Kealan McCluskey is an architect and property consultant who built a theatre in Powerscourt Townhouse Centre with his friend and business partner Catherine Mullarkey to stage their Irish dance show, 'Jig'. Originally from Monaghan, he lives in Ranelagh with his wife Niamh and daughters Juno (12), Ruby (10), and Tory (6)

I first came across Catherine at the Gaeltacht in Rann na Feirste in Co Donegal. She was one of the cool girls from Dublin. After that my brother Dara went on a French exchange and when he came back, one of the girls on the exchange came to Monaghan to visit with a friend . . . it was Catherine again. We were all about 15.

When Dara and I went to college, we lived in Sutton Park school; we were essentially security guards. Catherine’s from Sutton and once again she and Dara hung around together, so we’d meet from time to time. After college we all went in various directions. I got my degree in architecture and played with a band called The Pale full-time for about four or five years. My clever brother Lorcan went into banking – and Catherine was his boss.

In our 30s, we became involved in property separately. I’d started buying and doing up properties. We met from time to time to discuss ideas and projects. Then the property industry evaporated. With three kids, you must do something. In 2009, we set up a property strategy company, advising banks, receivers and individuals.

Catherine had done a marathon and I challenged her to do it again with me four years ago. She's a weapon. I spent at least six months running a kilometre behind her. While running we came up with the idea for Jig, which would blend virtuoso dancing with a bit of the history of different types of dance in a show that would give people an understanding of Irish dancing. It was a little idea about joy – you don't see many people coming out of the receivers or the bank with a smile.

One day I met Joe O’Byrne, a writer/director I’d worked with in the SFX years ago I and was telling him about the theatre we had created. He mentioned that he had a play, the second in a trilogy, about the 1916 Rising, so we decided to produce it.

Catherine has great organisational skills, doesn’t wing it, and that frees me to think up more mayhem. She’s too bloody perky in the morning . . . when we meet in our office she’s firing on full steam. She’s detail driven and right to be – I frustrate her with big picture, no detail. But at the end of the day, we have a laugh.

The Rising by Joe O'Byrne, choreographed by Breándan de Gallaí, a Vaudeville-style play about the 1916 Rising, starts a tour in Galway on February 20th and runs in the Powerscourt Theatre, Dublin, from March 11th-21st


Catherine Mullarkey is a financial/property consultant who co-created a theatre in Dublin's Powerscourt Townhouse Centre in 2012 and an Irish dance show, 'Jig'. She is co-producer of 'The Rising', a new play which opens there in March. From Sutton, Co Dublin, she lives in north Co Dublin with her husband Peter Barrett and children Kate (12), Simon (10), and Ruth (8)

I met Kealan’s brother Dara in Irish college when I was about 11 and again when I was in fifth year, when my French exchange student and Dara’s were friends. We went to Monaghan for a night or two and I remember that Dara and Kealan were big into music: there were lots of brothers running around, guitars and amps all over a big noisy house. It was a fun few days. We met again when they came to college in Dublin in the 1980s and lived in Sutton.

After college I went travelling, worked for KBC for six years, then in Anglo for nine – I left in 2004. I’ve been working for myself since then. Kealan and I would meet for coffee. I’d ask him for advice on architectural matters; he’d ask about banking. After the crash, we set up Blacktree Consulting, providing advice to banks, developers and so on.

We formalised the arrangement in 2009. It was a traumatic time all round but we share a lot of the same values about how you treat people in business. We’ve had a fantastic working relationship, helped each other through the difficult years.

We’d both married, had families and his girls were big into competitive Irish dancing. I come from quite a traditional Irish background as does Kealan. We decided we wanted to re-present Irish dancing: you have Riverdance at one end and competitive Irish dancing at the other extreme. So we set up Jig in March 2012. We built a 120-seater theatre in premises at the Powerscourt Townhouse Centre. We are the creative directors of Jig. We came up with the concept and Sean O’Brien is our lead choreographer. We also do a Hop Up show where audiences are taught to dance.

Doing this was very much a collaboration; everybody thought we were mad, our partners included. Sometimes I thought so too when I found myself painting the ceiling and the walls in Powerscourt at midnight and beyond. It was a journey but it was lots of fun with lots of laughs along the way. Kealan’s wife Niamh is lovely and my husband and I go out to gigs with them or out to dinner.

I’d know almost everything about Kealan at this stage, and likewise, he about me. It can be difficult when you’re living in someone’s pocket, but we have fun together. Kealan is very outgoing, an eternal optimist. He never says no, it can’t be done. I’d be more cautious. He’s quite impetuous – but in the very difficult years, he’d always be in good humour.

He’s definitely a positive influence in my life. There’ll be many more years of doing things with Kealan, a long road ahead on all sorts of ventures.