Rerhaps one of the most double-edged compliments that can be paid to an actor or comedian is that they are “generous” on stage.
If you are one of those rare reservoirs of positive karma who merit this description, you can be sure that everyone will be delighted to work with you. Maybe even a little too delighted.
It’s great that you have the respect of your peers. It’s maybe not so great that some of their delight comes from their belief that you are not going to outshine them.
Such is the burden not just carried by Tara Flynn, but worn proudly as a badge of integrity. Not that she’s one to follow the obvious route. In fact, often she seems determined to take the Road Less Travelled.
She first achieved prominence with The Nualas, the female cabaret trio who lit up the Irish comedy scene with cheery, cheap sparkle and beautifully executed musical pastiche in the late ‘90s.
Two of the Nualas were always Anne Gildea and Susan Collins. Being the third Nuala became not unlike taking up the drumsticks with Spinal Tap. To the best of my knowledge, no third Nuala ever actually exploded onstage. But I daresay it was a close run thing from time to time. Tara was the original third Nuala and was an integral part of that phenomenon from the word go.
“We were at a party,” explains Flynn, “and there was a guitar. We just started messing round in the kitchen. Being gals, we followed through. Anne was the very pro-active one and she booked a [Comedy] Cellar date for us, which meant we had to write enough songs to do an open spot there in the summer of ’95. It all happened very fast from there on. Within weeks we were supporting the likes of The Hairy Bowsies and playing in The Baggot Inn.”
The logic behind playing The Baggot Inn was the Nualas’ desire to make the music, which was their mainstay, as technically good as possible.
To that end, they decided to play in The Baggot Inn, almost deliberately setting themselves up to be mistaken for a serious music act. They wanted to see if anyone noticed it was funny. They did.
One of the punters who saw them in The Baggot turned out to be a Scottish restaurant owner who was so convinced of the girls’ potential that he helped them take their act to the Edinburgh Fringe. The benefactor paid for their flights and fed them while they were over there.
Their luck and/or timing was still in when they badgered Gilded Balloon owner Karen Koren into giving them a spot at the notorious but coveted “Late & Live” gig. “Late & Live” is a famous fixture at the Edinburgh Fringe, where even well-established acts are routinely mauled by a capricious, tired and emotional late night Edinburgh mob.
Flynn recalls the intense pressure and how the girls coached each other through unbelievable nerves, knowing this was potentially a big break or a big way in which to get broken. “We got an encore, which is almost unheard of. And all the big comedy heads were there to see it,” she recalls.
The Nualas were gigging like crazy and there seemed to be television opportunities and all of that not far off. Then the drummer gently but firmly exploded – Flynn and the Nualas parted company.
“It was all going too fast,” she remembers. “The Nualas was a full time job. We were gigging a lot but not for any great financial reward.”
She stood back from it all and didn’t like what she saw. Months earlier she had been pursuing her first love, acting. She had moved from her native Kinsale to Dublin in 1990 specifically so to do. Now one joke at a party had led to another in a surreal spiral and, all of a sudden, she wasn’t enjoying herself.
“I couldn’t keep up. I had no comedy ambition at the time and I wanted to concentrate on my acting,” she says.
For someone set on an acting career, Tara has notched up some serious comedy mileage, with television appearances on Stew, The Panel, X-it Files (as showbiz correspondent ‘Gayle Ryder’). On stage, she has appeared in Edinburgh and Dublin runs of Tis A Pity She’s Anonymous, with Deirdre O’Kane.
Her recent theatre work includes I Do Not Like Thee Doctor Fell in The Abbey. She also played ‘Surfia’ in the original production of I Keano at The Olympia
Patently sincere and serious about her work, Flynn seems ideally equipped for success. She is ambitious but wants to reach the top on her own terms, with work that she considers to be of quality and depth. More than most in the business, she is eager to learn and is not afraid to take chances.
Although Tara has been a core member of The Dublin Comedy Improv since 1999, only in the last couple of years has she seriously begun tackling the challenge of stand-up comedy. She used her slot at this year’s Cat Laughs Festival in Kilkenny, the highest profile gig in Ireland, to do what she thought someone with her level of experience should be doing, which was trying out new stuff.
“I’m not afraid to go down in flames to achieve my own artistic goals,” she explains. “For example, I did 15 new minutes in my set in Kilkenny this year. What I do isn’t showy. I am ambitious, but with qualifications. I won’t do a character that mugs at the audience and swears a lot”.
She’s dismayed by the often lurid tendencies of female stand-ups, especially in the UK. “’Fanny’ is funny? Can we get over it please? Referring to thrush as ‘fizzy fanny’ gets a huge laugh. I could go there. But I’m not. I’m going for long walks by the sea.”
Tara Flynn is vastly talented. She can write, she is a fine singer and actor and a great comedy improviser. But it’s fair to say she has yet to come to general notice in a big way. Perhaps this is partly because of the lack of an easy pigeonhole to put a polymath into?
“I’m aware of the possible danger of a jack-of-all-trades handle. Acting is my first love, but I want to work, so I will go where the work is. That’s why I was drawn back to the comedy improv – though part of it is that once you are bitten by the comedy bug you can never really leave”.
At 36, she feels her career is just beginning. “A lot of people play younger, but I’m proud of my age. I earned every minute of it and nothing’s come easy. I’m hungry and fearless!”
And very bloody good.