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Seána Kerslake and Patrick Kielty co-star in Ballywalter.

Patrick Kielty on his new film and how he thought he was being pranked when it was offered

Kielty stars alongside Seána Kerslake in uplifting tragicomedy Ballywalter.

PATRICK KIELTY’S FIRST Late Late Show has landed about the same time as another big first for the Co. Down man.

Kielty is also acting in his first feature film, an uplifting tragicomedy called Ballywalter that is in some ways very much in his wheelhouse but is also quite the departure.

The film is set between the Co. Down seaside village of its title and Belfast, where Shane (Kielty) must head to every week to attend a stand up comedy class.

Shane is unable to drive himself to the class and is instead forced to get a weekly taxi driven by Eileen (Seána Kerslake).

Eileen’s nixer as a part-time taxi driver isn’t papering over the fact that she’s clearly fed up with life and her caustic remarks to Shane only seem to enforce her unhappiness.

The pair engage in awkward chats but it’s clear from early on that both have an inkling that there’s a reason for their ennui and show each other more patience than they do to others.

Unlike Kielty’s amiable and gregarious persona, Shane is far more introverted and even his fellow wannabe stand-ups in the comedy class aren’t able to get much from him.

The film was written by Stacey Gregg, who is from Dundonald, about halfway between the two film locations, and is directed by Prasanna Puwanarajah, a prolific London-based actor, director and writer for both stage and screen.

Puwanarajah might be best known to audiences for playing Martin Bashir in the most recent series of The Crown but he’s also directed productions at the Royal Shakespeare Company. 

Kielty says he genuinely thought it was a wind-up when he was offered the role:

I didn’t think it was a real offer. I was waiting for Ant and Dec to come round the corner.

The story is of accidental friendship between Shane and Eileen and it touches on various forms of struggle including depression, problem drinking and grief.

This might sound like tough going but it’s really not as there is rarely a scene where a joke is not cracked, either directly or in a more sarcastic and Irish way.

Speaking to The Journal about the film, Kielty mentions one striking scene that could amount to a counselling session were it not for the slagging between them.

“At the start of their relationship they were using comedy to sort of bat each other away and, you know, push each other apart. That scene in Grey Abbey, that was a brilliant scene to film and it was that thing where they were saying, ‘I am being open here’. The characters were crying and revealing stuff about themselves, but they were still able to make each other laugh through the snot and the tears.”

The film is about repeatedly failing but not shutting yourself off the potential that something or someone could help. Leaving your light on as a taxi driver might want to do.

“There were definitely moments and some jokes that really tickled me that I’m like, no, I’m not meant to enjoy them as much as I did,” Kerslake says of the balance between comedy and more serious matters.

But I suppose it’s like life, isn’t it? You’re dealing with people and their baggage, unbeknownst to us. We knock through it with humour all the time, so we’re always navigating that path I think between the light and the heavy.

BREAK OUT PICTURES / YouTube

Dealing with trauma and loss is something that Kielty has spoken about in the context of The Troubles. His own father was shot and killed by loyalist paramilitaries and he has made a number of documentaries about the legacy of the conflict and the experiences of victims.

As a comedian, The Troubles has frequently featured as part of his career and he’s no doubt aware that audiences he’s performed to have similar experiences to his own.

“I’d done a couple of documentaries about the Good Friday Agreement and I think that opened up to me that everybody’s carrying something. Everybody in life is carrying some sort of pain, some sort of trauma,” he says.

So I didn’t really have to do any research for it (the film). But the moment that you open your eyes and you realise that everyone’s carrying something and maybe somebody is having a bad day, you ask ‘why are they having a bad day?’ Well, it’s probably because at some point they’ve gone through something that’s hurt them.

“I think at the heart of this film is two people who were hiding their hurt and the moment that they actually start revealing to each other that can sort of help fix that.”

The character of Eileen is younger than Shane and needs to break out of the rut that’s holding her back. She also drinks too much, not in the stereotypical film way of sneaking swigs of vodka during the day but in too often waking up full of regrets about her behaviour the night before.

