answered by McCormick in the pages of the journal Banba in June, 1921. McCormick acted in over 500 plays at the Abbey Theatre, becoming particularly associated with the plays of Sean O'Casey staged there. From 1923–1925, he was also stage manager at the Abbey. Of his performance as Seumus Sheilds in The Shadow of a Gunman, O'Casey said that the actor had created a character greater than that O'Casey had written. He played Capt. Brennan in the filmed version of O'Casey's The Plough and the Stars but it was his return to film in Carol Reed's Odd Man Out (1947) that saw him singled out for praise in contemporaneous reviews. The Irish Times wrote that "the acting of the Irish players was unremittingly professional, and, in the case of F. J. McCormick, as Shell, a weak-minded and elderly corner-boy, quite outstanding." The Times of London found "it is Mr. F. J. McCormick as a sly, bird-like creature, who stops just the right side of informing, who catches most surely at the imagination." In their review of the film Hungry Hill (also 1947), The New York Times wrote, "As the butler who served John Brodrick, his sons, and their sons in turn, the late F. J. McCormick is truly magnificent, giving an even more subtle portrayal of Irish character than he did as the wily tramp in Odd Man Out." Later life and death In the last 5 years of McCormick’s life he continued to work in the Abbey where he acted in over 70 plays before he died. He only starred in one play in the theatre in the final year of his life, the play They Got What They Wanted playing the role of Bartley Murnaghan. He secured more leading roles in the film industry. McCormick died on the 24 April 1947 from a brain tumour at 56 years old, in Dublin. He is buried in Deansgrange, Blackrock. He continued to work right up until his death. It is said that people regarded him as one of the greatest actors in his era. This comes from his work in 500 plays and 4 films over his career. A year after his passing in 1948 Barry Fitzgerald said he only knew of two actors with the gift that McCormick had and they were Charles Laughton and Charlie Chaplin. Legacy There are many popular plays and films that McCormick was part