The exact moment Liam Neeson knew he’d made it: “This is all supposed to happen”
Acting isn’t the sort of career you take on for the job security. It is a brutally difficult life, full of uncertainties, insecurities, and financial peaks and troughs. And that’s if you actually make it. Getting to the stage where you can call yourself a ‘superstar’ is a thankless task, one that most aspiring thespians never see through to the end. For a lucky few, it does actually work out, including Northern Ireland’s favourite badass, Liam Neeson.
Things could have gone very differently for the silver-haired action star. Prior to breaking through as an actor, he worked a number of odd jobs, including driving forklifts for Guinness and training to become a teacher. Thankfully, he eventually found his way through the muck, with one moment in particular giving him the confidence to admit he’d made it.
He recounted to the Irish Times a trip he’d taken to America to make a movie called The Mission. While he was there, he met a casting director for Miami Vice, which led to him taking a gig on the show. “They flew me to Miami and I got to stay in this great hotel,” he remembered. “They brought me up to my little suite which was overlooking this gorgeous sand and surf, and the bellboy opened the curtains and showed me everything and turned on the TV and as it came to life there was a huge close-up of me in a mini-series called Ellis Island.”
Airing on CBS in 1984 in three parts, Ellis Island follows four different immigrants as they converge on the titular New York port. Neeson plays Kevin Murray, an Irish nationalist. He is responsible for sending young Bridget (Alice Krige) off to America to avoid arrest. He later catches up with her in the States and continues to control her life. He ends up meeting a gruesome end, stabbed to death by Bridget’s sister, played by Judi Bowker.
According to Neeson, this was his ‘St Paul on the road to Damascus’ moment as an actor. “I looked at it [his face on the screen] and I thought ‘I’m supposed to be here’,” he said. “This is all supposed to happen.” Though he wouldn’t become a global superstar for another few years – that came with Schindler’s List in 1993 – this did mark a period of continued high-level jobs for the future Qui-Gon Jinn.
Ellis Island allowed Neeson to rub shoulders with some of the great and the good. Claire Bloom, Richard Burton, and Faye Dunaway all have parts in the drama, but the most important connection he made during this time was with a young actor playing the unfortunate role of ‘Young Whore’. This is where Neeson would have first crossed paths with Natasha Richardson, the woman who would go on to become his wife. The pair tied the knot in 1994 and remained married until Richardson’s tragic death in a skiing accident in 2009.
While you always have to be looking over your shoulder as a top star, it’s nice to have a moment in your career where you can relax a little bit. Neeson’s ‘road to Damascus’ moment gave him the confidence to continue following his dream, and, with the benefit of hindsight, he was absolutely bang on about this being the start of something major.
