My short film Two Cats recently premiered at the Kerry Film Festivaland I was delighted that it got shortlisted for Best Irish Short, which is a great result in its first run out.
There’s also a trailer for the film recently released into the wild. Check it out.
The film is synopsised thus: Two Cats is a black comedy that tells the story of a woman’s struggle to scatter her dead brother’s ashes discreetly in their hometown in the aftermath of his death. The film is a modern reworking of the old story of the two cats of Kilkenny.
It stars Aoibhín Murphy, Peter McGann, Amy Dunne, Ed Murphy and myself. It was produced by Alan Slattery and shot and edited by Sean Clancy. It’s produced under the Mycrofilms banner.
I’m hoping there will be a few more screenings of the film in 2019. Will post updates accordingly.
A short film I wrote about a group of criminals competing for a mysterious bag has just hit the interwebs in all its bloody and profane glory. The film was shot in Kilkenny under the Mycrofilms banner and directed by Ross Costigan.
It’s a short comedy based on the same play with a lot of the same characters and actors (except me and Niall Morrissey who are the ‘Pippas’ of this short) and it’s set after Smitten so it kind of works as a follow up episode! And there probably won’t be a follow up episode so best enjoy this one! The film can be summed up as “Drowning their various sorrows at a housewarming party, four friends trade stories about a near mythical girl from their past.”
Smitten has hit the RTÉ Player as part of the line up for Storyland 2016.
We went to the launch on Monday which was good craic. The other pilots look great so I’m looking forward to catching them. Here’s a picture of us trying not to look uncomfortable for press photos.
It’s been great to get the episode out there and I’m very humbled and heartened by the support. I wouldn’t have gotten to do this without such a powerhouse cast (Aoife Spratt, Clare Monnelly, David Thompson, Jack O’Leary, Amy Dunne, Pete McGann, Leah Egan and Gus McDonagh) and crew (too many toppers to mention but an extra special thanks to Ruth Carter for producing the hell out of this) and the support of everyone in Kilkenny which, in case you haven’t heard, is a pretty fucking great place.
And thanks so much to everyone who supported the various theatrical runs of Smitten, the short film version, the pop up book etc, over the years. It was great to make something for RTÉ about the hometown and even if it goes nowhere else, it’s nice to have had this opportunity. I don’t know if we’ll get to make other episodes for the rest of the characters but I guess the more people who like it and watch it, it’ll do the series prospects no harm. So if you do watch it and like it, please spread the good word. Thanks again.
Here’s some more words I wrote about the long pregnancy of Smitten.
There’s always a fine line between plugging away at something and flogging a dead horse. Speaking of which…
I shot the pilot episode for Smitten, a Kilkenny based comedy drama earlier this month and it’s going to be hitting the RTÉ Player early in the new year as part of the new Storyland initiative.
Smitten was an idea I’d had for a screenplay for a really, really longtime. And as I’ve gotten older, the characters have followed suit and at this stage it’s kind of followed through my twenties. So it’s a real surprise this episode isn’t people cursing water bills and freaking out about how to calculate tax. Smitten was basically a series of vignettes about an interlinked, fractured group of friends set in Kilkenny, a series of tragicomic stories. Nothing too gimmicky and basically an excuse for me to write something about where I’m from. Also, I loved the meaning of the word. It sounds romantic but it really means being sick, hit hard, afflicted, completely stricken. So, the absolute anti craic of romance. When I was a bairn in YIFM years back, I’d made a feature with a lot of these characters in it, and they were also bairns. It was called Skegs and Skangers and it was rough as arse (it’s a fucking mess truth be telt) but when you’re 17 and getting to make features, it’s a sweet learning curve to be clueless on. I’d been getting more into theatre post college so I decided to try Smitten as a stage play which Devious Theatrestaged in 2008 in The Barn.
It went down pretty well at the time but I still felt that there was more to be done with it. I wrote a screenplay and then re-adapted the play to suit that. So three years later we re-staged it again in a slightly more streamlined fashion in 2011 as part of Devious Theatre’s In The Future When All’s Well residency and brought it to Cork and had the craic. It was more of a musical this time and it felt right.
