[Irish inspired music] KATE SULLIVAN: Get ready for an adventure today, as we head to the beautiful Emerald Isle to dine, laugh and hear firsthand what it takes to be world-class at something you love.

MICHAEL FLATLEY: It took me 35 years to become an overnight success.

[Both laugh] KATE: It's not every day you get to dine with an Irish legend, but today, Michael Flatley is taking me to his favorite restaurant in Ireland to eat what he loves and find out why he loves it.

KATE: It's warm, it's hearty, it's comforting.

MICHAEL: Great, wholesome food.

KATE: And then, we're hearing his incredible journey in dance.

To produce, choreograph, and dance his way into the hearts and minds of people all over the world.

MICHAEL: If you come up against brick walls, go over it, go under it, go around it, or go through it, but don't stop.

KATE: Breaking box office records and becoming a cultural phenomenon at the same time.

MICHAEL: If you're willing to work for it, and you follow your dream, nothing is impossible.

You can have anything in the world.

Who would have thought some Irish dance guy from Chicago would outsell all those Rock bands?

♪♪ KATE: What's better in life than a bottle of wine, great food, and an amazing conversation?

My name is Kate Sullivan, and I am the host of To Dine For .

I'm a journalist, a foodie, a traveler with an appetite for the stories of people who are hungry for more: dreamers, visionaries, artists: those who hustle hard in the direction they love.

I travel with them to their favorite restaurant to hear how they did it.

This show is a toast to them and their American Dream.

To Dine For with Kate Sullivan is made possible by... (Music and chatter) MAN: During the weekends, we do like a grill.

(Clatter of chess board) MAN #2: You know you have bragging rights in the hood.

I'm like, "My guy won the game."

(Clatter of chess piece and men yelling and cheering) FEMALE ANNOUNCER: At American National, we honor the "do"-ers and the dreamers: The people who gets things done and keep the world moving.

Our local agents are honored to serve your community, because it's their community, too.

American National.

KATE: Hello everyone!

Today I'm in Dublin, Ireland, on my way into Irish gastropub, The Bull & Castle.

I am meeting a dreamer and visionary and perhaps one of the most famous dancers of all time.

I can't wait for you to meet Michael Flatley.

KATE: Michael!

How are you?

MICHAEL: Kate, how are you?

Nice to see you.

KATE: So nice to see you.

MICHAEL: Welcome to Dublin.

KATE: Aw, thank you so much.

I am so excited about this meal.

MICHAEL: It's going to be fun.

KATE: It is.

MICHAEL: This is my favorite steak restaurant.

KATE: I've always stuck to my mission to dine with guests at their favorite restaurant.

So when Michael Flatley's top pick was 3,657 miles away from my home in Chicago, I said, "Let's go.

We are off to Dublin."

Dublin is the capital of Ireland, home to 1.2 million people.

It's a city known for its love of art and music.

And that's why it's so fitting that I'm dining with an Irish legend, whose expertise sits at the intersection of both.

We're in the historic neighborhood of Christchurch, a stone's throw away from another intersection: Dublin Castle and a steakhouse with a deep historical legacy, The Bull & Castle.

STEPHEN BUCKLEY: We're part of the fabric of the city.

Now, at this stage, you know, everybody in Dublin and Ireland knows our restaurants and our brand.

We have traced it back to our first butcher shop in 1740, 100 yards down the road on a street called Bull Alley.

KATE: Seven generations ago, the Buckley family started off as butchers.

In 1986, they opened their first steakhouse.

Add on five pubs and restaurants, and they are now a Dublin institution.

STEPHEN: It's about going above and beyond the expectation of the customer and to make sure that guests feel valued, I think we're doing a good job of it.

We're voted at the top best steakhouse in the world last year.

KATE: Today, we're starting off with the deviled lamb kidneys served with mushrooms and toasted bread.

It is an Irish dish that stays on the menu for a very unique reason.

