Maev MacCoille

Dear John le Carré - what on earth do you mean with the phrase “Irish jaw” and why do you keep using it? If he means the kind of face that is traditionally described as “look at the big Irish head on him” why doesn’t he just say so? (I never pictured Alec Leamas as Colm Meaney, I have to say)

Me: I’m thinking of getting a cat, but the shelters all say get two, and I’m not sure the flat is big enough My sister: yes get two cats you’re a cat person go for it right now I think this is what they call enabling.

I am fond of Peckhamplex for many reasons, but their commitment to showing Irish indie films is definitely one of them. It’s a tough watch in places, but it needs watching. Even today people have a tough time facing the brutal treatment women and children received in the name of compassion.

Monica Dolan gives a really fantastic performance - not showy, not melodramatic, serving the script the whole way through - but magnificently embodied and real. She’s also one of the few non-Irish actors I’ve ever seen pull off an Irish accent without sounding cartoonish.

I have somehow only just discovered that Matthew McFayden is playing George Smiley in the latest le Carré adaptation. This is nonsense. He’s a great actor, but no - no one can play both Mr Darcy and George Smiley, you have to pick one. I’m sorry if it seems unfair, but life is at times.

Electoral reform is back on the agenda, and I will not express an opinion (I have one, I just won’t express it). But I do think political journalists wildly underestimate how much fun they would have with a multi-day vote count and the vote transfer horse race. Hours upon hours for speculation!

I honestly think this is because journalists can’t do maths. Whenever some UK political journalist is drafted to cover an Irish elections, you see them getting confused. “But X got the most first preferences” they say, as though it matters. (They do with this with the London Mayor elections too)

@michaelwarburton.bsky.social

But the drama of a four-day count in a close constituency…the eliminations, the redistribution of votes, the recounts… Don’t tell me a nation that loves X-Factor and Eurovision won’t enjoy some of that. I still have fond memories of Dublin Bay North being the constituency of death in 2016.

Maev MacCoille reposted

Michael Warburton

It’s 1970 and ELTON JOHN takes out a crumpled piece of paper and plays “Tiny Dancer” for the first time in front of his lyricist BERNIE TAUPIN and Taupin’s wife Maxine (for whom Taupin wrote the song).

22 Sept

Continuing with the WW2 theme, today I saw Pressure. Apparently it’s based on a play - and I think it would have worked better as play. I’d love to know what was up with Andrew Scott’s accent choices. He’s supposed to be Scottish (I think) and sounds about as Scottish as I do.

Montgomery is probably the most prominent officer from that background, though I doubt he had the accent (but his father definitely did). The Duke of Wellington sounded distinctively Irish (to English people) his whole life - something you will never see acknowledged on depictions of him.

22 Sept

Anyway, seems that wasn’t what they were going for, and Andrew Scott just failed the Scottish accent test. Of this week’s WW2 movies, definitely go to De Gaulle, it’s far more interesting.

I was thinking maybe it was a nod to the Anglo-Irish being over represented in the British military, and the Anglo-Irish accent is quite distinctive (to the Irish it sounds English, to the English it sounds Irish). It has largely died out, though I have met a handful of people who had it.

20 Sept

My weekend: watching a World War Two movie, drinking whiskey (a whole two drinks), and being sad. (When the miserables hit, they hit hard). It’s possible I’ve metamorphosed into a 70 year old grandad. In my defence, it’s been a stressful week. (Stressful may be some classic Irish understatement)

16 Sept

It’s been a long, long work week (yes, I know it’s only Wednesday). Watching Slow Horses takes some of the sting out of it, because however tough my week is, River Cartwright is always having a worse time.

12 Sept

Somewhere a US state department official is pleading with anyone who’ll listen to “please, please don’t unpick our most significant foreign policy success of the last fifty years.” Meanwhile, the entire Irish cabinet frantically discussing how to say “you’re not helping” in Trumpese.

8 Sept

Usually when I’m stressed, I resort to watching my comfort episodes of the West Wing. The last month or so, only Star Trek will do. I feel like that’s not a good sign.

