What’s Next For Say Nothing Cast?
The nine-part Northern Ireland drama Say Nothing, based on Patrick Radden Keefe’s book, is a massive hit for Hulu’s streaming service.
“In setting, subject matter, and theme, the series stands refreshingly apart from most American programming . . . it is one of the year’s finest shows,” raved New Yorker magazine.
Vulture.com put it more simply: “Tell everyone about Say Nothing.”
So, what’s next for the show’s sprawling, impressive cast of Irish talent – most of whom are unfamiliar to American audiences until now?
Anthony Boyle – who plays the IRA operative Brendan Hughes in Say Nothing – has the most interesting, and probably most Irish, project on tap.
Boyle leads the cast for House of Guinness, a series about the famous brewing family written by Steven Knight, the creator of Peaky Blinders.
Currently planned as an eight-part series for Netflix, House of Guinness will explore the family’s history, and take the viewer on a journey of “the pint,” from the founding of the brewery in Dublin in 1759 to the billion-dollar global brand we know today.
Boyle, now playing John Wilkes Booth on Apple TV’s Manhunt, will star alongside English actor Louis Partridge as brothers Arthur and Edward Guinness, respectively. David Wilmot, Jack Gleeson, Niamh McCormack and Fionn O’Shea are also in the cast.
However, the undisputed breakout stars of Say Nothing are Belfast native Lola Petticrew and Dubliner Hazel Doupe, who played the IRA-linked sisters Dolours and Marian Price.
Doupe starred in the 2023 Thadeus O’Sullivan film Miracle Club, while Pettigrew turned heads alongside James Nesbitt in Bloodlands. She also played an Irish Traveler/boxer in Float Like a Butterfly after winning the 2019 Galway Fleadh New Talent Award.
Doupe, a regular performer at Dublin’s Abbey and Gate theatres, will appear in the movie Down to Business next.
Immortal Men
Netflix, meanwhile, can’t seem to get enough of the Irish – especially as imagined in the work of British writer and director Stephen Knight.
Best known for the stylish gangster series Peaky Blinders, Knight turned a bunch of Irish, English, Welsh, and Scottish baddies into captivating characters.
So why stop now?
Barry Keoghan – who recently earned raves in the critics’ darling film Bird – will star with Oscar winner Cillian Murphy in a Peaky Blinders’ movie called The Immortal Man, to be directed by Tom Harper and written by Knight.
Also, look for Barry Keoghan down the road in Crime 101, a movie based on the work of celebrated Irish American crime writer Don Winslow. Keoghan is also set to appear in a project called Hurry Up Tomorrow, based on the music of Abel Tesfaye, better known as The Weeknd. (Yes, that’s how it’s spelled.) But showbiz watchers might recall another Weeknd project from HBO starring Lily Rose-Depp called “The Idol” that received, um, tepid reviews.
The Abandons
The Netflix Irish theme reappears in a forthcoming Western drama starring Gillian Anderson and Len Headey.
Entitled The Abandons, this will be “a lavish new Netflix drama set in Oregon in the mid-eighteen-hundreds,” as a recent magazine profile of the X Files icon Anderson put it.
Anderson will play Constance Van Ness, described as a strong-willed matriarch who inherited a mining fortune. She wants to turn it into a family empire on the American frontier.
Enter Fiona Nolan, an Irish immigrant and mother of four who is simply trying to survive on the frontier. Nolan (Game of Thrones star Lena Headey) will cross paths with the Van Ness, and nastiness will presumably ensue.
So far, most of The Abandons’ drama has occurred behind the scenes, where show creator Kurt Sutter – best known for his sweeping biker epic Sons of Anarchy – has clashed with Netflix executives. There is no word yet on whether tensions will delay the film’s release, which is slated for late next year.
Jessie Buckley Is “The Bride!”
Jessie Buckley has two very different productions in the works.
There’s the star-studded The Bride!, written, directed, and produced by Maggie Gyllenhaal. The Oscar-nominated Buckley – born in Kerry – will star in this film inspired by Mary Shelly’s acclaimed 1818 novel and Hollywood’s broad array of Frankenstein flicks.
Christian Bale, Penelope Cruz, and Annette Bening are also billed to appear in the Fall 2025 movie, which is sure to generate lots of Academy Award buzz.
Buckley will also star alongside Mr. Gladiator – Kildare native Paul Mescal – in a film version of Hamnet, based on Northern Ireland writer Maggie O’Farrell’s best-selling historical novel.
Buckley plays the wife of William Shakespeare, while Mescal is the Great Bard himself.
This story explores the death of their child, Hamnet, which might make you think of a certain Danish prince.
For all of the history and emotion here, Hamnet finally proves the old saying that a great writer like Shakespeare must have been Irish.
At least in this movie, the writer and his wife are.
Until then, you’ll be able to catch Paul Mescal very much in the flesh. Beginning in February, he will star in a revival of Tennessee Williams’ epic play A Streetcar Named Desire at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Mescal will sweat shirtless and shout “Stella” at the top of his lungs alongside co-stars Patsy Ferran and Anjana Vasa during a five-week run.
Blue Road, Spacewoman, & BREXIT
Finally, a trio of powerful – and very diverse – Irish documentaries are worth looking out for.
Blue Road: The Edna O’Brien Story explores the life and times of the groundbreaking Irish novelist who (as some folks have suggested for two decades) should have gotten at least more consideration for a Nobel Prize.
Blue Road opens with this 1967 diary entry by O’Brien (read by Jessie Buckley): “Ah, the trees, how tortured they are. If anyone asks me about the Irish character, I say look at the trees. Maimed and stark and misshapen but ferociously tenacious.”
And that’s Edna O’Brien and Ireland for you.
Directed by Sinéad O’Shea and including fascinating interviews with O’Brien, it’s a reminder of what we lost when she died in July 2024 – and one more reminder to read and re-read her novels.
Blue Road will be released in Irish cinemas on January 31.
A Fragile Peace: Northern Ireland and Brexit is a compelling look at more recent history. Just when it seemed as if the Good Friday Agreement would usher in an era of stability in the North, the 21st Century encouraged England to leave the European Union. One of the enormous questions lost in emotion and rage that followed, was how this British exit would impact the North, from daily imports and exports to crucial details of the peace agreements. Written and directed by New York-based Rory Duffy, A Fragile Peace reminds us that we should always be careful whenever we believe history has reached an endpoint. More likely, BREXIT will cause a wildly unpredictable new chapter in Irish history.
Then there is Spacewoman, a look at the extraordinary accomplishments of Irish-American astronaut Eileen Collins, the first woman to pilot and command the space shuttle.
From small-town beginnings, Collins had a trailblazing career at NASA, culminating in four space shuttle missions. Through archival materials and informative interviews, Hannah Berryman’s documentary, based on Collins’ bestselling biography Through the Glass Ceiling to the Stars, raises profound personal and cosmic questions while showing us a whole new side to Eileen Collins, who turned 68 in November.
(Watch out for a shot of Irish America cover featuring Eileen, which made it into the film.)
If you are looking for some good reading to complement Spacewoman, grab a new book by Loren Grush called The Six: The Untold Story of America’s First Women Astronauts. It includes Kathryn Dwyer Sullivan, a New Jersey-born geologist and oceanographer who went on to become a NASA astronaut and fly Space Shuttle missions.
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