Aisling Bea, 32, is an actor, comedian and writer from County Kildare, Ireland. She lives in Islington, London, with her sister Sinéad, a film costume designer. Bea studied French and philosophy at Trinity College Dublin and then went to Lamda. In 2012 she won the So You Think You’re Funny award at the Edinburgh festival and has appeared on various panel shows and in the sitcoms Dead Boss and Trollied. A role in the new series of BBC crime thriller The Fall will take her back to her dramatic roots.
What was it like to be the newbie on set on a show as successful as The Fall?
I had a ball. Northern Irish people tend to have this sharp, dark sense of humour. Everyone, including myself, took the work very seriously but no one took themselves too seriously. I also felt lucky to be there as Allan Cubbitt (the writer and director) took a chance casting me because of how much comedy I have done the last few years. I really wanted to do a good job for him as much as myself.
What impact did winning the award at Edinburgh have on your career? You were only the second woman to win it.
For me it was just a competition that got me to tighten up some of my jokes but after I won it there was definitely a hoo-ha that I didn’t expect. The attention made me a bit paranoid for a while but it opened many doors and was definitely one of those turning points you hear people talk about in interviews.
Who are your comedy heroes?
I went to see Billy Connolly do two hours, with no break, at the Apollo, with Parkinson’s disease, during the winter, and it was one of the most important gigs I have seen in my life. I found him mainly hilarious, but I was also just learning watching him. He is an inspiring master of storytelling. The funniest person I know though is Brona C Titley, who is also an actor and writer and one of my best friends and a soulmate.
Your mother was a flat-race jockey, and your father was a vet – why didn’t you opt for a more stable career?
I am too fat and tall to be a jockey. This is not self-deprecation, I realise that I am neither too fat nor too tall; but I am too fat and too tall to be a jockey. Fact. As for a vet, my father put his hand up cows’ arses and mares’ vaginas for a living and I suppose I feel I have an air of glamour that would conflict with that life. It’s that thing of parents working really hard so their kids can be whatever they want.
And now you live in London. Would you ever move back to Ireland?
I feel at home in London. The Irish community here is strong and vibrant and we are like a pack of mushrooms all sprouting up in the same areas. Would I go back? I don’t know. Most of my world is in London and I feel like this is where I went mad and ended up finding myself. My sister is here. And my mother is always on Facebook.
So you can always keep in touch with her. Now that the UK has voted for Brexit, and Ireland is still part of the EU, do you see that changing the dynamic between the two?
Ireland is very European. The EU built a lot of our roads and bailed us out when things went tits up. Brexit is not ideal. I’m famously not a Brexit negotiator, but relations between Ireland and the UK have been getting stronger and a big part of that has been trade and feeling like sister countries within the EU. I don’t think it will affect the “vibe” of relations, but it will have a significant effect on trade and business. I wonder how much more TV and film will start to use Ireland as somewhere to make stuff. An EU base with an English-speaking workforce and castles for the background? That will be interesting to see.
You’re in LA. What are you doing there?
I just did a show called @Midnight which is the closest thing to a panel show they have in the States. It was my first US TV spot and I was sweaty and nervous but it all records in an hour and airs the same night. I love LA. Some people arrive with big expectations and are inevitably disappointed, but I can audition in the day which can be gruelling and lonely, but then gig and be creative in the evenings. I am making no money, but creatively it is rewarding.
Do you like doing panel shows?
I love doing them but some days are tough work, just because of energy levels, subject matter or the chemistry between the people. I was on League of Their Own recently; I was the only girl and I think that the lads sort of forgot. We had to get into football gear and Tony Adams, who is the world’s nicest man, was just getting his kit off forgetting he wasn’t back in a dressing room with the England team. I got a flash. That man is still in very good shape.
You are good friends with Sharon Horgan, who you worked with on Dead Boss. What is she like to work with and will you work together again?
We played sisters in Dead Boss and I find myself naturally being a little sister figure to her. We wrote half a film together which didn’t go ahead. Now I’ve written this script which Channel 4 seem to really like – it’s about sisters – but I can’t say much more in case it doesn’t get made. I do really like the script. It’s quite close to my heart.
You campaigned for same-sex marriage legislation in the Ireland referendum. Do you remember where you were when 62% voted Yes?
I was in a Premier Inn in Newcastle during a weekend of gigs, crying over my laptop watching the news and wanting to hop on a plane back to Dublin. It was one of the proudest, happiest, most glorious days in Irish history. It’s a big thing for a Catholic country.
You’re also heavily involved with Repeal the 8th, the campaign to make abortion legal in Ireland. Do you see that happening in the near future?
The women of Ireland are already repealing, we are shouting it from the rooftops and from the bedsides of friends and family who have had to sit in a cinema in England for a day after an abortion with nowhere to go, just waiting until it is time to get the Stansted Express for their late-night Ryanair flight. The question is how long the government will pretend to ignore the problem.
You studied French and philosophy at Trinity College Dublin. But do you have any favourite French philosophers?
I mean everyone loves a bit of Jean-Paul Sartre, but I am a bit more into practical life philosophy. I love Alain de Botton, and listen to his little School of Life YouTube vids as I do the dishes. I shout: “That’s right, Oprah” when he says something deep that I connect with.
Who is scarier – Jamie Dornan as Paul Spector in The Fall or James Norton as Tommy Lee Royce in Happy Valley?
Well, I know Jamie now and he is the loveliest man. James was at drama school with my sister Sinéad and also seems like a very nice man. However, the writing on both shows is beautiful, and there are also many great parts for women. That is why they are two of my favourite shows – not just because of the hot psychopaths.
The third series of the Fall starts on 29 September at 9pm on BBC2
Comments (…)
Sign in or create your Guardian account to join the discussion