Ah, look. We were getting a bit carried away with ourselves. In the days building up to the Oscars 2023, Ireland’s papers were plastered with ambitious spreads about the nation’s biggest night at the awards ever – with 14 noms in total – filling the population with hopes and dreams that were unlikely to be fulfilled. Sitting at home in Dublin during the week, my mother – who has never once shown an interest in this sort of thing – turned to me and said, prompted, like all good conversation, by a push notification from The Irish Times on her phone: “Big night for the Irish at the awards this weekend.” Yes, mum.
And it felt like there might be something in it, actually. The Banshees of Inisherin, Martin McDonagh’s tragicomedy about rural despair (9 nominations) had done well at the Golden Globes and the Baftas, the awards season’s Carabao Cup and FA Cup, respectively. It seemed like Colin Farrell’s eyebrows and toxic masculinity-shattering charm might get him over the line in the best actor race. Supporting nods for Barry Keoghan, Kerry Condon and Brendan Gleeson all seemed like long shots, but their presence made the whole circus infinitely more interesting. Then there were the under-the-line hopefuls, like the first Irish-language film to be nominated, The Quiet Girl, which, obviously no one saw, but a win would be nice to put some numbers on the board, everyone seemed to agree.
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But when it came down to it on the night, it became clear that our presence at the awards was predominantly ornamental. Sure, the Academy said, you can have your pics of Paul Mescal blasting darts at Oscars parties, but you won’t be getting to see him on stage, no chance. Banshees, one of the most popular frontrunners for best picture, was shut out entirely, but was, of course, used as a set-up for some typically mid-tier gags from host Jimmy Kimmel – like when he brought out an imposter donkey in lieu of the film’s beloved Jenny, referring to it as an ‘emotional support donkey’. Elsewhere, Kimmel joked that there being five Irish actor nominees meant “the chances of another fight on stage just went way up”. The only winners on the night were Northern Ireland’s An Irish Goodbye for live-action short, and Dub Richard Baneham for his visual effects work on Avatar: The Way of Water. And, we’re happy for you lads, but that’s not exactly going to have us chucking our pints in the air, is it?
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The thing is, Ireland has a dicey record at the Oscars. Unless you count Irish Citizen but pure-blood-boarding-school Brit Daniel Day-Lewis (wish we could; we don’t), it’s been 34 years since the nation has won an acting award (Brenda Fricker for My Left Foot). And then you’ve got the general “Ireland is a silly place full of unserious people where we go to attend leprechaun museums, listen to bad trad music and wear jumpers that say ‘Ireland’ on them” attitude that bangs off of America, and which tends to rear its sad little head whenever a comedian gets within spitting distance of a cheap gag. This was, in our nation’s most ambitious, imbuing-something-meaningless-with-meaning terms, an opportunity to be taken seriously in a culture-defining country that rarely sees us as more than a punchline.
The Irish actor might not have scooped a gong, but he definitely came out on top in the style and watch stakes
But the writing was on the wall on Saturday night, when past-it sketch show Saturday Night Live aired an Oscars-centric cold open, featuring arsehole-scrunchingly embarrassing impressions of Farrell and Gleeson. The two, played by Mikey Day and Molly Kearny respectively, spoke in garbled nonsense, apparently owing to their indecipherable accents, which have somehow not hindered their international movie careers decades in. The bit ended with an all-too-obvious low blow: “They haven’t even started drinking yet.” Oh please, don’t let the fact that Colin Farrell has been clean and sober for 17 years get in the way of some lowest-common-denominator laughs!
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Most depressingly, that very same bit was invoked on Oscars night, when Kimmel, during an ill-conceived fan questions segment, came to Farrell with a “we didn’t understand your accents in the movie lol” question. Farrell, the good sport that he is, said: “I’d like him to go on Youtube and check out SNL from last night and he’ll have a good idea,” with a smile. A shame to have arguably the most charismatic man in the room reduced to another stereotype-stretching gag, but you can’t win ‘em all.
Farrell was gracious, but don’t expect the people of Ireland to follow suit. Their hopes shattered, the papers will be decrying bitter disappointment in the days to come. We'll be back in 34 years, lads.