It’s territory Kerslake notes her career has explored before (A Date for Mad Mary, Can’t Cope Won’t Cope) and she says this kind of destructive drinking is often too easily ignored and excused.

“I think in a lot of my work there’s been a lot of casual drinking and abuse of alcohol and it’s something that can definitely go under the radar. Phrases like, ‘oh, he’s fond of it’, you know what I mean? Usually it means he has an issue with alcohol, so you’re very aware of it.”.

The film reaches its conclusion in Belfast’s Empire Music Hall, where Kielty himself was instrumental in setting up Northern Ireland’s first comedy club back in 1992.

“It was when I got out of university and it was pretty much my first ever gig. So to be on that stage for the final scene in the film, that was a really weird full circle.”

Ballywalter is in cinemas from Friday 22 September

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    Mute Darren
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    Aug 24th 2019, 10:09 AM

    I recently completed a refurbishment project in South Dublin consisting of the delivery of 14 upgraded homes for Rathdown/DL council. I’m back every now and then carrying out maintenance and noticed how 12 of these homes were given to Muslim/ African couples only two of which have children, anybody know why they got first preference on these homes ahead of other families with children living nearby in accomodation?

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    Mute Dave Doyle
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    Aug 24th 2019, 10:10 AM

    @Darren: For division purposes. Nothing else.

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    Mute Darren
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    Aug 24th 2019, 10:23 AM

    @Dave Doyle: I would agree if the council housed other families elsewhere but this was the only housing project carried out last year.

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    Mute Dave Doyle
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    Aug 24th 2019, 10:30 AM

    @Darren: The civil rights movement in Nth. Ireland started over the discrimination in housing allocation. Given the housing situation in the country, this allocation of homes as you described can only have a political purpose.

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    Mute Brian Mc Elwaine
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    Aug 24th 2019, 1:33 PM

    Because these, especially the africans have a proven track record of boosting the economy, reducing crime, integrating very successfully and generally improving every society they’ve graced with their presence. Like
    Mulhuddart, Ongar, Tyrrelstown, Balbriggan, and Clonee. Welcome to Soror.

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    Mute ken gray
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    Aug 24th 2019, 2:20 PM

    @Darren: happening all over the country !

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    Mute Adrian Aungier
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    Aug 24th 2019, 7:48 PM

    @Darren: your right. Only white people are homeless. PC gone mad

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    Mute Raymond Westlake
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    Aug 25th 2019, 11:12 AM

    @Brian Mc Elwaine: waiting for your comment to be deleted -the Journal doesn’t subscribe to a balanced narrative. The Fleadh in Drogheda last week literally kicked off with a Garda being kicked in the head by our ‘culturally diversifying’ friends when a rave, posing as a bogus birthday party, was refused. These people are the so called ‘engineers and scientists’ with which Varadakar wants to flood the country.

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    Mute Dave Doyle
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    Aug 24th 2019, 6:48 AM

    The homeless industry, a gravy train for the well connected and misery that those who have to use such shoddy unsuitable accommodation and are expected to be grateful for.
    If animals were kept in these conditions there would be an outcry.

    127
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    Mute Alan
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    Aug 24th 2019, 8:03 AM

    @Dave Doyle: animals kept inside with a roof and four walls? That would be utter luxury for most of our farm animals??

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    Mute Clint Sofie
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    Aug 24th 2019, 3:38 PM

    @Alan: Ahh, but sure the auld meat is grand though.

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    Mute Dr. Udaya Khandavilli
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    Aug 24th 2019, 6:52 AM

    No father wants to to see suffering of his daughter. My heart broken after reading this article. We must do something to end this.

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    Mute David Jordan
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    Aug 24th 2019, 8:35 AM

    @Almight Joe: This is this toxic libertarianism from America that’s infecting Ireland really annoys me, the belief that tax redistribution to the poor via socal welfare is none other than theft. How many Jordan Peterson or Stefan Molyneux videos did you watch on YouTube before you came to your position?