STEPHEN: In the book Ulysses, Leopold Bloom used to buy his kidneys in Buckley's butcher shops, and that's why we have it as a signature dish on our menus.

KATE: And then, we're digging into what makes The Bull & Castle famous: their meats.

Today, we're dining on their rib eye.

It's dry aged for 28 days and then cooked to perfection in a charcoal oven.

KATE: Thank you for bringing me to The Bull & Castle.

MICHAEL: [Laughs] I know how cool is this.

It's um, it's my favorite steak restaurant in all of Ireland.

I love coming here.

They have, you know, great staff, great people, great food and nice and elegant little spot, but it's real...real Ireland.

And I love that.

KATE: This really is real Ireland.

MICHAEL: It really is and you know, we've eaten, and I think all of the F.X.

Buckley steakhouses now, and one is as good as the next, but the staff here are really, uh lovely people and so we got to know that made out of the whole crowd.

So we just tend to come here more often than the others.

KATE: Isn't it funny?

Sometimes it's not about the food.

It's about how a restaurant makes you feel.

MICHAEL: I agree.

Yeah, it's about ambience.

And a lot of times, you know, especially if you're in a French restaurant, you want to, you want to feel that flavor.

And coming to Ireland, you want to feel the Irish flavor, I think.

And luckily, with Bull & Castle you get both.

You get the uh, the...the really Irish feel.

You got a great staff, and the food, the steak is crazy good.

Well, there we are now, Kate.

Irish hospitality.

[Laughs] KATE: I didn't order this, but it arrived.

[Both laugh] MICHAEL: I can promise you one thing, once you have the first one, you'll be ordering a second.

[Both laugh] KATE: If you have anything to do with it, right?

MICHAEL: Yes, exactly, exactly.

KATE: Well, first of all, cheers!

MICHAEL: Cheers.

Great to see you, Kate.

KATE: Thank you for bringing me here.

MICHAEL: Thanks for having me on the show.

KATE: Absolutely.

Well, I'd love for you to take me back to the south side of Chicago, where you grew up.

I know you were born in Michigan, but your formative years were in Chicago.

MICHAEL: Yes.

KATE: I think people who don't know Chicago, who don't know that particular pocket of the city, don't understand what that tight knit Irish community really meant, especially, you know, when you were growing up.

MICHAEL: Yeah, my...my father was from Sligo, and my mother was from Carlo, and they came to America in 1947 with nothing.

And they just wanted to build a better life for themselves, and um we worked seven days a week.

Uh, you know, they, I don't remember my father ever taken holidays off.

KATE: Wow.

MICHAEL: He used to say to me, "Michael, the harder you work, the luckier you get.

Just get up earlier, if it's not working, get up earlier, work harder."

And uh, and he raised uh, our whole family.

My brother and I worked with him on those freezing cold Chicago winters, you know, below zero, on construction sites swinging sledgehammers and...and digging foundations.

And it was uh, it was a tough sort of upbringing, but yet it was the best thing that could have ever happened to me.

You know, keeps you really grounded and down to earth and learning the value of hard work, discipline, preparation.

KATE: Right.

MICHAEL: And that's how we were brought up.

KATE: So that first dance class, right?

That first dance class on the south side of Chicago, when did you know that A, you loved to dance and B, you were good at dancing?

MICHAEL: Things got a little tough in our neighborhood.

I used to get in a few scraps uh going and coming from school.

And um, after one too bloody- one too many bloody noses, my father said, "Come on, you're going to boxing class."

And my mother said, I'm taking him to dancing class.

And um, she dragged me by the ears.

I did not want to go.

None of us wanted to go.

And when I got there, uh, the teacher said to me, "How old are you?"

I'm 11 years old.

And he says, "No, sir, you're...you're really too old.

The other kids are all six or seven, starting to dance.

KATE: So your first class was at 11?

MICHAEL: Yeah.

