, and we humans bonded over our shared rescue experiences. Brenda told me how her little terrier, Jack, had been stolen from a house in Lucan by a gang to be used for dog fighting.  Brenda said he had been ‘chucked out’ by the gang when he was no longer strong enough to fight. Incredibly, after a two-year odyssey, Jack somehow managed to find his way home, all the way from Mullingar, 66kms away. But by this time his owners’ circumstances had changed – and so it came to be that the woman who had won global acclaim for her Academy Award-winning portrayal of Christy Browne’s fiercely devoted mother took Jack in. Most evenings, Brenda walked her beloved Jack to the end of the little cul de sac on Watkins Square and turned back just outside our window. The actress knew that we knew who she was, of course, but we only spoke about our dogs, or about any packages she needed help with.  She also told us she enjoyed watching us as a young couple starting our lives out together. Brenda was softly spoken and had no airs and graces.  She was engaging and clearly had a kind heart. The actress knew that we knew who she was, of course, but we only spoke about our dogs, or about any packages she needed help with She has spoken openly about how she suffered with depression, and told Ryan Tubridy a few years ago that she sometimes found it hard to leave her home. This was evident to her neighbours, and we could go for days without seeing her out and about. Brenda has spoken about her love for her dogs down through the years, and it was reported in the last week her latest pet Juno died just days before her. She has also spoken about her lovely home in the Coombe, which comprised three tiny 35 square metre cottages combined into one. In 2006 she told a newspaper: ‘I wanted a small place near town and the theatres. This little terraced cottage at Watkins Square, Dublin 8, came on the market and it was all I could afford.’ After living in the one-bedroom cottage for a while she began to eye the place next door, which had been lying idle for a long time and would give her more room. ‘I tried to find who it belonged to, but it took years to trace the owner.  Eventually I did and they agreed to sell,’ she said at the time. A few years later she bought the third house in the row and combined them all into one.  ‘With the three entrance doors to my home, at times I feel a bit like I’m living in the house in the Beatles film Help where they all have their own entrance doors but are really entering the one house,’ she said. Brenda’s agent Phil Belfield confirmed last week she had died at the age of 81, saying: ‘We will never see her like again, and the world is lesser for the lack of her.’ A sentiment shared by her old neighbours in the Liberties, who warmly remembered her as a familiar and quiet presence with her beloved dogs on the old narrow street. Sorry we are not currently accepting comments on this article.