Latest news with #MarianKeyes
Irish Times
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
Marian Keyes on casting The Walsh Sisters: ‘The big worry was who is playing Luke Costello?'
When Marian Keyes first visited the set of The Walsh Sisters, the upcoming RTE drama series based on her books, seeing the cast in action she says, was like watching her characters emerge straight off the page and into real life. 'They weren't even being filmed at the time, but all five of them [the sisters] were talking together and they were just this ball of chat…it was like they'd walked out of my head, they looked exactly like how I imagined them,' she says. The new six-part drama series, which will be on our screens this autumn, is based on characters from five of Keyes' novels, including Rachel's Holiday and Anybody Out There. Set in Dublin, it follows the lives of Anna, Rachel, Maggie, Claire and Helen as they navigate relationships, heartache, addiction and parenthood. Louisa Harland (Derry Girls), Stephanie Preissner (Can't Cope, Won't Cope) and rising talent Caroline Menton (Oddity), are just some of the names headlining the cast. READ MORE Although the casting of the five sisters was important to get right, it was the casting of Luke Costello, Rachel's complicated love interest, which Keyes says was really crucial. 'It was the big worry as far as everyone was concerned,' she says. 'I was getting literal letters, threatening letters, saying: 'Who is playing Luke Costello',' she laughs. In the end, the role was given to an actor from Dublin called Jay Duffy. He's the son of former Boyzone member, Keith Duffy. Of his casting, Keyes says: ' It was the only bit of casting that I felt that I could kind of get down on my knees and plead about. So I mean, I did go to them and say: 'don't f**k this up', because it just mattered to too many people.' The highly anticipated Walsh Sisters isn't the only TV adaptation in the works for Keyes. Her 2021 novel Grownups is currently being adapted for Netflix, with filming on the project due to begin later this year. Screenwriter and producer Samantha Strauss, the woman behind Apple Cider Vinegar and Nine Perfect strangers, has been tasked with bringing the novel to life. Other than the fact that it is being filmed in Ireland, Keyes says she can't share much else, especially not about the casting. 'I'll get into too much trouble,' she adds. You can listen back to this conversation with Marian Keyes, recorded live from Kildare Village in the player above, or wherever you get your podcasts. This episode was recorded as part of The Women's Podcast Live Book Club summer reads event. You can check out the full list of summer reading recommendations from the event here.
Irish Times
05-06-2025
- Politics
- Irish Times
Almost 400 Irish writers sign statement calling for immediate ceasefire in Israel-Palestine conflict
Almost 400 writers in Ireland have signed an Irish PEN/PEN na hÉireann statement calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Israel-Palestine conflict , the release of all hostages and the protection of the lives and human rights of writers, journalists and all innocent people affected by the ongoing conflict. Since October 7th, 2023, at least 181 journalists, 120 academics and 23 writers have been killed. According to PEN International, this has now been the deadliest war for writers since the second World War. Signatories include well-known figures such as Roddy Doyle , Marian Keyes , Colum McCann , Donal Ryan , Lisa McInerney , Kevin Barry , Mary Costello , Paul Lynch , Sinéad Gleeson , Jan Carson, Glenn Patterson, Paula Meehan, Carlo Gébler, Theo Dorgan and Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin among a total of 388 writers. More than 50,000 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the conflict. READ MORE Arundhati Roy stated in last year's PEN Pinter Prize speech: 'Not all the power and money, not all the weapons and propaganda on earth, can any longer hide the wound that is Palestine. The wound through which the whole world, including Israel, bleeds.' The PEN community has repeatedly called for an 'immediate end of all hostilities, the protection of civilians, and a just resolution to the conflict', and urged the United Nations and its member states 'to take all necessary steps to broker an immediate ceasefire'. 