Cillian Murphy and my part in making him an Oscar nominee

Everytime an actor turns the first page on a new script, he starts to draw from the well of experience that has made him the person and actor that he is. And so, as the FedEx guy pulled up to the door of Cillian Murphy with a “hot package” from Christopher Nolan, and as Cillian turned that first page on the “Oppenheimer” script, he knew that he would have to draw on all of his atomic experiences. And happily, I was present for one of these.

However, in the same vein as Monsieur Nolan, a scene must be set.

GALWAY, 2004. INT PUB - NIGHT

I think most people have been in this scenario more than once. You and a friend get invited to the pub by a couple of other friends, who are already in the pub. Except that, when you arrive, you realise the friends have been in-situ for several hours. And while they appear to be having “mighty craic”, it is the sort of mighty craic that requires around 6 pints to get onboard with. You don’t understand what they are laughing about. You don’t get the references to earlier anecdotes or callbacks to incidents from hours ago that you weren’t there to witness. It’s Tuesday night. You expected “civilised pints”. You weren’t prepared for this.

You try your best, but you know you’re on a hiding to nothing, your drunken friends are in a different time zone of inebriation. They encourage you to “have a few shots”, but you are world-weary enough to know that this is a fraught exercise. You don’t simply “catch up” with people on this sort of drunken plane. You can only orbit them from afar, being called a “dry shite” and “Captain Buzzkill” for having the gall to being your sobriety to the pub with you.

And then, Cillian Murphy comes into the pub.
Or so it happened on this particular occasion. Tuesday night. 2004. Quiet pints with drunken lunatics. Cillian Murphy.

When Cillian Murphy comes into a pub, heads turn. Even in 2004. I didn’t recognise him at first. It took me a good 5 minutes of racking my brain, thinking “Did I work with that lad in Salt n ’Pepper…or was it Connacht Laundries? No, I think he was in my Archaeology class….” before I realised who he was. He was starring in “The Playboy of the Western World” in the Town Hall at the time and had clearly just finished rehearsals and headed into this pub, The Stage Door, for a well-deserved pint.
Upon realising who he was, the two sober members of the group, myself and Mark, cooooed and awwwed and were all like “Jaysus, I’m a straight man, but even I would”. The 2 drunken members, Joe and Ed, had other ideas.

“We have a bottle of Buckfast hidden in the bushes outside”, Ed joyfully announces.

Buckfast. Just what this evening did not require. I tried to visualize this bottle of Buckfast as described, nestled snugly in some shrubs, but in my mind’s eye the bottle of Buckie looked like a jerry-can of petrol and the shrubs had been replaced by a bonfire.

“How cool would it be to go drinking Buckie with the next Batman villain!?”

Mark and I looked at each other, rolled our eyes and sighed with such synchronicity that it would have earned unanimous 6.0s from the judges had it been an Olympic sport. The Buckie bonfire I had been imagining now had a stake in the middle with Cillian Murphy tied to it.
Joe and Ed could see no fault with the plan. In fact, they were giddy at the thought. I tried to pour some cold water on the Buckie bonfire.

“Yeah, it’s a nice thought. But it’s not going to happen.”
“Well, it definitely won’t happen if we don’t ask.”
“Right…so are you just going to rock up to Cillian Murphy at the bar while he’s surrounded by his thespian buddies and suggest he leave them all for a Buckie sesh with a bunch of random lads?”
“I’ll wait until he’s alone”.
“Right…how’s that gonna work?”

With the sort of timing that Christopher Nolan could only dream of, Cillian sashays past us into the toilets.
“I’ll ask him now!” was the words that Joe left us with as he leapt from the seat to stalk Cillian Murphy in the toilets. Again, the sober contingent were in harmony as faces smacked palms and uttered “Oh for fuck sake” in unison.