KATE: At the age of 11.

MICHAEL: And so he sent me home, and when I was in the in the class, of course, I was like, yes, I'm delighted.

[Kate laughs] And then... Oh, thank you.

KATE: Ahh, thank you.

MICHAEL: That looks so delicious.

KATE: These are the kidneys right?

MICHAEL: Fabulous.

Thank you.

Specialty of the house.

KATE: Yes.

MICHAEL: This looks crazy good.

KATE: Oh, it does.

It does.

I didn't know if we put it on the toast.

You gotta go right in huh?

MICHAEL: I don't eat carbohydrates.

But you can.

KATE: Mmm.

It's warm, it's hearty, it's comforting.

I mean, you could, this is like a meal.

I know it's a starter, but this, this feels like a meal.

MICHAEL: It does, great wholesome food.

When I got home, though, Kate, something bothered me.

It upset me.

My friends were in their class, which is advanced class.

They were all in this.

dance business, but I was told I couldn't do it.

And I don't know what hit me or something triggered inside, but I didn't feel good about it.

KATE: Michael decided he wouldn't be told he couldn't dance.

He started studying dance on his own, learning five steps a week from his friends who were in the class, teaching himself and creating new steps.

MICHAEL: And I remember then the teacher saying, Wow, this- You know, this kid is great.

He told my parents.

I didn't really notice it at the beginning, but then we started going into competitions, and I started winning all the competitions.

And then all of a sudden, you sink your teeth in, and you feel like I could do this.

KATE: And what did your construction worker father think of your dancing?

MICHAEL: Well, he was Irish, you know, from Sligo, big strong guy.

And, you know, he- there was a balance.

He loved it, but he wanted me to pursue my boxing career.

KATE: Right.

MICHAEL: He wanted me to continue the boxing and had to be up every morning at six, get in the truck, go to work.

But even then, Kate, at the bottom of the ditch.

I was dreaming about a dance.

I was dreaming about a career.

I always wanted to have dance to be the number one act, not behind the singers.

I felt a dancer could carry a show.

I wanted to compete with all the big shows and the world and all the rock groups.

I wanted to be in Radio City Music Hall.

KATE: So you're saying, even when you're working construction, you're planning the steps in your head.

You're thinking you're choreographing, it was in you that you wanted to create.

MICHAEL: Especially in my teens, and getting to my late teens, I might have been in the bottom of that ditch, but in my in my heart and in my mind, I was at Madison Square Garden.

KATE: In 1975, at the age of 17, Michael became the first American to win the World Dancing Title at the Irish dancing championships.

But his success didn't lead to a job on the stage.

Michael made his way to New York and walked every street on Broadway looking for work as a dancer, he came up empty.

MICHAEL: So I went home, and I went back into this a broken down studio, and I worked on my style, where I've used my body and my acting and my arms, and like Irish people are so filled with passion and poetry and fight and music and, you know, love and laughter.

KATE: Yes.

Wait a second, how come they dance like this with no facial expression?

Who made up this rule?

KATE: Yeah.

MICHAEL: This is not the Irish people that I know, and I remember that I never wanted to hold my arms by my side.

In fact, my teacher tied a belt around my arms one time in front of the class, and all of those, they all sort of laughed and jeered at me.

KATE: Because Irish dance, your upper body is rigid, your arms are by the side, right?

MICHAEL: Well, it was Kate.

KATE: Yes until you came on to the scene, yes.

MICHAEL: And I started using my arms.

And the more I experimented on audiences, from Carnegie Hall to, you know, all over- the Boston Symphony Hall.

And the more I used my arms and used my style, the more the audiences stood up.

KATE: Oh, wow.

And what a lesson to lean into who you really are... MICHAEL: Yeah.

KATE: To lean into your own authenticity.

MICHAEL: Yes.

KATE: And what that does, creatively.

MICHAEL: Yes, so important And...

