The Long and Shorrt of It - Pat and Faye Shortt - Best of Ireland

Two primetime RTÉ TV shows; scene-stealing cameos in Bodkin and The Young Offenders; a short film and a slew of feature-length ones coming up; a nationwide comedy tour with his daughter Faye that keeps on being extended; and prepping for a trip round Afghanistan and Iran with his biker buddies.

If anyone’s having a busier 2024 than Pat Shortt, we want to know what they’re taking!

Faye’s no slacker either with a film of her own, Sunken Place, in post-production and rave reviews for her recent co-hosting of the 2024 Ireland’s Young Filmmaker of the Year Awards, which took place in Limerick’s Troy Studios.

“It was sort of a full circle moment because the Young Filmmakers were sponsored by Bow Street: The National Screen Acting School of Ireland, which is where I studied,” Faye explains as we meet up in the Shortt’s Limerick HQ. “I loved my time at Bow Street which is based in Smithfield in Dublin. Some of its best-known graduates would be Barry Keoghan, Niamh Algar, Brian Gleeson and Jack Reynor.

“I’ve a friend, Peter Claffey, who got cast in the new The Lord Of The Rings series that HBO have coming out – there’s a massive buzz about it already. The acting coach there is Gerry Grennell who’s trained amazing people like Johnny Depp and Heath Ledger and my drama tutor, a Limerick gal called Jean Rooney, is in Bodkin which looks great from the trailers.”

Her Dad is equally enamoured of the acting school, which has helped transform Irish cinema.

“When I did Life’s A Breeze in 2013, which was Barry Keoghan’s first film, the casting reps and the director told me that some of the best prepared students they’d ever come across were from Bow Street and its predecessor, The Factory,” he notes. “Even at that early stage you could tell Barry he was going to be a massive star.” Housed in the former Dell factory, Troy Studios has well and truly put Limerick on the international filmmaking map with Foundation, Nightflyers, Battle At Big Rock, Smother and The Wayfinders among the major productions that have used its four state-of-the-art soundstages.

Sarah Greene, Daniel Radcliffe and Pat Shortt in The Cripple Of Inishmaan

“We shot four or five years of Kilnascully in there before it became Troy Studios,” Pat recalls. “We used to take over the canteen, which was 10,000 square feet alone, so we kind of gave them the idea.

“Ireland nowadays has amazing infrasctruture with studios all around the country, which goes back to when Michael D. Higgins was the Minister for Culture. He saw the potential and helped realise it by bringing back the Irish Film Board and putting the tax breaks in place that are attracting these big Hollywood players.”

Moving on to familial matters, when did Faye realise that Pat wasn’t – in every sense of the word – a normal dad?

“Seeing him dressed up in women’s tights and a padded bra set the ball rolling,” she laughs. “When the teachers at school asked the class, ‘What does your dad do?’ it’d usually be accountant or doctor or electrician. I was like, ‘I think he’s a clown.’ Everybody had the idea that he went to birthday parties with his face painted and did the balloons!

“I wasn’t overly fussed about Dad being on the TV and stuff until I was in secondary school and he appeared in the West End production of The Cripple Of Inishmaan with Daniel Ratcliffe. We were huge Harry Potter fans so that was very cool – and even cooler when it transferred to Broadway!”

Faye and Pat were on the same RTÉ Does Comic Relief show in 2020 as Paul Mescal. Again, was it obvious that he was a superstar-in-the-making?

“Oh, absolutely,” Pat nods. “Another example of that is the fella who’s doing everything at the moment, Andrew Scott. These guys are top of their game. I was with a pre-fame Aidan Turner the day he got Poldark and, jaysus, the amount of work he put in. Years ago, actors would swan in half-pissed not knowing their lines but that doesn’t cut it anymore.”

Having previously wowed the country with the largely sketch-based Well, Pat and Faye are currently out on the road with Knuckle Down, which is a very different type of comedy show.

“We have one small scene together but otherwise it’s us doing our characters and stand-up,” Pat explains. “This country has some amazing performance spaces. Cleere’s in Kilkenny was one of the first places to take the D’Unbelievables on. Vicar St. in Dublin has been a huge one for me down through the years, as has the Theatre Royal in Waterford. The Hawkswell in Sligo, The Glen in Cork and St. John’s Theatre in Listowel are great venues as well. Every parish seems to have somewhere now where you can put on a show.”

Faye, meanwhile, will forever remember the Teach Amergin in Waterville.

“I did my first stand-up there a while back which was terrifying,” she grimaces. “I went on thinking, ‘What if they don’t laugh?’ Which thankfully they did. I was like, ‘Okay, I can do both now.’

“The mad thing is I’d never planned on going into comedy or being in a show with my Dad. I had huge plans after drama college to go to London, but then Covid struck. Just for something to do we started writing sketches, which we performed in the garden and it grew from there.”

As they travel from county to county, does Pat find that the sense of humour differs?

“Yeah, it does,” he nods. “In the early days I’d have recognised a darker humour up around the border. When Jon Kenny and myself travelled up in the van to Carlow and Monaghan, you could always sense The Troubles even if they weren’t directly spoken about. That quirky, dark humour is still there now.

“There’s a general Irish kind of wacky humour, which people like the 2 Johnnies are doing very successfully at the moment. Tommy Tiernan does that as well but in a different style.”