    The argument for welfare is that we need a safety net, without which the vulnerable of society fail and drag others others down too. You just have to see the extremes of your phylosophy in the decaying cities in the US; San Francisco for example, where the influx of high paid IT workers and not enough houses resulted in spiralling rent prices that put thousand of poorer people out of their homes, who now live in ever growing homeless cities without a proper social welfare safety net. It’s got so bad they’re worried about disease epidemics normally seen in the 3rd world. Yes, I know things won’t get as bad here, it’s only an example of what you seem to prefer, a country that does not cares for all of its citizen.

    All men are created equal.

    * except the ones who are homeless.

    https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/03/typhus-tuberculosis-medieval-diseases-spreading-homeless/584380/

    Similar happened here to our housing market, a pause in house building during the recession and a growing population due to natural increased and net immigration, a move away from building council homes and towards an ill consieved HAP scheme that artificially inflated rents, and a government who foolishly thinks the free market (foreign vulture funds etc.) will fix the housing crisis.

    But no, you just blame homeless (including 1700 children) who you think did it to themselves.

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    Mute wacker macker
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    Aug 24th 2019, 8:59 AM

    @David Jordan: This is the result of massive economic migration. They heard Ireland gives you free money and housing.

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    Mute Dave Doyle
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    Aug 24th 2019, 10:09 AM

    @Alan: The poor choices rest exclusively with the neoliberal FG minority government. Who see no problem with Billions and Millions in cost overruns on building projects, can give Billions in corporate welfare for a broadband system as long as the right man is involved, can spend 25 million on consultants to compile reports on it. Yet can remove a pittance in allowance for the disabled, throw homeless families into any sort of a s***hole room, lie about the actual numbers of homeless, and put out the lie that it’s all the fault of the homeless for being homeless.
    No social housing being built, no affordable housing, the most expensive rents in Europe all to benefit foreign private investors. Any all the FG fanboys agree with this sort of governance of the country.

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    Mute David Jordan
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    Aug 24th 2019, 12:09 PM

    @wacker macker: “This is the result of massive economic migration. They heard Ireland gives you free money and housing.”

    Actually jobs…

    The employment rate for non-nationals is overall slightly higher than Irish nationals.

    “Many non-Irish nationals are as likely to be employed and as educated as Irish people”

    https://www.thejournal.ie/immigrants-employment-education-ireland-esri-4325207-Nov2018/

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    Mute Sk19
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    Aug 24th 2019, 1:40 PM

    @David Jordan: based on all non nationals yes of course

    Drill down into certain countries / ethics and give me the stats ?

    Of course an australian/ Indian / Brazilian executive is here to work

    Break it down by country I’ll bet you now certain counties are 70% unemployed

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    Mute Alan
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    Aug 24th 2019, 7:18 PM

    @Dave Doyle: you think were not spending billions on welfare? The biggest expense of the country every year yet it’s the wealthy who are to blame? This country is getting to to the point that even moderately comfortable people will be expected to give their money away to the poor!

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    Mute acallkelly
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    Aug 24th 2019, 1:59 PM

    A recent report bt crosscare group tell us that 34%of people on the waiting list for soial housing list are not born in Ireland , of the 23% were eastern european the remaining 11% were non European.
    This is crazy to allow people to keep coming to Ireland for ‘jobs’ and putting massive pressure on not only housing but schools, hospitals and other essential services.
    I was in a Dublin hospital three times in the past two months for outpatient care, more than a third of those waiting were obviously foreign born, accents and visually. We need a big discussion in Ireland on the increasing numbers, this is not even talking about those arriving here illegally , not invited etc.
    We are told that its all about jobs, and labour shortage, and yet the numbers on the unemployment list are not getting shorter.

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    Mute Paul Whelan
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    Aug 24th 2019, 2:27 PM

    A copy of this shoukd be sent to every African country , to show them how goid they have it.