I would encourage all young people, follow what's in your heart.

That's the most important thing.

KATE: What's that saying?

They say, first learn the rules, then you can break them.

MICHAEL: That's it.

I like that.

KATE: That's you, right?

MICHAEL: I'm gonna use that.

KATE: Oh my goodness.

Oooooh!

MICHAEL: This is heaven.

KATE: [laughs] This looks amazing.

MICHAEL: Isn't this great?

KATE: It really is.

MICHAEL: I...Maybe I'm biased, I think it's best steak in Ireland, I really do.

KATE: This is your order, right?

The bone-in rib eye?

Some mushrooms, oh my goodness, and then there's more.

KATE: Mm.

[hums merrily] That is delicious.

That is absolutely delicious.

MICHAEL: I hope you're gonna pause those cameras while I murder this steak.

[Laughs] KATE: Michael wanted to break the mold of traditional Irish dance, which is exactly what he did in 1994 at the Eurovision Song Contest, an annual international singing competition.

He was booked to dance during the intermission and burst onto the stage in a billowing satin shirt, arms up in the air.

The seven-minute routine stole the show and changed the course of his career.

KATE: Take me to 1994, the intermission of the Eurovision Song Contest, when really Riverdance.

MICHAEL: That's it.

KATE: Had its moment.

Take me to that moment.

What was it like for you personally?

MICHAEL: How great was that?

When I got on stage finally that night for the Eurovision.

That's what I was dreaming of in those ditches.

That's what I was dreaming of when I spit on my hands and picked up that sledgehammer every morning.

That's the kind of thing that was in my head every time that hammer came down, boom.

[makes sound effects in rhythm] And it was always in my head.

I couldn't get out.

So when I got there, I was like a loaded gun.

I was- I felt like, you know, please ring the bell.

I'm so ready.

KATE: It was your moment, and you were going to seize it.

MICHAEL: You know it.

KATE: What was that moment like, if you had to put it into words, when you think back at that memory?

MICHAEL: Finally to...to bring my art to the world.

KATE: Yeah.

MICHAEL: So I, you know, of course, everybody was saying, "Oh, my God, how great it was."

And you know, but it took me 35 years to become an overnight success.

[Both laugh] KATE: And here you are at 35 and really it was like a catapult, because nine months later, Riverdance became a stage production and you were fully immersed into something even bigger.

KATE: The show debuted in 1995 at the Point Theater in Dublin and sold out for five weeks straight.

Riverdance quickly became a global phenomenon.

To date, the grand-scale production has been performed in more than 49 countries on six continents and has been seen by more than 30 million people.

KATE: During the second run, out of the blue before it starts, you're fired.

MICHAEL: Yes.

KATE: You were fired, why?

MICHAEL: Over creative control.

KATE: But that must have hurt to put all that work into it in that moment right before you.

I mean, you talk about being like shot out of a cannon and all your hard work, that must have been a...a real hurtful moment.

MICHAEL: I'm not gonna lie about it.

Yeah, it hurt a lot.

I mean, I've been prepared to go on stage, and my posters of me alone were up in the front of this Hammersmith Apollo where the show was.

And so they were sold out for weeks in advance, and then they took the posters down and fired me.

And I just thought that was a bit unfair, that I had to say.

I called my parents, and the first thing my mother said is, "Oh, Michael, it's just a disagreement.

Go back and ask them for your job back and tell them you'll take less money or whatever you need to do."

And you know, she was a worried, concerned mother.

My father got on the phone and said, "Michael, you created this.

You invented this whole thing."

He said, "Let them take the credit.

Let them keep the money.

Go off and do your own one and prove that you did the first one."

Smart man.

And but he got my Irish up.

KATE: Yes.

MICHAEL: And uh, then I felt, whatever I have to do, I have to get my own show started now.

KATE: Enter Lord of the Dance.