'Together with colleagues from across the globe,' the letter went on, 'Irish PEN/PEN na hÉireann calls for an immediate ceasefire, the release of all hostages, and the protection of lives and human rights of writers, journalists, and all innocent people affected by the ongoing conflict in Palestine.' It quotes Amnesty International , which has stated: 'Israel must immediately end its devastating siege on the occupied Gaza Strip which constitutes a genocidal act, a blatant form of unlawful collective punishment, and the war crime of using starvation of civilians as a method of warfare.' The letter pledged that alongside amplifying the voices of writers of Palestine , 'we must also do all we can to help bring an end to the unimaginably difficult situation they are facing on the ground daily'. [ 'So much gratitude in West Bank for Irish solidarity': How Nobel Prize-winners are raising Palestinians' plight Opens in new window ] 'As in the PEN Charter, literature knows no frontiers and must remain common currency among people in spite of political or international upheavals; PEN stands for the principle of unhampered transmission of thought within each nation and between all nations, and members pledge themselves to oppose any form of suppression of freedom of expression, condemning any racist, antisemitic, or Islamophobic commentary that has been used in relation to the conflict. 'We stand in solidarity with Palestinian, Jewish, and Israeli people who are opposing the genocide perpetuated by the current Israeli government. 'We ask that the international law, including international humanitarian law and international human rights law, be respected at all times. And we ask all nations to join our call for the immediate distribution of food and medical aid in Gaza by the UN and an immediate ceasefire guaranteeing safety for all Palestinians, Israeli hostages, and Palestinians arbitrarily held in Israeli jails.'
The Age
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
Good food, good craic as bestselling author Marian Keyes gets real
'I never saw any reason to hide it. I kind of thought, well, I was a 30-year-old woman and I was educated and I was middle class and all of those things,' she says. 'So if it could happen to me, it was probably happening to an awful lot of other people and if it's not been spoken about, nobody can get help.' After Keyes came out of rehab, she wrote her first novel, Watermelon. She has stayed sober and written books – all bestsellers – ever since. Life seemed good but, in 2009, completely out of the blue, the author experienced the onset of a debilitating four-year depression during which she barely got out of bed and suffered ongoing suicidal tendencies. It eventually lifted, which she attributes to time and the support of her loved ones. And hormone replacement therapy! Nothing is off the table at a Marian Keyes lunch. I asked her if she thought it was a great comfort to readers going through tough times to read about someone similarly afflicted and know they're not alone. She agreed. 'Every single one of us on earth, we think that bad things only happen to other people. It's a survival technique – but sooner or later, the terrible thing happens to us,' she says. 'You know, the spotlight of doom is above our head. There's such an endless list of awful ways for your life to be unbended. But most things are survivable; you can, you will be happy again. You can be happy again, in a different way. We can never go back to the person we were before the terrible thing. Back to your old self isn't really possible in big trauma, I think, but you're still there.' One of the things Keyes discovered, after the darkness had lifted, was her capacity for resilience. 'We only really discover the resilience when it's required, but we're given it at terrible times or difficult times, I think. Whatever loss there is, that kind of muscle of resilience is still available to us, maybe in a different form. We are stronger than we know, but it doesn't mean it's going to be pleasant. Feeling resilient doesn't mean that you're feeling good. No, in the storm, it means you're surviving.' Keyes is prolific on social media; her Instagram feed is a riot and includes candid photos of her family: mother ('Old Vumman'), four siblings and several nieces and nephews. They are a close family. Keyes and her husband Tony Baines ('Himself') have been married for 29 years. Earlier this year, she spoke about their inability to have children, saying she was at peace with it. 'We're fine now, you know, we're grand,' she said. 'I also felt like ... I'd been given so much by the universe, like I was given the ability to stop drinking alcoholically, and then I met this lovely man who was really, really nice to me, and then I got a job doing something that I was able to do when people were willing to kind of pay me for it. And I just think I thought, like nobody gets everything. 