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    Mute Eddie O'Neill
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    Aug 24th 2019, 11:00 PM

    I would like to see the system where some people get benefits like free houses and allowances for life addressed, be they Irish or other wise. The woman who brought her 8 kids to the garda station and then got a free house in Meath should be made to train and work her way to paying for that house or buying one for herself and not being a burden on the state. Otherwise her kids and their kids will repeat the process and it will cost the state, at a guess, millions in taxpayers money. Now how many people contributing tax over their lifetime are needed to fund that benefit cycle for 30 citizens? It is not equitable and therefore should not be a normal practice. Same for other benefits, they are a safety net to catch you when you are down but you must work your way back to being a responsible citizen again.

    Currently, working your way back to independence, after state benefits, is a pipe dream because it’s like what happened in the US when the “American Dream” became unattainable, that you will never get there, the sums don’t add up and you cant see a point where you will win, and in the case of the US it signified an end to a period of great growth and prosperity for workers. I refer to the price of a house of course, or indeed rented accommodation. The price is too high, you cant get a sufficient mortgage, your salary won’t cover the cost of rent. Why do an honest days work for an honest days pay if it doesn’t allow you to actually have a life worth living?

    Imagine a young married couple, 2 kids, one works full time and the other minds the children, manages the home and supports the salaried parent, not such an unusual setup not to long ago. The salaried parent makes E20,000 a year in a low skilled but ultimately crucial service that everyone else in society benefits from. That salary is used to feed and dress the family etc. They decide to buy a home and apply for a mortgage, bank says we can give you 3.5 time your salary, around 70k and they would need to have a deposit of 10% to make up the difference. So a 3 bed semi in Dublin needed for 80-90k. How many of those is there?, none. They decide to rent, a 3 bed semi in Dublin, at E1300 a month (hard to find that cheap) will cost E15,6000 a year, leaving E4400 to live off for a year for 4 people, 2 of which are expected to be the next generation of workers assuming they can afford to keep them in school.

    Therein lies the problem, the housing crisis is 10 years old, successive FG governments and ministers have done nothing to fix this and everything to make it worse. Again this is not equitable behavior and makes no common sense in an economy, a business, or for a family. It will end up costing more to the taxpayers over the longer term. It does make sense for the perpetrators of this crime, the TD’s. And the landlords, hoteliers bankers and vulture funds. The TD’s are laughing all the way to the bank, their time is short, there are no consequences for their treachery and when their political career has fizzled out the bankers and vultures who owe them a favour for the good years (2010 to present) will give them jobs and board seats and we will provide them with a pension that’s so good they could buy a house every 2/3 years with it.

    You might have reasons to vote FG again, I can’t imagine any, but if you do, for the love of your fellow citizens, insist they address the issues facing our society in return for your valued vote. We must declare, all of us, to be sick and tired off being treated like a doormat, of being left on a trolley in a corridor for 24 hours, of being left on a waiting list for years, of ever increasing taxes, of ever worsening traffic, of homeless people sleeping in doorways at -5 in January, of houses prices that have no relation to our salaries, of being ripped off by insurance companies on car, house and health year in and year out, of increasing levels of crime, of worsening levels of corruption and cronyism and the fraudulent redistribution of taxpayers wealth via broadband and hospital projects. Enough already. If they continue to oppress the society then don’t be surprised or upset when the society eventually decides to fight back, historically they always do, and in doing so inadvertently laying waste to whatever small parts of good that still remain in this great nation of ours.

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    Mute Shane Cusack
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    Aug 25th 2019, 7:52 AM

    @Eddie O’Neill: 3 bed semi for €1,300. Not a hope! 1 bed apartments are easily getting that!

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    Mute Almight Joe
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    Aug 24th 2019, 4:13 PM

    So many left wing Journal (aka Socialist Times) writers …..

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    Mute Brian Flavin
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    Aug 24th 2019, 9:46 AM

    Terrible bad condition mound & cockroaches

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    Mute Mark Doyle
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    Aug 24th 2019, 11:38 PM

    Adrian, shut up you ignorant, rasist, knuckle-dragging loser!

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    Mute Mark Doyle
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    Aug 24th 2019, 11:39 PM

    Adrianl, shut up you ignorant, rasist, knuckle-dragging loser!

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