Michael's second show premiered in 1996 in the same spot Riverdance got its start, The Point Theater in Dublin.

This time, Michael's show was created not just for theaters but scaled up for arenas and stadiums.

Lord of the Dance broke box office records and had 13 consecutive sellout shows at Radio City Music Hall in New York.

It is exactly what Michael dreamed about when he was digging ditches as a kid.

In 1997, Lord of the Dance performed at the 69th Academy Awards in front of 1.3 billion viewers.

Michael found himself in the Guinness Book of World Records, both as the world's highest paid dancer and for the $40 million insurance policy on his legs.

MICHAEL: Nobody gave me any chance after I left Riverdance, every promoter: no lightning doesn't strike twice.

No, no chance.

Just try and get your job back.

Everybody.

I didn't have the money, I didn't have anything, but I got together a group of some of the greatest dancers in the world that really followed me and believed in me and wanted to be part of this.

We got to opening night, and we got five standing ovations on opening night.

KATE: Wow.

Okay, so what?

What was it?

What?

How did you get Lord of the Dance out there, which went on to be a phenomenon and so successful millions of people watched that.

So what was it?

MICHAEL: I would line the dancers up in three lines, show them the step, and then I would dance it in front of them.

Then I would say back line to the front.

And so I would dance with every line, all day long, all night long, while they would dance every third time.

But it's that hard work that made the difference.

It made Lord of the Dance, a far superior uh, show in the end, because it became it keeps growing.

It keeps evolving, and my steps and my creation keeps evolving.

So if you can imagine, you've got 40 dancers on the stage, and they're all dancing as fast as they can, hitting the stage several times a second at exactly the same time.

That's unique.

KATE: It's so hard to do.

MICHAEL: It's something that the audience knows.

Audiences are smart, and they can see that didn't happen just by luck, these young people are giving it everything that they've got.

KATE: What was that like to bring Irish dance and to put it on full display for all the world to see; the beauty, the rigor, the hard work of it?

What was that like for you personally?

MICHAEL: I don't have a record label behind me, spoon feeding me, and saying, well we'll put you on all the billboards, we'll get you all the press, we'll pay for all this, and we'll book the shows.

I did all that myself.

KATE: Mm-hmm.

MICHAEL: I don't have a big movie company, you know, a Paramount, or one of those saying, you know, we'll put you everywhere, on all the TV.

I didn't have any of that, not like a sports star.

KATE: In fact, you had people telling you that Irish dance wouldn't be saleable.

MICHAEL: 100 percent.

KATE: You know, in America on a national level.

MICHAEL: Yes, 100 percent but we outsold them all.

And people like Celine Dion, and um, one- my favorite in the world, Celine, and Phil Collins, coming to the show, Elton John, Michael Jackson.

And that made me so proud that I'd stuck, with my dream.

I believe in Ireland.

I believe in Irish people.

I believe in...in the Irish art form.

I believe in my parents and my Irish bloodline, why shouldn't we take our rightful place at the top of the ladder?

KATE: You were- have worked so hard and it has taken quite a toll on your body.

MICHAEL: Yeah.

KATE: You had to stop dancing simply because you couldn't anymore, correct?

MICHAEL: Well, that's true Kate, yeah, but I'm, I'm proud to say I've retired at 58 years old.

I'm still going with the, with the troop and my job is keep them all working.

My dream is keep all of those dancers working.

And if it took me to do that, then I was happy to carry on as long as I could.

But yeah, my spinal column, my legs, my oh, it's a long list; C3, my T1, my L5, sacroliacs.

I've got torn right calf muscle, two ruptured Achilles tendons, a broken bone on my foot, fractured ribs, my two shoulders need replacing.

KATE: And yet you probably want to dance today if you could.

MICHAEL: Other than that, I feel great, Kate.

[Kate laughs] I know what you're thinking.

I should have stayed with boxing.

[Both laugh] KATE: Sounds like you did.

