Cork actor Cillian O'Sullivan talks about his role in new Sky Max thriller Then You Run, getting his Dublin accent right why he's only getting into his stride now
"That’s my dog, Neptune." I have just Zoom called Cillian O’Sullivan in New York only to be met with a screen saver of a large Doberman and not the rugged good looks of the 28-year-old Cork actor.
Turns out animal lover Cillian adopted Neptune in LA last year.
"I actually have a dog back home in Ireland called Cú Chulainn, but he wouldn’t travel well so I left him at home with the folks," explains the rising star who can currently be seen in new Sky Max thriller Then You Run.
"I would have considered it a betrayal to get another dog," he continues. "So, I got into fostering dogs, and I started fostering Neptune and ahhh, I have such an amazing relationship with him."
As if on cue, Neptune leaps up into view and gives O’Sullivan a quick slobber. Clearly this faithful hound is ready for his close-up and so is O’Sullivan.
You may have seen him pop up in BBC series 6Degrees, which followed six Irish university students as they move from youth to adulthood, his recurring role in US TV show The Blacklist, and appearances in Vikings, Bull, Chicago PD, and FBI’s Most Wanted. He also has a major part in Netflix drama series, In From the Cold.
However, even in a world where the creative industries are now called "content" and streaming has turned into an instant gratification merry-go-round of new must-see shows, Then You Run should bring O’Sullivan a bigger audience.
It’s an anarchic and frankly warped tale of four young London girls, Tara, Stink, Ruth and Nessie, whose dreams of the perfect end of school days holiday turns into a nightmare when they end up falling into the orbit of a bunch of very, very nasty drug dealers in Rotterdam.
O’Sullivan plays the seemingly innocent Orin O’Rourke, the estranged father of the highly intelligent and street-smart Tara (Limerick actress Leah McNamara). When she travels to Rotterdam to try to salvage their relationship, things start to go wrong almost immediately.
And when her mates join her, they go very, very wrong indeed.
However, asking O’Sullivan about playing Orin is tricky. Then You Run is the kind of twisty drama where one spoiler could unravel the whole increasingly unlikely and frankly bonkers plot. Let’s just say it’s a toxic and anarchic clash of young ones and wrong 'uns.
"You could say Orin is a very broken individual, but that just doesn’t do him justice . . . " says the very easy-going and affable O’Sullivan.
"Orin is someone, who on the surface, is very good at presenting a confident, charismatic individual, but underneath it all he’s hiding an absolute tornado of issues.
"For me when I’m coming into a character, I don’t really do well with words," he adds. "Orin is someone who has great shame in himself and his past but masks that with charisma and confidence.
"He has shame about his thoughts, who he is, who he wants to be and shame that his brother essentially takes care of him."
There is certainly a lot going on in Then You Run and the whole merry chase crackles with inky black humour. As well as those nasty drug thugs, led by Richard Coyle as Reagan, who just happens to be Orin’s brother, there is also the small matter of The Traveller.
He is a wickedly ingenious serial killer who has been prowling the lonely roadways, cinemas, and train networks of Europe for the past decade and somehow you just know he’s going to cross paths with poor Leah, Nessie, Stink and Ruth.
"I don’t know anybody else who is doing what Then You Run is doing," says O’Sullivan. "I am very behind this show, I really, really like it.
"I mean, I’ve done plenty of things that I would turn off after the first episode. I haven’t done anything like that in a long time, thankfully, but with Then You Run, I would watch the shit out of this show."
The cast also boasts Famke Janssen, who you may feel you haven’t seen in a long time. The chemistry between the four leads, played by McNamara, Vivian Oparah, Monet Prince and newcomer Isidora Fairhurst, fizzes and Richard Coyle as Reagan radiates menace every time he’s on screen.
And O’Sullivan and McNamara aren’t the only Irish actors in Then You Run. Frances Magee, who chewed the scenery and spat it back in our faces in KIN, plays a philosophical henchman in a long black coat, and Darren Cahill provides comic relief as Reagan’s idiot son.
"It was great to see such a strong Irish cast in such a high-level production coming out of the UK," says O’Sullivan. "There’s even another Cork man in it! How crazy is that?"
O’Sullivan was born in New York and moved back to Cork when he was a kid with his family, settling first in Mahon and then Ballinlough. He moved back to New York in 2018 and he says he did have to work on getting his Dublin accent right for Then You Run.
"Richard was doing a brilliant kind of neutrally Dublin accent, and I had to change mine," he says. "They weren’t too concerned about it, but Ireland will rip this show apart if one brother has an inexplicable Cork accent and the other is Dublin. I’ve only ever had one role when I’ve done my Cork accent.
"I lost a lot of my accent when I came to new York because I was working in restaurants, and nobody could understand me."
He adds, "For the audition for this show, I accidently started talking in an American accent, so I’ve definitely lost a lot of my Cork accent which I hate. I did ask Darren Cahill for advice on how to do a Dublin accent and I noticed inconsistencies, so I apologise to any Dublin actors watching."
He’s too modest. O’Sullivan has been a quietly successful jobbing actor since he moved back to New York. He’s just wrapped a new Marvel show and he is the lead in a new film which goes into production in Morocco next year.
But he’s auditioning all the time and waiting for the big breakthrough role to come along.
"I think any actor is waiting for the role that will make their career a lot more consistent and stable," he says.
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Listen to Alan Corr's preview of Then You Run
"At the same time, I’m only back in the game five years. Especially with living back in America, I have come to know a lot of really gifted actors who can’t even get an agent. I don’t know how it works. I was rejected by two different agencies before I got my agent here in America.
"To be fair, I never had connections, I never had a way in, I never had someone to recommend me to an agent. It’s not built to make it easy at all and even me getting to where I am now has had a lot to do with luck.
"Yeah, I work hard, and some might say I’m a good actor, but I’ve spent time in my career where I was really, really learning and I didn’t know how to act, and I was a plank of wood at best.
"You can’t always put it down to talent either. I am definitely a better actor than I was before .. . but you’re always waiting for a role to grow your name, to make it easy for you to get jobs. That’s part of the game. But I am positive. I do believe I will eventually get a job where my career will be easier."
Neptune will be pleased.
Alan Corr @CorrAlan2
All episodes of Then You Run are available on Sky Max.
