Tommy Tiernan Show review: Gabriel Byrne turns the tables and quizzes the host
Gabriel Byrne on the Tommy Tiernan Show
Acclaimed actor Gabriel Byrne has opened up about his career’s highs and lows as well as why he believes actors don’t have many friends with the same job.
Looking back at his rich filming career, Byrne told the Tommy Tiernan Show he could not have found success without also experiencing failure.
“I've learned more from failure than I ever learned from success,” he says.
“If I do a good film that’s a huge success, that's terrific. But if I look at a film that I did that's not successful, I learn much more. I've learned more from my mistakes, which is why I'm not afraid to admit them, than I ever had from anything that I would count as successful.”
He says he believes many people in the film industry are “addicted” to filmmaking, which he likens to being trapped in a lift with a stranger, and he thinks actors don’t have many friends with the same profession as a result.
“I've worked with some amazing, amazing actors from my time in the Riordans and Bracken. I’ve worked with some of the greatest actors in the world. And I have to say that I have very few actor friends. And I don't think that many actors have that many actor friends either.”
Byrne also spoke about the difference he perceives between men and women when it comes to speaking about emotions.
“I love talking to women because I think men don't have the permission, if you like, to reveal themselves emotionally to a great extent. Men are not encouraged to talk so much about their feelings.”
“I am a strange person, I’d be difficult to live with but I’d be ultimately harmless” 😂
— RTÉ One (@RTEOne) January 15, 2022
Gabriel Byrne turns the tables on @Tommedian and is asking the questions. #TommyTiernanShow pic.twitter.com/x6t8uEFUWi
The actor turned the tables during the interview after being asked by Tiernan if he considered himself strange: “Let me ask yourself, do you think you're a strange man?”
The host detailed how his upbringing and life experiences make him believe that yes, he is strange. The pair also quizzed each other on their public and private selves.
“There's a difference between me off stage and me on stage and it's not something that can be strictly defined or is a definite, fixed thing. It's moving all the time,” Tiernan says.
Later Tiernan was joined by money mentor Santis O’Garro, who detailed how she found herself in debt as a single mother but managed to pay it off.
After Tiernan described the rush he felt spending €250 on CDs he already owned earlier that day, she explained how she has found another outlet that replaced impulse shopping.
“I’ve transferred [the buzz of shopping] to nature,” says O’Garro, who was born in the Caribbean.
“I have a lot to live for, I have dreams. It’s really simple: it's not the car, it's not the furniture, it's not having a brand new kitchen. It's connection. When you peel all that back, that's exactly what I want.”
Finally, GAA legend Davy Fitz spoke to the comedian about his involvement in hurling since 1989 and why his focus now is spending more time with his family.
“My main focus now will be once the people around me are healthy, I really mean this. Sometimes we take this for granted. My uncle is living with me and he has Parkinson’s. He's not too bad now, he's tough out," Fitzgerald says.
“Once the people around you are happy and are healthy, like my mam and dad. I still get to play my cards every Thursday night, which I love. To be able to do that or to be able to do stuff with your mam and dad, to be ringing my dad every day - sometimes I would ring him and I don’t even know why I would be ringing him. I would ring him to hear his voice and chat. That's important to me to be able to do stuff like that.
“Maybe a number of years ago that wouldn't have come into my head. There are a lot more things in life than a hurling game. The hurling is pretty high up there but number one: family, life, time.”
