The conflicting day Liam Neeson became an actor
In terms of the most significant actors to have come from Northern Ireland, they don’t get much bigger than the legendary Ballymena-born Liam Neeson. Known and loved for his intense character portrayals, Neeson is a true icon of Irish cinema, although his acting efforts have been admired all over the world, particularly in the United States.
After making his film debut in Pilgrim’s Progress, Neeson set about becoming one of the most established stars of his generation with further efforts in the 1980s movies Excalibur, The Bounty, and The Mission. His real breakthrough came in Steven Spielberg’s 1993 war drama Schindler’s List, though, and his portrayal of German businessman Oskar Schindler earned an Academy Award nomination for ‘Best Actor’.
From there, Neeson’s future was bright, and he followed up by giving countless memorable performances in the likes of Rob Roy, Michael Collins, Les Miserables, Star Wars, Batman Begins, Gangs of New York, Love Actually, and Kinsey. Just reeling those films off alone shows the stunning career he has had.
However, that career had to start somewhere, and in an interview with the BBC, Neeson once explained the conflicting day that he truly became an actor for the first time. “I had an extraordinary day actually,” the actor said. “I remember it was 1975, and I was accepted into Northern Ireland’s only repertoire theatre—Belfast Lyric theatre.”
Of course, in the 1970s, there was great political upheaval in Belfast as a result of The Troubles. “It was a time when bombs and explosions were going off all over the city,” Neeson explained before noting how he had snuck away from his Ballymena hometown to do an audition in the Northern Irish capital without mentioning it to his parents.
After all, Neeson’s parents would have been terrified of letting their son go into such a dangerous place, so the future actors knew that the only way to go to the audition was to go without their permission. After studying at Queen’s University Belfast for a short period of time and at a teacher training college in Newcastle, Neeson was back at home in Ballymena, working a handful of casual jobs.
However, he knew that his heart lay in acting, so he had to take the audition despite the precarious nature of the time. It was that very afternoon, after all, that Neeson was accepted into the Belfast Lyric Theatre, being handed a paid equity contract. Naturally, Neeson had to celebrate with a couple of pints.
“I remember coming back on the train to my home, which was 30 miles away, stopping in at various pubs along the way, with this equity contract,” Neeson explained. However, the new actor had largely forgotten about leaving the house without telling his parents where he had gone, and they had naturally begun to worry for the worst.
After arriving home at midnight, Neeson’s parents “were white as sheets”. He explained, “I was stupid in that day and age to not telephone, so they literally didn’t speak to me for a week because of the shock. I could tell when I walked into the house how dumb I’d been.”
Still, that day was one of the most important of Neeson’s life and he signed off on the matter, “I was overjoyed my life was going to change, I was going to get paid for acting”.