It sounds like you did stick with boxing.

MICHAEL: It would've been safer.

KATE: Uh it must have been hard though to stop.

MICHAEL: Yeah, of course it is.

You know, you're walking down in an arena, 10,000 people standing up when you come down the stairs.

And they had come into the front of the stage with those army of dancers, and then this sound.

You know, 40 dancers dancing as fast as they can, it was, for me, being at the front, it was like hearing a Concord taking off, just that magic, passion.

It just lifts me.

And so giving that up was very, very difficult.

So we're going on to do other things, which is exciting too, but in my heart, it's the shows.

In my heart, it's the dancers.

I love my dancers, I really love them, and my, my whole goal now is to make stars out of every one of them.

Make them stars.

While I was on Broadway, I challenged as many of my dancers as I could to do one of the four leading roles in the show just once for a matinee, evening show.

Just go out there and give it your best.

And I got so many dancers to try it.

The reason I did that is because dance is short-lived.

It's like sport.

They'll retire by the time they're 30, but for the rest of their lives, on their CV, they can say, I was a star on Broadway.

KATE: Yeah.

They can have that moment.

MICHAEL: Yeah.

They can say I was a star on Broadway.

KATE: And Michael is still very much in the world of dance.

He has created global dance competitions and he's worked hard to train the next generation of Irish dancers as well as guide the next installment of Lord of the Dance, which will celebrate 30 years in 2026.

KATE: You talked about tuning out the world's um, opinion of you.

If you had not done that, you would have kept your arms by your side.

MICHAEL: That's right.

KATE: You followed who you were, your creativity, your intuition.

What do you say to a young person who, in this day and age, it's so hard to tune out the world with all the social media and just the way the world is.

What do you say to them?

MICHAEL: Make a list of the top 10 things that you want to do in your life and don't hold back.

And no matter how hard it is, scratch nine things off.

KATE: Mm.

MICHAEL: And you're left with the one thing, the one thing that really, forget about what people will say, the one thing that if was just me and God, if I could do anything, that's it.

When you have that one thing, don't let anything in the world stop you.

If you come up against brick walls, go over it, go under it, go around it, or go through it, but don't stop.

That's the one thing.

Do not stop.

Just go and get it and make it your own.

KATE: Mm.

MICHAEL: That's my advice.

If you're willing to work for it and you follow your dream, nothing is impossible.

You can have anything in the world.

KATE: Mm.

MICHAEL: Who would have thought some Irish dance guy from Chicago would outsell all those Rock bands?

KATE: This has been such a privilege.

Really.

Cheers to you.

Let's do a toast, an Irish toast.

Thank you, Michael.

MICHAEL: Slainte.

KATE: Slainte.

MICHAEL: God bless.

KATE: As if Michael's talent for dance isn't enough, he's also an award-winning flautist, and to end this meal, I got to hear a special performance with his Rudall and Rose flute made in 1836, one of the rarest instruments in the world.

And let me tell you, it was better than dessert.

MICHAEL: This is for you, Kate.

KATE: Thank you.

[Upbeat Irish music plays] KATE: [Claps] I loved it.

Wow.

MICHAEL: Thank you.

Welcome to Ireland.

KATE: If you would like to know more about the guests, the restaurants, and the inspiring stories of success, please visit ToDineForTV.com or follow us on Facebook and Instagram @ToDineForTV.

We also have a podcast.

To Dine For , The Podcast is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

To Dine For with Kate Sullivan is made possible by... (Music and chatter) MAN: During the weekends, we do like a grill.

(Clatter of chess board) MAN #2: You know you have bragging rights in the hood.

I'm like, "My guy won the game."

(Clatter of chess piece and men yelling and cheering) FEMALE ANNOUNCER: At American National, we honor the "do"-ers and the dreamers: The people who gets things done and keep the world moving.

Our local agents are honored to serve your community, because it's their community, too.

American National.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