5 Sept

Years ago, I had a conversation with a friend about how DIY dentistry is an absolute dealbreaker in a potential boyfriend. Tonight’s play proved me right - DIY dentists are psychopaths. (I gave the actors a real panto reaction when I realised just what *kind* of psychopath).

5 Sept

There are vineyards in north county Dublin. From which wine is produced. For €60 a bottle. I don’t know which of those facts is most astonishing. (I think label must say “for those who live dangerously” or something - they have to know, right?)

This may be a specific cultural inheritance, but my bar for credibility in a fantasy/period drama is simply “Who is doing the laundry?” Because it’s physically exhausting, resource intensive work, and if it just ‘happens,’ then the writer has not thought enough about the foundations of their world

Most Jane Austen adaptations pass, because they show servants, shifts, and repeated outfits. We have enough information to infer who’s doing the laundry and how often, even if we don’t see it. Most Brontë adaptations fail, because what are clean clothes to sexy brooding men (a red rag, apparently)?

Star Trek passes, because the set up heavily implies that no one needs to do laundry, super-duper computers do it for everyone. Star Wars wobbles between Infinite Wardrobe that Takes Up No Space (Padme) and “I have precisely three outfits and they get visibly dirty” (Han, Leia, Rey). Partial pass

If you ever see a story set in the American South where the nice plantation owner has ‘released’ all their slaves (*cough* the Beguiled *cough*) but is still wearing pristine whites…the bar has not only been missed but flung as far away as humanly possible, because thinking about is inconvenient.

Bridgerton does NOT pass, because while it does show servants, it commits another cardinal sin - everyone dressed in silks with not a shift to be seen. Without a sin you will sweat all over your expensive (and expensively dyed) finery, and it will be ruined on the first wear. Instant failure.

Harry Potter (eventually) passes this bar. Tolkien passes it (sometimes). George RR Martin wants to pass, but can’t make himself find laundry interesting. Terry Prachett probably would have written a book about the Discworld’s first washing machine if he’d had the time, so I’m giving him the pass.

Maev MacCoille reposted

Deadly Hunkerbunker

@joaquindead.bsky.social

Pierce Brosnan was the result of a GoFundMe campaign to aggregate all of the trace amounts of Irish suavité in one person. Worked a treat, but now National resources are utterly depleted.

Maev MacCoille@msmaev.bsky.social

“We [the Irish] don’t do suave as a personality trait. Pierce Brosnan was a one-off, and no one really knows how it happened. And it seems to have come at the cost of his ability to sing.” Look, I said a mildly witty thing at dinner yesterday, and I want to extend its half-life. Just work with me.

I went to see the De Gaulle: Resistance film today, which is interesting for a tonne of reasons (it acknowledges the role of colonised nations in the war!)… one of which is that I think Simon Russell Beale does the best performance of Churchill that I think I’ve ever seen.

Churchill was so rich with idiosyncrasies (and drunk, don’t forget drunk), that I think it’s easy for actors depicting him to fall into shtick (or speechifying, which might be worse). But Beale gives us the calculating political mind that underpinned all Churchill’s eccentricities.

austintassletine.bsky.social

It was his ability to cut through and understand what mattered and what really didn’t that made Churchill such an essential leader, and Beale nails it. The depiction of Antony Eden, on the other hand, is risible. Unless Eden was an ingenue who needed realpolitik explained to him…seems unlikely.

Maev MacCoille reposted

@austintassletine.bsky.social

Replying to @msmaev.bsky.social

I'm inordinately please with this gag.

thejournal.ieVacuum billionaire James Dyson in stand-off with Waterford locals over access to graveyardDyson owns the historic 850-acre estate in west Waterford which he purchased for around €30 million two years ago.

I’m shocked. Shocked.

The Journal@thejournal.ie

James Dyson, the billionaire inventor of the British vacuum brand, is in a stand-off with locals in Co Waterford over access to a graveyard and historic rights-of-way on the grounds of his estate. Dyson owns the historic 850-acre Ballynatray estate, which he purchased for around €30 million.