Cillian Murphy either has a very small bladder or the rare ability to stop peeing mid-flow and save it for later. Perhaps he simply didn’t get the opportunity to get his knob out of his pants before some pissed-up sham from Salthill had run up to him at the urinal and shouted “Oi! Scarecrow! Fancy coming drinking Buckie down the canal!?”

Whatever the attributes of Cillian Murphy’s bladder, he very quickly emerges from the toilets with an embarrassed smile and a shake of the head, followed almost immediately by Joe who slinks into his seat and moans “He didn’t seem to be up for it.”
“How did you put it to him?”, I asked, curious at the brevity of the whole encounter.
“He was at the urinal and I walked up to him and said ‘Oi! Scarecrow! Fancy coming drinking Buckie down the canal!?’
“Just like that?”, says I.
“Yep.”, says Joe.
“What!? And he wasn’t up for that offer!?”

Mark smiled but the sarcasm was wasted on the other two. They appeared very confused by the refusal. At that stage of drunkenness, they saw themselves as keyholders to the best night possible in Galway. Why would anybody not want to go drinking Buckie down the canal with them?

I offered up some reasons.
“Maybe Christopher Nolan had it written into his Batman contract. Avoid risky pursuits before filming begins. Don’t go paragliding. No solo hikes through the Andes. Don’t go drinking Buckfast with random lads in Galway pubs…that kind of thing.”
This didn’t wash with the drunk folk. Their confused disappointment turned to quiet seething as the imagined opportunity for drinking fortified wine with a Batman villain faded. They eyed the beautiful Cillian, standing at the bar, with barely disguised disdain.

Fortunately, as is often the case with alcohol, the drunken lads don’t linger too long on their simmering feud with Cillian Murphy. As the alcohol flows, the conversation turns to other topics; football, women, music, football, films, women, music, films etc etc etc. An hour or so passes before we are once again reminded of Cillian Murphy’s existence and presence in the bar, this time because he and his theatre-folk entourage are making for the back door and their departure.

Seated where we are in the Stage Door, our table and chairs seriously hamper traffic in and out of the back door. It means that we are regularly obliged to all stand up, shift chairs and mutter greetings/apologies at whoever it is that’s trying to get in or out, before sitting back down and having to repeat the process again milliseconds after our arses have hit the seats.

Anyway, the departure of Cillian & Co. necessitates us standing and creating an inadvertent and awkward Guard of Honour.
I’m not one for being star struck or having photos taken with celebrities or any of that jazz. Actors and musicians et al are, after all, just people. I always shudder when I see people imposing upon them for a photo or an autograph. But, in this instance, as Cillian Murphy approaches, my hand instinctively reaches out to shake his. He frowns slightly and gives my hand the slightest of shakes and I utter something like “Good luck with the Batman movie.” He nods in amused appreciation. Instantly, I'm a mix of emotion. I am massively mortified that I did it, but simultaneously delighted that I didn’t say anything too stupid.

Following my lead, Mark extends his hand of congratulations and mutters some vague platitudes. Cillian obliges. Next up, Joe offers a thumbs up from across the table. “Knock ‘em dead, Scarecrow!” Cillian smiles and nods at Joe. Lastly, Ed rises to open the back door for the Cillian entourage and extends a hand which is about to be shook, only for the hand to be withdrawn at the last minute and the door slammed shut as he screams “I HOPE YOUR CAREER FAILS, YOU FUCKING ACTING BOLLOCKS! WHY WON’T YOU COME DRINKING BUCKFAST WITH US!?”

I didn’t stay for what followed. From where I was standing, the path into the toilet cubicles involved a right turn, a short corridor, a left turn and another short corridor, a door and a few steps across the toilet. In my recollection, I made it into the cubicles in just 3 steps, bolted the door behind me and cringed until I was almost foetal. The row outside subsided almost instantly but I still didn’t chance going back out to the bar for another five minutes, until I was sure I had regained my composure and that Cillian Murphy was safely off the premises.

