He left school in Dublin at age 16 to become an actor, and joined Ireland's national theater, the Abbey Theatre, in 1953. Later in life, he was the Abbey's artistic director.
Performing in Arthur Miller's "The Price" at the Miniature
Theatre of Chester, a professional theatre company which Vincent helped
found. (October 2005)
He was the biological father of the Irish politician Richard Boyd Barrett. He was put up for adoption by his mother Sinéad Cusack and they met late in life.