The itch to do something with it for the screen was still there. I’d written a screenplay which I had hawked around unsuccessfully for a year or two. Realising that a multi character story these days would probably make a better fit for television, I made a short film called Daffney Molloy And Other Catastrophes, based on a scene from the screenplay and used that as a proof of concept for something for TV. It screened at IndieCork this year and will go online next year. Then the Storyland opportunity came up and it was off to the races.
The pitch for the series was to focus on one character per episode and the Storyland version of it looks at the character of Bronagh, ostensibly the most level headed, together member of this group of friends but one who’s put in a right state of chassis when she discovers she’s pregnant on the same day her ex Dave goes missing. And she’s really the only one who can find him.
The cast for the show is a line up of absolute toppers: Aoife Spratt, Clare Monnelly, David Thompson, Jack O’Leary, Amy Dunne, Leah Egan, Peter McGann and Gus McDonagh. I was blessed to work with a cracker of a crew on this too. It’s been produced by Ruth Carter for Mycrofilms. There’s a great team on board and I’ve been a very lucky man to work with them. That’s the craic anyway, it’ll go online in the new year and I’ll probably write something else about it then. It’s been really nice to get to this point with something I’ve been plugging away at for a good, long time now. And if this is as far as it goes, I’m good with that. Bottom line, keep plugging away. Plugging away is a good thing.
My new short film Daffney Molloy And Other Catastropheswill have its premiere on October 9th at this years IndieCork festival. I’m looking forward to taking a trip down Cork way to see it with an audience. Set in present day Kilkenny, the film is about four fellas at a house party who drown their sorrows whilst trading stories about a near mythical girl from their past. One of their number, Tommy, hasn’t heard of Daffney Molloy and is trying to figure out what’s the truth and what’s fantasy.
Here’s the trailer for the film:
The cast includes Eddie Murphy, Aoife Spratt, Amy Dunne, Niall Morrissey, Jack O’Leary, Leah Egan, Lynsey Moran, Peter McGann, Aoibhín Murphy, Alexandra Christle, Molly O’Byrne and Paddy O’Leary. It was produced by Alan Slattery at Mycrofilms and shot by Ross Costigan.
This is the first poster for my second short film (this was the first). We’re putting the final touches to it at the moment and hoping to premiere it at some point of 2015.
The film is a comedy set in present day Kilkenny about four friends who drown their sorrows while trading stories about a near mythical girl from their past. I was very lucky to work with a sterling cast on this including Eddie Murphy, Aoife Spratt, Amy Dunne, Niall Morrissey, Jack O’Leary, Leah Egan, Lynsey Moran, Peter McGann, Aoibhín Murphy, Alexandra Christle, Molly O’Byrne and Paddy O’Leary.
Here’s a pic of the character I’m playing in the upcoming crime short Swerve, directed by Ross Costigan. The Mastermind is a smug, over dramatic strategist trying to pull the strings of all the players in the brutal game the movie centres around. It was a lot of fun to play and I got to drive a jeep. Happy out.
The film will premiere later this year. For more check out the Swerve page on Facebook.
Here’s the first few pictures from my new short film Daffney Molloy And Other Catastrophes. It’s currently in both post and pre-production with Mycrofilms. It’s a story about stories so we’ve got the story part filmed, stories yet to be filmed. The synopsis for the film is thus:
A comedy set in present day Kilkenny, it tells the story of four catastrophes of men who, whilst drowning their sorrows at a housewarming party, get caught up in stories about a near mythical girl from their past. Apart from one of them. Crippled with social anxiety and struggling with his newly found sobriety, Tommy has no idea who Daffney Molloy is. As the yarns are spun, he begins to question how much of what he’s hearing is reality and how much of it is fantasy.
It’s adapted from my play Smitten which Devious Theatre produced a couple of times. Why I’ve gone for a longer title for the short is beyond me but shur, look. I’m very lucky to have a great cast on this one including Eddie Murphy, Jack O’Leary, Niall Morrissey, Peter McGann, Aoife Spratt, Amy Dunne, Lynsey Moran, Leah Egan, Alexandra Christle, Paddy O’Leary and Aoibhín Murphy. It’s produced by Alan Slattery and shot by Ross Costigan with a great crew on board. As was the case with the play itself, it’s nice to make something that’s set in Kilkenny and about the relationship between the place and the people who live in it. Got a good chunk of work still to do so we’ll be premiering it in 2015.
