Irish actor Patrick Gibson, who's been winning rave notices for his star turn in the new Netflix sci-fi hit, The OA, has said he was "blown away" by the character when he was first auditioned for the role.
Gibson, who's best known for his role in Lenny Abrahamson's movie What Richard Did alongside Jack Reynor, plays one of the pivotal roles in the mystery series.
His character, Steve Winchell is the local bad boy who is befriended by Prairie Johnson, a girl who one day suddenly reappears having been missing for seven years. Oh and she's no longer blind and now calling herself 'The OA'.
The actor told RTÉ Entertainment that he was completely taken by the character of Steve, an aggressive but deeply wounded teenage bully.
"I was blown away. I don't think I've every become so obsessed with a character from literally just the sides and character breakdown. It was one of those rare occasions, where they don't write down that 'he's troubled' or 'misguided'. The character was there in the words which is really rare....So that really stood out to me", he said.
The show arrived without much fanfare last week, but has already attracted huge attention and has been favourably compared to this year's other breakout Netflix hit, Stranger Things.
Gibson says that he'd "never seen anything like that. The pace of it and everything is unusual - it really lends itself to Netflix."
The actor has won huge praise for his performance in the series and got the part after a very impressive audition in front of the show's creators Brit Marling and Zal Batmanglij.
“He had this notebook in his lap labelled ‘Steve Winchell,’” Marling recently revealed. “He opened it and showed me page after page of watercolour drawings he’d done, playlists for the kinds of music he would listen to as Steve. It was the kind of notebook that I would have made to prepare for a part I had gotten already—he had made it just to come audition."
Gibson has shrugged off the praise he's been receiving and says he's deliberately avoided keeping an eye on social media and online commentary.
"To be honest I haven't read anything online. I did google myself once and I was like 'I'm never doing that again, its so lame'. It's kind of strange".
"The strangest thing is seeing people is talking about the show. It was this world we lived in for six months and in its own way became a family and then actually seeing people talk about it...I didn't think people were actually going to see it", he laughed.
The talented 21 year-old says that a second series of The OA looks likely but in the meantime he's being kept busy.
Irish audiences will next see him starring alongside Idris Elba no less and Irish actress Denis Gough in Sky Atlantic’s Guerrilla, a new political drama from the Oscar-winning writer of 12 Years a Slave, John Ridley and there's also a period drama, The White Princess, on the way as well.
He's now back home in Ireland for Christmas and despite his growing success and fame across the Atlantic he says he'd jump at the chance to star in more feature films back here if the opportunity arises.
"I would absolutely love to work here as much as I can. It's the same with Jack [Reynor]. I know he said a while ago that he wants to stick around here and not forget where he's from.
The OA is available to stream now on Netflix.
