Eleanor Tiernan: Filming Holding, and hanging out with Oscar winners in West Cork

Eleanor Tiernan and Star Yang on the set of Holding, filmed in West Cork

“Would you like to come to West Cork for the summer to film a TV show with some of your all time comedy heroes?” they said. 

It isn’t something you expect to get asked a lot but it happened to me last summer. I was thrilled. 

A project with Graham Norton, Conleth Hill, Siobhan McSweeney, Charlene McKenna, Helen Behan and Pauline McGlynn among others and of course the Best Actress at Cannes Film Festival, Kathy Burke! It seemed like it had leapt into my lap, straight from my imagination.

After being cast in the role of indecisive school principal Susan Hickey in Holding, which was being filmed for ITV last July, I made my way to Skibbereen in West Cork where the production team had set up. All communications up to that point had been done via my agent so I really felt I was stepping into the unknown. Was it even real? I wondered. I couldn’t have dreamt it, could I? 

Dawn, the production manager, put paid to that. A busy schedule of costume, fittings, makeup, intimacy coaching sessions and accent work dispelled any notion that there was something unreal about this. The job was well underway. By Friday evening I was having pints in the street with the rest of the cast but with a different colour hair than when I started.

And so it began. Filming by day but the evenings were our own. Staying in a small town with the other actors, the summer took on a sort of holiday camp vibe. We swam in the sea most evenings and ate al fresco (as was within the restrictions at the time). When it got cool enough, about 8pm, I sometimes went for a run out past the famous Skibbereen rowing club and back in. 

If there are any users of the exercise app Strava in West Cork, I created a segment along my running route that others can follow. It’s named after the character I played in the show - the Susan Hickey loop runs along the river Ilen and it’s a treat to get a notification that anyone’s run along it.

We did actually do some work from time to time which saw us setting up camp, bleary-eyed from the early morning start, in locations across the region like Drimoleague, Leap and Castletownshend. 

Locals tried to get on with their business but it's hard when you have a force of nature like Pauline McGlynn in your midst. The woman is adored wherever she goes in Ireland. It’s a delight to see a person who has the power to make someone’s day do so over and over again.

Eleanor Tiernan and Amy Conroy, co-stars in the ITV drama series

The production wasn’t good news to everybody though. Most of the scenes were shot indoors but others on the street for which traffic arrangements had to be made. If it’s any consolation to the drivers of West Cork who sat in queues on sweaty Friday evenings waiting for our director to shout "Cut!" I can only apologise for my part in the delays. I did definitely try to get my lines right first time so your inconvenience was minimised but there were definitely a couple of lost minutes that were on me.

There was a week in the middle though where things went from the sublime to the ridiculous. I was in the makeup chair being made presentable for my scene when who should I see in the chair next to me but only bloody Irish acting legend Brenda Fricker. 

She was very much a lead in our production but I had no scenes with her so it was a surprise to cross paths. And there the tiny lady was, scanning the script for that day's shoot. I hadn’t ever seen anyone who has won an Oscar before then. I could have said something like “I’m a fan!” but I kept my distance and let her get on with learning her lines.

That was more than enough excitement for one week until later when I was in the bar of the West Cork Hotel in Skibbereen. I had gone for a trip to Lough Hyne with some of the rest of the cast for an evening jaunt. The rest slipped up to their rooms after to de-beach themselves and suddenly I was alone when a gentleman started speaking to me. 

His crisp pronunciation and stature had a familiar ring to it. “I have an awful fear I might be talking to someone famous but who the hell is it?” I wondered. Of course, if you are with somebody famous and you don’t know who they are, then the worst thing you can do is ask them as they’ll start to question their worth in the world. It was all I could do to continue the conversation and wait for the rest of the cast to return to the bar when they could confirm my suspicions. And I was right. 

Turns out the man I was speaking to was none other than UK actor but more recently Cork-based, Jeremy Irons the 1991 Best Actor winner for Reversal of Fortune. He joined us for a while that evening while we basked in the star power he lent to our group.

Two Oscar winners in one week seemed like too much to ask for anyone. Would you believe me when I tell you that I did actually meet a third one? When I used some of the downtime between day's shooting to visit Dingle and I met another. 

I was with a pal in the street having lunch when his friend Glen Hansard joined us for a bit. His song Falling Slowly of course won the Best Song award. I was there and peripheral to the conversation for a good half hour before the penny dropped and exclaiming to all present “Oh My God Glen, you’re the third Oscar winner I’ve met this week”. Cool as a breeze he replied “Ah sure they give them out to anyone these days”.

Working in entertainment means you can be on top of the world one minute and back of the queue the next. The lesson learned is not to expect anything to last but to make the most of the chances when you get them.