Fringe Factions: The Irish

The Rubberbandits and Mary Bourke talk about Irish comedy and the ghost of Father Ted

Feature by Bernard O'Leary | 01 Aug 2012

“James Joyce was a gas cunt. You should read his letters to Nora Barnacle, they’re all about farting.”

Blind Boy from The Rubberbandits, currently Ireland’s most popular comedy act, is tracing the roots of Irish humour. “The language of comedy is universal, jenowatimean? The assumption is that what we do is very parochial but if you look at it with a critical eye you see it’s not. Our jokes aren’t about Limerick or about Ireland, they’re about wherever you’re from.”

Mary Bourke, meanwhile, is staying true to her Irish roots at the Fringe. “I’m not doing a traditional Fringe show; there’s no narrative arc, no singing, no obligatory sad bit at 27 minutes. It’s just jokes. You couldn’t do that kind of Fringe show to an Irish audience, Irish people are more cynical and they can feel it coming. They hate the contrivance more than anything. If you did the obligatory sad bit for an Irish audience, they’d look at you and think, ‘what the fuck?’”

I ask both of them about Father Ted, which was Irish comedy’s 9/11 (in a good way). Mary sighs. “Let it go, let it go. It still gets mentioned all the time. We’re like some guy who’s still banging on about some girl he used to go out with.”

Blind Boy, who was 7 when Ted first aired, is more awed. “Father Ted was perfection. It’s not that Irish comedians can’t escape Father Ted, but Irish comedians can’t escape the Catholic thing. No matter how hard you try it’s always there because you’re indoctrinated at such a young age. But I think that helps cause one thing Irish comedians are really good at is surrealism. If you grow up with the belief that your bread is haunted, of course you’re going to have surreal thoughts.”

The Rubberbandits, Gilded Balloon, 8-26 Aug, 10.30pm, £14/£12 Mary Bourke: Hail Mary!, The Stand, 1-26 Aug (not 2 or 13), 4.40pm/7.30pm, £8/£7