Character actor Thomas Patrick McKenna was born in Mullagh, County Cavan, Ireland, in 1929. A prolific theater actor throughout his career, he made his stage debut in "Summer and Smoke" by Tennessee Williams at the Pike Theatre in Dublin in 1954.
He made his film debut in the IRA-Nazi drama Les combattants de la nuit (1960) and from this uncredited beginning he moved up to tenth billing in The Siege of Sidney Street (1960). His next major movie was in 1964's La fille aux yeux verts (1964), by which time he had started a successful television career.
He made his TV debut in Espionage (1963) and over the next few years appeared in several more TV shows. His versatility enabled him to play three characters in Chapeau melon et bottes de cuir (1961). He was also featured in such well-regarded shows as Adam Adamant Lives! (1966), Dixon of Dock Green (1955) and Le Saint (1962).
Meanwhile, his film career was developing along literary lines, and he was featured in Brendan Behan's The Quare Fellow (1962), the Sean O'Casey biopic Le jeune Cassidy (1965) and James Joyce's Ulysses (1967). He took smaller parts in such epics as La charge de la brigade légère (1968) and Anne des mille jours (1969).
British films such as L'arnaqueuse (1970) and Salaud (1971) allowed him to showcase his suave, urbane persona before trying something different in the controversial Les chiens de paille (1971). He appeared alongside a young Anthony Hopkins in All Creatures Great and Small (1975) before starring with John Gielgud for the second time, this time in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1977). Over the next few years his co-stars were as diverse as Leonard Rossiter (Britannia Hospital (1982)), Timothy Dalton (Le docteur et les assassins (1985)), Ben Kingsley (L'île de Pascali (1988)) and Dolph Lundgren (Le scorpion rouge (1988)). Not all of these films were successes, but McKenna always gave good value for the money and developed themes of his, such as an interest in Irish issues, in The Outsider (1979). His last released film was Valmont (1989), which was unfortunately completely overshadowed by Les liaisons dangereuses (1988), which was based on the same novel.
Over the years he has made numerous guest appearances in TV series such as Minder (1979), Casualty (1986), Les règles de l'art (1986), Inspecteur Morse (1987), Heartbeat (1992) and Ballykissangel (1996). McKenna has also been prominent in TV movies and series, featuring in Charles Dickens' Bleak House (1985), Stendhal's The Scarlet and the Black (1993) and most recently an adaptation of Henry James' The American (1998).
McKenna is up there with the greats of character acting such as Lionel Jeffries, Dennis Price, Richard Wattis, Wilfrid Hyde-White and John Le Mesurier.