When they’re touring, is it father or daughter who’s the more civilising influence?

Pat and Faye Shortt

“Me, I’m very civilised!” Faye shoots back. “There’s a touch of the old rocker in me, Stuart!” Pat admits. “I’ll be cracking a few beers backstage while she’s all about the Gen Z with her yoga.”

Asked who their comedy heroes are, Faye reveals that, “I’m obsessed with Caroline Aherne. I love all her old clips. If I achieve a quarter of what she achieved, I’ll be doing well. Of some of the younger comedians coming through, I really admire Justine Stafford.”

“I have to say that, for me, Dylan Moran is one of the finest comics ever – his delivery and everything is incredible,” Pat takes over. “Peter Foote, who writes The Young Offenders, is a talented fella too. That said, I was surprised how much the actor who plays Conor MacSweeney, Alex Murphy, improvises. A lot of the comedy comes from him. Dominic MacHale, AKA Sgt. Healy who my character bonds with, is a funny fecker as well. I really enjoyed doing that episode of The Young Offenders.”

Pat in The Young Offenders

Along with the fourth season of Pat Shortt’s Entertainment From D’Telly, he’s also teamed up with former Stockton’s Wing man Mike Hanrahan to bring us The Songs Of Ireland, a musical trip round the country which has just completed its first RTÉ One run with a second outing already being planned.

“It was a big one for me because it was me coming back to my music,” Pat enthuses. “As Mike says in the programme, he first knew me as a saxophone player back in ’86 doing a gig in the Belltable in Limerick. I sort of fell into comedy and the D’Unbelievables with Jon Kenny. I’ve been lucky enough to play with great people like Georgie Fame and have always had some sort of musical element in my shows. This was a real test for me because it was twenty songs in twenty counties in twenty days with young artists, the emphasis being on them rather than us. We were just the accompanists.”

Asked what his personal highlights from the series are, Pat says, “God, there are so many… I loved doing ‘The Limerick Rake’ with Willzee who’d I’d only seen clips of before. That was Day Two and the hairs were up on the back of our necks after his performance. He’s a member of the Traveller Community whose contribution to Irish music can’t be over emphasised. “Another person that blew me away was Winnie Ama in Belfast. She did ‘I’ll Tell Me Ma’, which is a schoolyard song in a totally new way. In between us contacting Winnie and her doing the piece, she went through the roof in England and ended up on the Glastonbury stage. She flew back specially to Belfast to do the show.

“There was another rap artist in Dublin, Asha Ari, who did ‘Raglan Road’. She knew the Luke Kelly version but not who Paddy Kavanagh was. She sang the first verse beautifully and then did a spoken word thing about her being half-Ghanian and how much Dublin and being black meant to her. It was extraordinary.”

While moving away could at various points have been beneficial to his career, Pat has remained loyal to his native Southwest and stayed in the region.

Mother Mac's

“I wouldn’t have said it years ago but Limerick is one of the best cities in the country,” he proffers. “There’s a huge amount of industry and tech companies which means there’s a bit of money floating around. With that comes a younger, multicultural crew which has made the nightlife better. Mother Mac’s is my go-to pub and I’d better mention Nancy Blake’s as well or Donal will be cross with me! The students bring a huge amount to the place as well.”

Nancy Blake's

The Treaty City’s abundant delights don’t end there.

“You’ve got the new International Rugby Experience which is really impressive; Dolan’s which is one of the best music venues in the country; its theatre equivalent, the Belltable; and the world class Hunt Museum,” Pat notes. Food-wise the Shortt family are extremely fond of La Cucina, a real deal Italian joint near their new home in Castletroy.

“The food and wine there are fabulous,” Faye confirms.

La Cucina

River Shannon

“We moved into Limerick fairly recently from Castleconnell, which is another fabulous spot,” Pat resumes. “You’ve an amazing bar, Bradshaw’s, which dates back to the 1700s and stretches of the Shannon you can fish and swim in.” “I’ve so many beautiful memories of being a kid down by the river or going through the little fairy fort by the bridge in the grounds of the Castle Oaks Hotel,” Faye chips in. “Those old style pubs are so hard to come by now but Castleconnell is full of them.”

Along with her yoga, Faye keeps fit by getting a dip in whenever she can.

“I’m a big sea swimmer so used to head out to Howth and Dun Laoghaire when I was living in Dublin, which I love, love, love,” she enthuses. “Now I’m back living at home, I go to Lahinch and Kilkee which is a big Limerick getaway.” Pat, meanwhile, has a recently acquired soft spot for West Waterford.

“I can’t recommend Paul Flynn’s Tannery restaurant in Dungarvan highly enough,” he says. “The food there is beautiful. There are also some amazing pubs on the square like Downey’s which has a picture of U2 standing outside of it. Their tour manager Dennis Sheehan, who’s from Dungarvan, passed a few years ago and they came down to pay their respects.”

Finally, what’s all this about Pat zooming around Afghanistan and Iran with his biker mates?

“I’ve a Harley and a few other bikes which I’ve toured all over the world on,” he enthuses. “Last year I was in Istanbul and all around there and before that in Finland and Sweden. The Silk Road’s going to be with a different bunch, but normally I drive with the Blue Knights who are serving police and retired police. We do a lot of charity work for kids and stuff like that, but mainly it’s just an excuse to get out there on the road!”