11 Facts About Margaretta D'Arcy

Margaretta D'Arcy was born in London to a Russian-Jewish mother and an Irish-Catholic father.

Margaretta D'Arcy worked in small theatres in Dublin from the age of fifteen and later became an actress.

Margaretta D'Arcy was married in 1957 to English playwright and author John Arden, and they frequently collaborated.

Margaretta D'Arcy has written and produced many plays, including The Non-Stop Connolly Show.

Margaretta D'Arcy has written a number of books, including Tell Them Everything, Awkward Corners, and Galway's Pirate Women: A Global Trawl.

Margaretta D'Arcy's book Tell Them Everything tells the story of her time during the Armagh and H-Block dirty protests and was one of the earliest accounts about the Armagh women, their Republicanism and imprisonment.

Margaretta D'Arcy directed Yellow Gate Women, a film about the attempts by women of Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp to outwit the British and United States Military at RAF Greenham Common with bolt cutters and legal challenges.

In 2011, Margaretta D'Arcy refused to stand for a minute's silence to honour a PSNI officer Ronan Kerr, killed by dissident republicans, at an Aosdana meeting.

Margaretta D'Arcy's actions were deliberate, she told the media afterwards, which attracted fierce criticism of her perceived support for armed republican groups in Northern Ireland.

Margaretta D'Arcy was given a suspended 12-week sentence, but was imprisoned in 2014 after refusing to sign a bond saying that she wouldn't trespass on non-public parts of Shannon Airport.

Margaretta D'Arcy was released after serving nine and a half weeks of the sentence.