Has this summer changed something fundamental in me? How can I be glad about this?

26 Aug

*grumble grumble grumble* Theatres closing their script submission windows early (when they are only open for two weeks every 24 months) is so bloody irritating. I know they have their reasons, but when you give me a deadline, I work to the deadline, not an unspecified date sometime before.

m.youtube.comCoat of Many Colours - Dolly Parton, Ireland 1990YouTube video by CR's Video Vaults

26 Aug

Pure class can’t be bought. m.youtube.com/watch?v=NqdK...

23 Aug

Serious theatre festival sends email about this year is all about mothers and matriarchy and female experiences. 50% of the shows the festival has programmed on this theme were written by men.

19 Aug

My local cinema screened Robin Hood Prince of Thieves because I don’t know why… It’s a wildly amusing. Simultaneously brilliant (the score, costumes, beautiful locations and lighting), terrible (Costner’s accent, hair, acting, and poor Christian Slater, who is at least TRYING) and plain weird.

19 Aug

I cannot decide which is more historically questionable - the ‘Celts’ showing up (who are they supposed to be? Scots?) or mother and baby surviving a woodland Caesarian section.

Maev MacCoille reposted

Sir Basil

@sirbasil.bsky.social

10 Aug

I don't think there should be a defibrilator on Snowdon. And that's a hill I'm prepared to die on

10 Aug

Pausing to note here how totally stunned I am that anyone was able to make RTE Player work in the UK, as whenever I attempt such a feat it melts down approximately once every 45 seconds. (I am also resisting the urge to explain that it’s actually called camogie, because GAA pedantry isn’t charming)

This post is unavailable.

9 Aug

Just out of Spider-Man and… the MCU has an alarming degree of tolerance for powerful people who resolve their mental health issues by controlling everyone around them. Apparently they all just need a hug. (Am I being a touch facetious? Yes. But three times is a pattern).

9 Aug

The person who compared its attitude to mass surveillance to the Dark Knight was also most definitely on to something. Like, I’m not saying the Dark Knight is the world’s most profound film or anything, but at least it asked the question!

3 Aug

All my work from Friday disappeared in a puff of “maybe there are network issues.” 7 hours of tedious, essential, brain-melting work to do over again. I am inconsolable.

30 July

Me: I went so see the Odyssey last night. Colleague: no spoilers! …there’s a statute of limitations on this stuff, right?

theatreweekly.comFull cast announced for world premiere stage adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House - Theatre WeeklyThe full cast has been announced for the world premiere stage adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House

22 July

On the one hand, when I read this book, I remember thinking it would work brilliantly on stage (it would even give a purpose to the Olivier’s ever present revolve). On the other, the Haunting of Hill House is a one of only a handful of perfect novels. Could you ever do it justice?

Theatre Weekly@theatreweekly.com

The full cast has been announced for the world premiere stage adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House theatreweekly.com/full-cast-an...

19 July

The BBC’s decision to broadcast the All-Ireland final has at least made my Sunday afternoon much, much better. Definitely my preferred way to recover from jet lag.

futurism.comThe Backlash Is So Strong That People With "Pervert Glasses" Are Afraid to Use Them in PublicMeta's camera-equipped "AI Glasses" are so divisive that some adopters are reportedly leaving their expensive smart glasses at home.

19 July

Seeing the random assortment of famous Irish people the BBC gather to ‘explain’ hurling to a UK audience is always entertaining. What do you want to bet they’ve been trying to get Cíllian Murphy for the last five years?

Maev MacCoille reposted

Petergeist Clines

@peterclines.com

13 July

Nice work, everyone! Keep it up!

12 July

Usually I never go near Irish bars when travelling…but on this one occasion I felt obligated. I admit I may be unreasonably pleased, but the name Maeve/Maev/Medb or other derivatives thereof show up basically never. And the cocktail is good - though the decor is lacking an essential bull theme.