Everyone needs a man with a van. And Oddy's your man. But who is Oddy Sherwin? As he takes a bow (and a well-deserved Lifetime Achievement Award) Arts Manager and artist Lian Bell celebrates one of the unsung legends of Irish theatre.

It's midnight, it’s drizzling, and the wet black pavement reflects the city lights. We’re down a lane in the centre of Dublin that doesn’t smell so good. The load-in door of the theatre is wide open, and figures are moving in and out of the light. Which theatre? Any of them. The back of the big van is wide open. Which van? Oddy’s.

It’s the final night of the show, and the cast and creative team are celebrating in the bar. The production team have swept in as soon as the last audience member left the auditorium and dismantled everything at speed. There’s women and men dressed all in black with steel capped boots ferrying oddly shaped set pieces, boxes of props, black theatre lights, loops of cables, and bags of costumes out of the theatre. Oddy is standing in the back of the van, speedily wrestling everything into place, knowing how to jigsaw the lot in. There’s a shorthand of language and jokes between everyone.

Someone swings into the passenger side to accompany him for the journey. As Eimer Murphy, Prop Master at the Abbey Theatre, says "I have always called the Sherwin’s van the mobile therapist’s couch. The secrets he has heard in that van. Affairs, heartbreak, scandal, divorce – he heard about it all".

In September, Odran "Oddy" Sherwin was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Dublin Fringe Festival awards ceremony. As he said himself, "I’m probably the oldest get in town. Oddy will you get this, Oddy will you get that. It should be called the Get Award."

Thank you so much for all your hard work Oddy. You'll be very much missed.

The award was presented by Marie Tierney, one of the longest serving production managers in the business, who spoke of her colleague with genuine warmth and gratitude. "I had two numbers that I could remember by heart, and his was one of them. He would always be there for us. There isn’t a production manager or a stage manager or a props person who hasn’t absolutely depended on him. He has made my life and every other production manager’s life so easy. He is a stalwart of the industry." Oddy was presented with a bronze sculpture by the artist Mick Kelly. Two figures, one holding the other aloft in an elegant acrobatic moment, speak of the essential support that people like Oddy give to artists.

Oddy’s work happens in the deep background. Many of the artists in the room at the awards won’t even have known that he worked on their shows. Not just that, but he has played a hidden but pivotal role for decades, not just with Fringe, but across the Dublin theatre community. In his acceptance speech he said "I’m with the Fringe Festival since before they got funding. So I’m a long time in the industry. I originally fell into it in my 30s and just loved it. I loved the buzz of it. I’m not artistic, but what yis give off is a great buzz. It really is."

Now that he is retiring, his son Owen, who has worked by Oddy’s side for years, is taking over the family business. There was a bittersweet edge to the evening: the one important person missing was Cecilia Sherwin, Oddy’s wife and Owen’s mother. A gorgeously warm woman who worked hard to support Oddy in his business and raise their family, she sadly passed away in August this year.

Many production staff from across the Dublin theatre community attended the awards to show their respect for a colleague who has been a part of their lives for decades. Like all production staff, Oddy has a deep appreciation for the artists he has worked with over the years, and turned the spotlight back onto them as he ended his acceptance speech: "What you guys give off, it’s brilliant… I once asked my father – because he’d done a bit of writing – how can you explain what is art? And I thought it was the best explanation I ever heard. He said, it’s a feeling. How do you get a feeling across when you are a singer, guitarist, or an actor? You are portraying a feeling to other people. And well done. Yis do it great."

Thank you so much for all your hard work Oddy. You’ll be very much missed.