Brendan Gleeson has revealed how he nearly lost out on his breakthrough role in Mel Gibson's historical epic Braveheart.
The Oscar-nominated, Emmy Award-winning star of In Bruges, the Harry Potter movies, and The Banshees of Inisherin played highlands bruiser Hamish in the 1995 movie, which was one of the biggest film productions ever mounted in Ireland.
Appearing on Second Captains Saturday on RTÉ Radio 1, he recalled how Gibson offered him the part after he saw Gleeson appearing in Juno and The Paycock in Dublin’s Gaiety Theatre.
"And then I nearly lost the part," the Dublin actor said. "We had a run-through of Juno first in Dublin and then we were supposed to go to Chicago and Mel said, `do you think you can still do Braveheart and I said, `I might, yeah.’
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"He rang the theatre and told them but I said, `I have two weeks to go here and they won’t let me go . . . ' and I thought, I could just go anyway and do the movie but that would be a really dumb thing to do and also really unethical in my hometown, I’d never work again.
"So, I lost the part in Braveheart but then they decided to switch some things around and I got to do it in the end."
69-year-old Gleeson appeared on Second Captains Saturday to compete for the show’s unofficial award for Non-Sportsperson’s Sportsperson 2024.
Actor Michael Sheen, Conan O’Brien, Aisling Bea and Radie Peat of Lankum have previously taken part in the competition, with Sheen emerging as the winner last year.
Discussing his life as a sports fan, Gleeson said he was an early Aston Villa supporter.
"I had a bit of a history with Villa because I started when I was 14, I’d picked Villa out of an FA Cup draw, they had all this cool gear, they had all these little stripes so I thought I’ll jump in with those.
"They became my team and then the following season they were relegated so when ‘94 came around and we did win silverware, I did kinda lose the run of myself."
Gleeson also spoke about supporting the Dublin football team and said they were a big part of his childhood. "My brother Barry ended up playing with Parnells and he was a big Gaelic fan and he brought me to Croker, I think around 1958.
A massive thank you to Brendan Gleeson for one of our favourite-ever conversations on Second Captains Saturday 🏆
— Second Captains (@SecondCaptains) July 20, 2024
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"That was what I was brought up with but in primary school there was a fantastic Chistian Brother there who took me in different directions. He had a choir which I really loved singing in harmony with and he’d put on concerts and that took me away from the football, it was in the background, I may have played with the juniors but I wasn’t really all that fussed."
Gleeson was working as a teacher and appearing in Roddy Doyle and Paul Mercer plays with Passion Machine before he broke into acting and he discussed one of his most beloved recent roles as hot-headed prison cook Knuckles McGinty in Paddington 2.
"When I first heard about the role, I thought I like the sound of this," he said. "Then I read the script and thought this is kind of funny and then I watched the first one, which I hadn’t seen, and I thought this is brilliant, these guys are absolutely brilliant. Knuckles for me was great craic."
