Phew, I knew I wasn\u2019t alone.<\/p>\n
In recent years, that little yelp of recognition has become commonplace, as actors and actresses from the Rebel County have excelled in the thespian world.<\/p>\n
I was watching a thrilling new drama last week when the finger-pointing happened again. And I have to report that there is a new name to add to the Cork acting canon.<\/p>\n
The series is called Young Sherlock and was released on Amazon Prime last month. It\u2019s easily the finest TV series I have seen so far this year.<\/p>\n
Not only that, but the Cork actor in it, D\u00f3nal Finn, steals the show from a host of other brilliant talents.<\/p>\n
If you hadn\u2019t heard his name before, I\u2019m positive it will be up in lights soon alongside the likes of Rebel luminaries Cillian Murphy, \u00c9anna Hardwicke, Fiona Shaw, and Sarah Greene.<\/p>\n
\n Young Sherlock is an eight-part mystery drama set in Victorian England, inspired by Andrew Lane\u2019s book series of that name, and produced and directed by Guy Ritchie – Madonna\u2019s ex.<\/p>\n
It reimagines the early life of Sherlock Holmes as he begins to cut his teeth in the world of crime-solving. Finn, 30, from North Cork, plays the future detective\u2019s arch-rival James Moriarty – but with a twist.<\/p>\n
When this series starts, Holmes and Moriarty become the best of friends when they meet at Oxford University, and solve crimes together using their combined genius.<\/p>\n
Finn\u2019s portrayal of Moriarty is superb – he plays him as a wildly unpredictable, outspoken, and impulsive Irish man, contrasting sharply with the well-to-do Englishness of the teenage Holmes.<\/p>\n
\n Young Sherlock is compelling, twisty, and great fun, and boasts a top-notch cast – including Colin Firth as the university boss and Joseph Fiennes as Sherlock\u2019s father. Max Irons, son of Sin\u00e9ad Cusack and Jeremy Irons, plays Sherlock\u2019s brother Mycroft, and Dubliner Simon Delaney plays a wizened old detective who wears a cape and deer-stalker (no prizes for guessing who that influences…)<\/p>\n
All of them are excellent, as is Hero Fiennes Tiffin – nephew of Joseph Fiennes – as Sherlock.<\/p>\n
But our own D\u00f3nal puts in a mesmerising performance that leaves the rest standing.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t just take my word for it.<\/p>\n
The reviewer of Young Sherlock for The Guardian said Moriarty \u201cblows the lead off the screen\u201d in a \u201cmagnificently assured turn from D\u00f3nal Finn\u201d. They later added: \u201cIt doesn\u2019t help that Fiennes Tiffin has been teamed with the explosively charismatic Finn, whose presence here reduces everyone within the blast zone to a smoking hillock of moustache.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n The Irish Times said the role of Moriarty was \u201cone of those parts where the villain truly gets the best lines,\u201d adding: \u201cDon\u2019t be surprised if Finn becomes Ireland\u2019s next acting superstar.\u201d<\/p>\n
Indeed, if there is any justice, Finn\u2019s charismatic portrayal of Moriarty should catapult him into the big time – just like it did for another Irish actor, Andrew Scott, who played the Victorian villain in the Sherlock series that starred Benedict Cumberbatch.<\/p>\n
There has long been a consensus that Arthur Conan Doyle – who had Irish blood himself – portrayed Moriarty as an Irish character, and there is even a theory that the author based him on UCC mathematician George Boole.<\/p>\n
While Scott played the character as a south Dubliner, Finn leaned on his own strong accent for the role in Young Sherlock.<\/p>\n
To my ears, some of his sentences sounded pure Roy Keane, but he actually told the Irish Times in an interview that he went a little further west for his Moriarty voice<\/p>\n
\u201cI had some people in my head that I think influenced me in developing what the character\u2019s voice is,\u201d he said. \u201cThey would be from the southwest.\u201d<\/p>\n
Specifically, Finn decided to channel the late Kerry actor and storyteller \u00c9amon Kelly for the role.<\/p>\n
\n \u201cHe was very old school and theatrical in a way. I wanted to harness some part of that story-telling quality. Moriarty is able to hold people\u2019s attention in such an amazing way, and that\u2019s how the seanchaithe worked as well. They were incredible storytellers.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
Finn grew up in Dromina, near Charleville, close to the Cork-Limerick border, one of eight children raised on a farm.<\/p>\n
He honed a long-held passion for drama and musical theatre, and performed in community halls around Cork, taking part in pantos in Fermoy, along with musicals in the Opera House.<\/p>\n
He told The Irish Times he was eternally grateful for the support his parents gave him to help him pursue his acting dream in the UK.<\/p>\n
\u201cI worked in a supermarket in Kanturk, which was the town I went to school in. I was there for a year,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of my friends had gone off to college in Cork, Limerick, and Dublin. That was a year of working and saving money to fly over and back for auditions at drama schools.\u201d<\/p>\n
He ended up becoming a student at Lamda, the London Academy of Music & Dramatic Art.<\/p>\n
Finn told the Irish Examiner in 2023: \u201cI think a goal of mine would be to repay my mother for every ounce of petrol that she ever put in the car to drive me to Mallow, Charleville, Cork, Kanturk. Pantos in Fermoy, musicals in the Opera House, drama lessons out in Ballincollig…<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I could go as far as to repay her for all the hours and the miles that she put in that Mitsubishi Space Wagon… I\u2019m eternally grateful to both my parents, for such wild and almost I would say daft support!\u201d<\/p>\n
Hopefully, that day won\u2019t be too far away as his career progresses.<\/p>\n
There is no word yet on a second season of Young Sherlock – although the fact it set a new record for the most watched Amazon Prime Series trailer in its first seven days in February is evidence it will happen, as well as the positive reviews.<\/p>\n
With seven additional books in the series, there is plenty of source material for the story to continue<\/p>\n
Finn\u2019s CV also includes a role in another Amazon Prime series – fantasy The Wheel Of Time – and in hit BBC drama SAS Rogue Heroes, made by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight. He appeared in Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets Of Dumbledore, The Witcher, and How To Build a Girl, and last year starred in a West End production, Hadestown.\n <\/p>\n
You can currently also see him in the cast of BBC period drama The Other Bennet Sister.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When you\u2019re watching a TV series or film, and hear the unmistakable Leeside burr, do you react like…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":381434,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[93,61,60,16841,282],"class_list":{"0":"post-381433","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-john-dolan","12":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=381433"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381433\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/381434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=381433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=381433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=381433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}