'But I feel like some kind of grace was afforded to me and my husband and we were just able to go, 'Let's focus on what we have rather than what we haven't.' You get what you get, and this is what I've got. And I'm absolutely grateful for my life.' We've been talking so much that we've hardly touched the food, which is light and delicious. The sun is refusing to come out. But I'm so engrossed in our conversation, which ranges from mental illness to lip liner, I stop noticing. Keyes revealed that she has become addicted to online personality quizzes – in particular, about the diagnosis du jour, ADHD. And after watching Andrew Scott in Ripley, she did several quizzes titled, 'Am I a psychopath?' (The answer was no.) 'I am very much self-diagnosed as (someone with ADHD). I've met a lovely woman who says she will diagnose it with a test. And I'm so scattered that I haven't got it together to go and do it – the proof is already there. I don't even need to do the test. If I'm too scatty to actually get it together to do it I should already be getting my green tick.' I asked her about My Favourite Mistake, which features a 48-year-old woman called Anna Walsh. At the start of the story, she jettisons her relationship, her job and her entire life in New York to go back to Ireland, without a plan of action. We discussed the phenomenon of older women increasingly deciding to upend their lives to run away and experience life on their own terms. When Keyes turned 60, she didn't run away but blocked out a year to pause her writing and go back to university to study design. 'The older I get, the more I realise that you can start again at any stage,' she says. 'Last year, I took a year off and I went back to college, just to do something that I had always wanted to do. And I think with better health care and longer life expectancy, women are far more vocal about what they expect from their lives than they used to be. 'I do think burnout is very real. Anna doesn't have children, but I often see it when the children are grown, the children have gone to university, that's it, and women are deciding, this is my time and I'm going to do all the things that I wanted to do when I was told I had to be doing other things. And I love it.' Lunch passed in a rush and Keyes' minder arrived to whisk her away. I stepped outside, suffused with the contentment you feel after a meal of good food and great 'craic', in Irish terms. Turning to take in one of the world's iconic views, I spotted a patch of blue. Like a Keyes novel – the clouds part, and the light returns.
Sydney Morning Herald
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
Good food, good craic as bestselling author Marian Keyes gets real
'I never saw any reason to hide it. I kind of thought, well, I was a 30-year-old woman and I was educated and I was middle class and all of those things,' she says. 'So if it could happen to me, it was probably happening to an awful lot of other people and if it's not been spoken about, nobody can get help.' After Keyes came out of rehab, she wrote her first novel, Watermelon. She has stayed sober and written books – all bestsellers – ever since. Life seemed good but, in 2009, completely out of the blue, the author experienced the onset of a debilitating four-year depression during which she barely got out of bed and suffered ongoing suicidal tendencies. It eventually lifted, which she attributes to time and the support of her loved ones. And hormone replacement therapy! Nothing is off the table at a Marian Keyes lunch. I asked her if she thought it was a great comfort to readers going through tough times to read about someone similarly afflicted and know they're not alone. She agreed. 'Every single one of us on earth, we think that bad things only happen to other people. It's a survival technique – but sooner or later, the terrible thing happens to us,' she says. 'You know, the spotlight of doom is above our head. There's such an endless list of awful ways for your life to be unbended. But most things are survivable; you can, you will be happy again. You can be happy again, in a different way. We can never go back to the person we were before the terrible thing. Back to your old self isn't really possible in big trauma, I think, but you're still there.' One of the things Keyes discovered, after the darkness had lifted, was her capacity for resilience. 'We only really discover the resilience when it's required, but we're given it at terrible times or difficult times, I think. Whatever loss there is, that kind of muscle of resilience is still available to us, maybe in a different form. We are stronger than we know, but it doesn't mean it's going to be pleasant. Feeling resilient doesn't mean that you're feeling good. No, in the storm, it means you're surviving.' Keyes is prolific on social media; her Instagram feed is a riot and includes candid photos of her family: mother ('Old Vumman'), four siblings and several nieces and nephews. They are a close family. Keyes and her husband Tony Baines ('Himself') have been married for 29 years. Earlier this year, she spoke about their inability to have children, saying she was at peace with it. 