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D.A.D.D.Y. POOL Mike and Enda had a good few frie
nds and long-time collaborators work with them on Extra Ordinary. They talk about their connections to them. George Brennan - Music George we have known and worked with for almost 20 years. He has always made great music we were fans of. The soundtrack he made for our short film The Hatch is the best thing about the film and there was never a question it would be George making the music for Extra Ordinary. Fun fact: George also features as a blood covered goat farmer in the film. screencomposersguild.ie/georgebrennan James Mather - D.O.P. James has shot a lot of commercial and short film and music video projects over the years. He has shot trawlers West Cork in rough seas to cowboys in Spain. He is a friend and collaborator and is used to our weirdo double brain shorthand which is helpful on set! He has shot some of our favourite films (Adam & Paul, Frank). jamesmatherisc.com of the night. There were two lines about this couple called Ray and Maureen, a husband and wife team, who were ghost hunters or whisperers. He would envelop the ghosts in a vortex of light and she would speak to him. He was a lorry driver and she worked in a credit union by day. It was those couple of sentences that grabbed our attention – how the fuck did they meet each other? How did they fall in love? How did they have the gift?” Recipients of the Film Board’s Catalyst scheme, Extra Ordinary has been, like most features, many years in gestation waiting for all the right elements to finally fall into place. “The whole thing about film-making is that it is a massive collaboration. There is no way you can do everything and, therefore, you have to trust the people you work with,” says Enda. “Nobody cares about the ads really,” adds Mike, “even some of the budgets are bigger. All the time while we were waiting to get money through we were developing with Yvonne in Blinder (Films) who was our counsellor, script editor and therapist.” “We had Maeve in mind from early on. It felt like she’d be a great character to play a version of herself. And, then it went from there,” says Mike. They even brought elements of the script into play in pitching sessions such as at Fantasia in Montreal. “Enda couldn’t go so we did this pitch where he was dead and I was reaching him through a Ouija board on stage. We pre-recorded his responses as if he were lost in space.” They made Charleville Castle the lair of Christian and Claudia Winter, a location they had originally encountered back in the early 2000s at the mór festival via The Chalets and Warlords of Pez. “The Coen brothers are a big influence on us. All their cameos are so brilliantly cast. We knew there were a bunch of tiny parts.” As such they created a wishlist, of some of the elder acting royals we have, bagging the likes of Mary McEvoy, Eamon Morrissey and Daniel Reardon for memorable moments. And what remained crucial for their vision is that whilst it is “out there” it still remained “incredibly cinematic”. They also made a point of avoiding certain cliches. “We had a manifesto when we were writing it that there would be no booze, no priests and no IRA in it. We went fuck that, let’s leave that out. We held true to that idea,” says Mike. In terms of the self-confidence needed to step up to this scale of production, they both attribute it to the experience that comes with age. “Having two is good for that cause when you falter, the other person usually says ‘ah it’ll be grand’,” says Mike. Having made its international debut at the prestigious SXSW festival in the spring, it has been doing the festival circuit picking up awards such as the aforementioned Galway Fleadh and elsewhere in the likes of Belgium where it was co-produced. “What’s really exciting is watching it with audiences because it goes down so well,” says Mike. And, the translation and discovery of new humour within its comic crevices is always a thrill. “There is a joke in the film which has a Swiss clock and literally the moment it came on screen in Switzerland, it almost got a standing ovation,” chuckles Mike. As for their next step, the D.A.D.D.Y. boys have just returned from shooting a commercial in Toronto and have a number of others under consideration via their agents Red Rage films here and 1st Ave Machine in the UK and US. They are working on a script for Aardman Animation, the home of Wallace and Gromit, and are also keen on a possible spin-off TV series from Extra Ordinary. One thing we can be assured of is the merging of those two words in anything they do. ● Karl Toomey - Credits Karl ‘Tombstone’ Toomey is a friend, a sounding block for ideas, wrapped up in an incredible graphic designer. He has worked with us on lots of stuff from books (100 facts about Pandas) to title designs, but is generally and importantly just a huge creative brain friend who is full of energy and enthusiasm. karltoomey.com Extra Ordinary is on general release from Friday September 13. Mike Ahern and Enda Loughman will be joined by Maeve Higgins for a Q&A after the 6.20pm screening in the IFI on Friday September 13. Extra Ordinary is reviewed in Film on p76. teamdaddy.com Chris Judge - Smiley Chicken products illustration Enda knows Chris since he was fouryears-old and Mike and Chris became best friends in college, so, in fact, Chris is the reason we met. It helps Chris is an incredible illustrator and he has even been a D.A.D.D.Y. member before heading off to be a successful international kids book writer and illustrator. We annoy him to draw stuff for us whenever possible. He mostly draws mean pictures of us with big noses. chrisjudge.com Joe Fallover - Production Designer Joe we started working with on commercials and he has become a close collaborator and friend. He is an incredibly talented ‘maker’ and mind and has built crazy sets, giant objects and generally helped bring the most stupid ideas come to life in amazing creative ways. falloverart.com 30