Like a Soldier getting over the War.
A fitter, happier Colin Farrell has left his wild years behind, come through rehab and recovery — and he’s still smiling after it all. Tara Brady catches up with Ireland’s one and only natural born movie star.
Tara Brady, 09 Mar 2010
There are smoke shops and churches on fire” laughs Colin Farrell as he gestures toward the city beyond the window of Dublin’s Merrion Hotel. “Anarchy can’t be far behind, huh?”
In a better world, we wouldn’t bother with other movie stars: we’d just interview Colin Farrell every day. This would not only make our editor happy, it would make life easier all round.
In an industry noted for glowering personal assistants and compulsory no-disclosure forms, he is, as a current flurry of tabloid headlines suggest, an eye-wateringly frank sort of fellow. A straight-shooter, he reveals small personal details that most folks in the public eye would drag you through the courts for even thinking. Can you imagine Tom Cruise revealing that in the run-up to the birth of his second child, he worried that he’d love both his children equally? Can you picture George Clooney talking through an addiction that caused white-knuckle cravings during early visits with his (admittedly) hypothetical son?
Hardly.
It’s not that Mr. Farrell isn’t media-savvy. Au contraire, he can charm the pants off the most gnarled and bitter journalists, to an extent that ensures their protective instincts kick in. In the past, however, his easygoing manner and the exquisite business of simply Being Colin Farrell, has left him open to gutter reportage. An early Fightin’ Irish write-up in Vanity Fair, you may recall, stopped just short of drawing leprechauns around the page.
For all the sniping, for all the kiss-and-tell scoops, for all the ex-girlfriends who have behaved in a less than gallant fashion, Colin Farrell gets the last laugh. Some of his contemporaries could point to better box-office receipts or superior films, but they don’t get sent up on Family Guy.
“I was actually like a cartoon for a while,” he shrugs. “So fair enough.”
This country may have produced character actors of the calibre of Brendan Gleeson and dishy blokes of the Robert Sheehan and Cillian Murphy variety, but only Colin has sailed into movie-stardom proper. Like Grace Kelly, who built a golden reputation from a handful of movies (and only four good ones) Colin Farrell doesn’t need to appear in Avatar for the movie-going public to know who he is. Despite his attachment to high-profile flops like Alexander or low-profile and criminally neglected films like The New World, Colin Farrell shines on.
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