Born in Dublin, Fricker began acting in the 1960s at the age of 19 in film, on stage and later in popular television shows in Ireland and Britain.

Brenda Fricker, the acclaimed Irish actor who became the first Irish woman to win an Academy Award for acting, has died at the age of 81.

Fricker won a best supporting actress Oscar for her performance as Bridget Fagan Brown in 1989’s My Left Foot, opposite Daniel Day-Lewis, who also won an Oscar for his portrayal of an Irishman named C...