Brothers Domhnall and Brian Gleeson team up for sitcom hijinks in Frank of Ireland – streaming on Neon. Providing good giggles per minute, the Irish comedy sees the brothers’ real-life relationship shine through, writes Adam Fresco.
It’s not big, and it’s not clever, but this six-part Irish sitcom is a frothy-headed pint of darkly Irish fun. Brothers Domhnall and Brian Gleeson, (who co-created the show alongside Michael Moloney), take the lead roles. Brian plays Frank, a loud, grumpy, pugnacious, unemployed musician, living with his mother, Mary, played with gusto by Pom Boyd as an alcohol-soaked, pill-popping force of nature.
Dressed like a bearded scarecrow, Frank dreams of creating a concept album about the counties of Ireland. However, his opus is stalled, not just by laziness, but heartbreak, having split from his partner Áine (Sarah Greene) some six years earlier. Now all Frank has to show for six years pining after Áine are a string of one-night stands, and a handful of song titles consisting of terrible puns based on movies—‘The Witches of East Wicklow’? Ouch.
The movie based gags don’t stop at punning titles. There’s an opening nod to Christopher Nolan’s Memento, when Frank wakes up with the reminder “Don’t sleep with Áine” inked on his hand. Cut to narration straight from Martin Scorsese’s classic Taxi Driver, as a cab carrying Frank appears out of the mist in slow-motion.
If gags overtly referencing movies work for The Simpsons, then I guess it’s fair game. As is the use of stock characters clichés. Take Frank’s best friend, the aptly named Doofus, (played by Brian’s real-life brother, Domhnall). He’s basically that old comedy staple, the man-child. Like Dougal in Father Ted, Cardi in Brassic, or even Kramer in Seinfeld, Doofus is a kid in a grown up’s body. Naïve to the point of stupidity, Doofus somehow manages to hold down a job as a shopkeeper’s assistant, and doesn’t seem too bothered by Frank’s wild outbursts, misplaced vanity, and manic displays of seething aggression.
Despite the presence of female characters, the focus remains firmly on the two manchild leads as they lurch from one blokey shenanigan to the next laddish debacle. The humour is often broad, with cracks about bodily functions and private parts aplenty. Unapologetically a bawdy, boys’ own farce, Frank of Ireland revels in inappropriate behaviour, confusion, misunderstandings, and political incorrectness. It’s a show that owes a genetic debt to UK sitcom Men Behaving Badly, and that Charlie Sheen US TV ratings-machine, Two and a Half Men.
Take the pilot episode, in which Frank tries to turn playing a song at the funeral of his ex-girlfriend’s grandmother into a full-on gig. There’s a squirming, painful pleasure in watching Frank vaingloriously attempt to impress his ex, Áine, in front of her new beau. From the sight of Frank using the coffin to support his music gear, to Doofus flogging merchandise at the church door, it’s bad-taste farce—depending on your taste for uncomfortable comedy poking fun at social norms, and a central protagonist who is, to use the scientific description, a bit of a self-absorbed dick.
As the misanthropic Frank and lovable but dim Doofus, the brothers’ real-life relationship shines through, lending the Gleesons’ characters an unlikely but believable bond. Brian can be hilarious when Frank’s in full madcap monster mode, with the safety switch blown clean off, and his egotistical inhibitions let loose, whilst Domhnall lends the inept Doofus a humanity often absent in one-note portrayals of the simpleton BFF character.
By the fourth episode, A Good Few Angry Women, the hapless anti-heroes end up writing music for a local amateur drama group. Their church hall production becomes a full-on farce, as confusion runs riot between two courtroom classics, 12 Angry Men and A Few Good Men. The first became a cinematic classic starring Henry Fonda, the latter a powerhouse film performance by Jack Nicholson and Tom Cruise, arguing over just who can handle the truth.
The mix-up results in some wonderfully inappropriate musical numbers by Doofus, and a jealous Frank, who insists on getting in on the act by penning a few songs of his own. The resultant fiasco offers plenty of manic fun, including a scene in which ladies of a certain age are hurled about the stage in over-the-top stunts, leading to hip injuries that cause the play’s director to yell: “That’s the fourth juror we’ve lost in a row! I’m gonna have to cut some of the action scenes!”
While Frank of Ireland doesn’t offer anything new, there are enough laugh-out-loud moments along the way to make it a sitcom worth watching. Best of all, the final episode rewards viewers with a guest appearance by the real-life father of Brian and Domhnall, Brendan Gleeson, who turns up for a delightfully daft cameo, combining his darkly comic turn as Mad-Eye Moody in the Harry Potter films with his bored but deadly hitman laying low In Bruges.
Providing good giggles per minute, the show might further come into its own if it gets a second season, and breaks further away from well-worn comedy tropes. There’s both entertainment and potential in this darkly funny, bad taste, politically incorrect, unabashedly male-orientated, Irish buddy-comedy mayhem.
