Ardal O'Hanlon

All my memories of 'Father Ted' are very pleasant.

We thought 'Father Ted' was destined to be obscure late-night Channel 4 fodder and then it works and you don't really know why.

I'm as crippled with doubt as the next actor.

I am going through a Neil Young phase. I also listen to a lot of alternative country, a band called Smog and Bonnie Prince Billy, which is very dark and twisted.

I read one of the funniest books last week by Don DeLillo. He wrote this book, 'Amazons' many years ago, under the pseudonym Cleo Birdwell. The book is very funny but I also think it's funny that he denies any involvement with it.

I visit a lot of art galleries. I live in Dublin and there's a very good gallery called the Kevin Kavanagh gallery.

I think making a documentary gets you out and about more, with people. With stand-up, you're talking at people. With documentaries you're talking with people, and you're listening a lot more.

I think Irish people pride themselves on being at the forefront of technological industries, things like the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, all those hi-tech industries, we're always there or thereabouts.

I think there is a very strong sense of Irish identity, and I think partly that's to do with the fact that we have evolved differently from Britain and other countries in Europe.

I suppose British people generally, probably have very stereotypical notions about the Irish that go back to Victorian times.

From day one working in TV, I have been very conscious of the way the Irish are represented, In every show I've been involved in I read the script, take out the Irishisms right away and say, 'I'll supply those'.

I was quite young when my dad went into politics but, as it went on, I became self-conscious about it.

There are lots of channels and lots of companies looking for content, as they say, but it's quite difficult to get things off the ground.

I have other careers in terms of stand-up, stage acting and writing, so I don't feel too hidebound by that, but I do quite like playing those warm roles.

I listen to WTF with Marc Maron, although I'm getting annoyed with him, he's a bit too intrusive and fawning. But he's done some great interviews in the past, like with David Simon, the writer of The Wire, and Bruce Springsteen. He gets fantastic guests. I just wish he let them talk more.

The beauty of stand-up is that it's very flexible, it's very malleable and immediate. Whatever is in your head that day you can verbalise in some way that night. It's the medium that suits me best.

I was able to tour successfully and attract a fairly wide audience, but it was hard to assert myself as a stand-up because people were more familiar with me as a TV character.

I couldn't make a living as a comic in Ireland and I was watching my friends from college getting good jobs, buying houses, and I had to really take stock and say: am I going to go for this comedy thing, or what?

When we left university, in the late '80s, one of the guys had been to the Comedy Store in London, came back very excited and suggested we set up something like it. And so we did.

Carrickmacross always had a border mentality. Smuggling would have been a big thing there in the past; there would have been spillover from the Troubles in Northern Ireland.

My father was driven, active and always busy. We didn't see that much of him, although he never went far away or stayed overnight anywhere.

As a comic, you are trying to please people in some way - to make them laugh.

We didn't have an awful lot of space. There were six of us born within the space of seven or eight years - I was third. I remember sharing a room with one or other of my brothers - at one point we had three single beds in one room.

Mum was a teacher before I was born, but never worked after she had kids. She was too busy looking after us and making kedgeree.

I get up every morning the same as everyone else, and scratch my head and just get on with the job. Whatever that job may be.

In terms of being typecast, if you do something like Father Ted that infiltrates the public's imagination to the extent that it did, I think realistically you're not going to be asked to do something radically different from that very often. But it's not a problem.

Getting up in front of the toughest crowds, you know, playing pubs in South Armagh - where people didn't necessarily even know what stand-up comedy was - you had to force yourself to do it. It went against every instinct in your body, but you did it anyway.

When I was growing up, you never knew whether people were being serious or not. There was a lot of nodding and winking.

My mother tells me I regaled people with stories but I don't remember that. And she disputes the idea that I might be chronically shy. She says I was the most outgoing of all of us.

People love authenticity in comedy and, coming from a region, you get a very strong sense of place. They can place you straight away, so they can relax.

It's quite telling that the really big comedians - like John Bishop from Liverpool, Kevin Bridges from Glasgow, Peter Kay from Bolton - stand out with their strong regional accents.

Father Ted' was written by Irish people, so that was fine, but around the time we were shooting it 'EastEnders' went to Ireland and represented it as this terribly backward society where people were going around with one eye and drunk.

When you grow up in a border area of Ireland, people are very wary and cagy and keep their head down at all times. Don't speak unless it's absolutely essential, and don't give anything away.

Banter is a great way of breaking the ice.

There is something restless and curious about the Irish. Like everybody else, we want to make money and make our way in the world but it's not the be all and end all. We also want to have fun, we want to make friends, make connections, share stories.

Irish people are still very prickly about Catholic Church. Despite all the scandals and cover-ups that have rocked the church, you can only push it so far.

While I try to retain the slightly odd perspective and some of the innocence, it's really liberating to be able to talk/rant about all the stuff that bothers me.

The English, being the most practical people in the world, came up with parliamentary democracy and codified football and Cadbury's Creme Egg. And yet they voted for Brexit.

They were always my favourite scenes working with Don Warrington. He's such a brilliant actor, he has such a presence, you don't have to act with him you just react you know he's so good.

I think a certain amount of depression is sort of a normal state of mind to have. Deep depression is another story - and I wouldn't say I've been quite there, but you know I have been quite down at times, I have not wanted to leave the house for days on end.

I think my first girlfriend and I hardly spoke to each other in the year we were going out. In fact we never even spoke to each other to formally break it off. For all I know she still thinks we're together. Maybe in a parallel universe we're very happy.

I remember my first ever gig in town, I was very nervous. I had a big red shiny face. But that all disappeared after 30 seconds and I settled down and got a great lift from that.

My father was a typical Irish father. He was a nice, hard working, driven guy. His politics were very conservative and I was just a very different kind of kid to that. I was very shy and bookish.

I had a thirst for knowledge. I was always curious about stuff.

Even when we had new clothes, we were told not to wear them. You just didn't draw attention to yourself. Showing off was the worst thing you could do. We could put the clothes in the drawers - but not wear them.

I was genuinely shocked to even be in the frame for a sitcom role on British TV.

I think I was always this weird, watchful kind of kid, and there was an awful lot of coming and going in my house as a result of my father being a doctor and then, later, a politician... We'd literally be having to get through the window some days because we couldn't get in the door.

I have a certain sympathy with politicians having lived with one. I've seen how no matter how earnest or driven or energetic they are, it's still difficult to change things. I have been encouraged to go into politics, but I don't think I could make a contribution, it suits me better to be sniping from the sidelines.

To be honest I would like to do more movies, I've been a victim of my own success in that sense, as if you have a TV character that really endures, it's really hard to get into film.

Fundamentally, I was a very shy and quiet person growing up, so it was just really difficult getting up on a stage. It was a perverse career choice really.