When I come back out, the bar is a sea of surprising calm, with Joe and Ed now reseated and sat chatting in a remarkably civilised fashion. Mark looks at me and I swear, in that instant, he invents the Grimace Emoji. I flash it right back at him as I retake my seat.
“I can’t believe Cillian Murphy wouldn’t come drinking Buckie with us”, quips Ed.
“I can’t believe you screamed ‘I HOPE YOUR CAREER FAILS YOU ACTING CUNT’ at Cillian Murphy.”
“Well now, nobody called anybody a cunt. I called him an acting bollocks.”
“Oh, sound so. That's much better, you fucking lunatic!"
Ed holds his hands up and gestures for silence.
“Look it, I’ve thought about my actions and I feel really bad about what just happened. I’ve decided that I’m going to write an open letter of apology and ask for it to be published in the Galway Advertiser. I'll do it tomorrow. ”
“Nice one. I’m sure Cillian will feel much better. Are you going to ask them to print ‘acting bollocks’ and the whole Buckfast proposition?”, Mark asks.
Says Ed, “I’ll work on the wording so that it contains adequate information and is appropriately remorseful.”
The eyes nearly roll out of my head.
“Jesus, Ed. You came up with the apology quicker than you came up with the insult.”
Joe is eager to change the subject.
“You still up for drinking Buckfast down the canal, Bob?”
“Up for it? After all that, I feckin need it.”

AND…SCENE!

And so, Cillian was gone. The encounter, atomic. The reaction, seismic. The fallout, radioactive. The whole episode augmenting his pathos. And you can see it in his eyes. That moment in Oppenheimer, when the Trinity explosion reflects in his pupils. He is not simply witnessing the first atomic explosion. He is conjuring that memory and that raw emotion of “ WHY WON’T YOU COME DRINKING BUCKFAST WITH US YOU FUCKING ACTING BOLLOCKS?”

I only hope he remembers us in his acceptance speech.

At last…the Bob Blog!

A couple of key “components” of ADHD are procrastination and over-thinking. With those things in mind…and they are always on my mind, except for when I say to myself “I’ll over-think that later”…welcome to the website I’ve been promising to build since 2008. After over-thinking the design of the website for 10 years, in 2018 I made the decision to keep it simple and start work at the beginning of next week. It turns out that Mondays are no good for me and Tuesdays are usually spent dealing with the fall-out from Monday. Wednesday is a great day to reschedule everything to the following Monday. Anyway…263 postponements later, here we are.

Jokes aside (Everyone who is not Bob: “Wow, are these jokes, Bob?”), the last 20 or so months since being diagnosed with ADHD have been some of the best. The positive change that I’ve experienced in almost every aspect of my life has been profound. Including comedy! September and October have been huge months for me what-with supporting the legendary John Colleary on his national “Loud & Colleary” tour and also Reginald D. Hunter in Sligo and my own lovely Ballina in the county of Mayo.

AND! Next week I’m back on stage at Ireland’s Smallest Comedy Club on Thursday October 26th as part of the Galway Comedy Festival, in a show that includes Edwin Sammon, Aideen McQueen and Johnny Graham. Then, on Friday October 27th, I’ll be performing my solo show “It Doesn’t ADhD Up” in the Dew Drop Inn, again, as part of the Galway Comedy Festival.

Then, on Sunday October 29th, I will once again be supporting John Colleary on the final leg of his tour as he closes out the Galway Comedy Festival on the main stage in the Roisin Dubh. Phew!

But that’s not all! I will also be appearing at a ADHD Ireland events in Portlaoise and Dublin on Monday November 20th and Thursday November 30th respectively. More information in the coming days and weeks from ADHD Ireland website.

As for the incredible journey of the last few years, big shouts out and lots of love to my family, my friends old and new and my comedy brethern and sestern, especially Selina and Ringo. (How do I do the heart symbol on this yoke!? <3 used to work on Tumblr!)