'We're fine now, you know, we're grand,' she said. 'I also felt like ... I'd been given so much by the universe, like I was given the ability to stop drinking alcoholically, and then I met this lovely man who was really, really nice to me, and then I got a job doing something that I was able to do when people were willing to kind of pay me for it. And I just think I thought, like nobody gets everything. 'But I feel like some kind of grace was afforded to me and my husband and we were just able to go, 'Let's focus on what we have rather than what we haven't.' You get what you get, and this is what I've got. And I'm absolutely grateful for my life.' We've been talking so much that we've hardly touched the food, which is light and delicious. The sun is refusing to come out. But I'm so engrossed in our conversation, which ranges from mental illness to lip liner, I stop noticing. Keyes revealed that she has become addicted to online personality quizzes – in particular, about the diagnosis du jour, ADHD. And after watching Andrew Scott in Ripley, she did several quizzes titled, 'Am I a psychopath?' (The answer was no.) 'I am very much self-diagnosed as (someone with ADHD). I've met a lovely woman who says she will diagnose it with a test. And I'm so scattered that I haven't got it together to go and do it – the proof is already there. I don't even need to do the test. If I'm too scatty to actually get it together to do it I should already be getting my green tick.' I asked her about My Favourite Mistake, which features a 48-year-old woman called Anna Walsh. At the start of the story, she jettisons her relationship, her job and her entire life in New York to go back to Ireland, without a plan of action. We discussed the phenomenon of older women increasingly deciding to upend their lives to run away and experience life on their own terms. When Keyes turned 60, she didn't run away but blocked out a year to pause her writing and go back to university to study design. 'The older I get, the more I realise that you can start again at any stage,' she says. 'Last year, I took a year off and I went back to college, just to do something that I had always wanted to do. And I think with better health care and longer life expectancy, women are far more vocal about what they expect from their lives than they used to be. 'I do think burnout is very real. Anna doesn't have children, but I often see it when the children are grown, the children have gone to university, that's it, and women are deciding, this is my time and I'm going to do all the things that I wanted to do when I was told I had to be doing other things. And I love it.' Lunch passed in a rush and Keyes' minder arrived to whisk her away. I stepped outside, suffused with the contentment you feel after a meal of good food and great 'craic', in Irish terms. Turning to take in one of the world's iconic views, I spotted a patch of blue. Like a Keyes novel – the clouds part, and the light returns.
Extra.ie
12-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Extra.ie
RTÉ reveals first cast photo for Marian Keyes adaptation The Walsh Sisters
RT have revealed the first cast photo for their upcoming comedy-drama series The Walsh Sisters . The six-part series, which will air later this year, is based on the novels of best-selling Irish author Marian Keyes. Starring Louisa Harland, Caroline Menton, Danielle Galligan, Mirad Tyers and Stefanie Preissner, The Walsh Sisters follows the titular sisters – Anna, Rachel, Maggie, Claire and Helen – as they navigate the ups-and-downs of their late 20s and 30s. The cast also includes Aidan Quinn, Carrie Crowley, Jay Duffy, Samuel Anderson and Debi Mazar. 'It's impossible to overstate how thrilled I am with this production,' said Marian Keyes. 'Stefanie Preissner's scripts alchemised the vibe of my novels into a new and compelling thing.' 'This probably sounds like a strange thing to say but even if I wasn't involved in this, I'd be dying to see it,' she continued. 'I'm so grateful to all the individuals who worked so hard to make this beautiful series and I'm very excited for the world to see the finished product.' Keyes has sold over 40 million books and her work has been translated into 36 languages. She has won 5 Irish Book Awards and was named Author of the Year at the British Book Awards in 2022. She is considered among the most successful Irish novellists. The Walsh Sisters is produced by the multi-award winning studios Cuba Pictures and Metropolitan Pictures for RT in association with the BBC, Screen Ireland and Cineflex Rights.
