Saoirse Ronan has responded to the criticism about her Saturday Night Live sketch which aired in December.
The comedy sketch featured Saoirse dressed as flight assistant and was packed full of Irish stereotypes and dodgy Irish accents from the other actors. Naturally enough, Irish viewers weren’t too impressed.
Speaking about the backlash, the actress told the Sunday Independent,”I was surprised by that”.
She added that she is a loyal Aer Lingus traveller: “One of the brilliant things about the Irish is that we can take the piss out of ourselves. And I love Aer Lingus, I’ve flown with them since I was a child, and one of the most emotional moments for me about going home is when I get on an Aer Lingus flight and I hear the Irish accent and I’m surrounded by people from home. So it was never done in bad taste or anything like that, and you also have to remember, it’s a comedy show, and they poke fun at everyone, and they poke fun at themselves, and we had sketches about Brooklyn as well and I wasn’t offended.”
“It was all a bit of craic, like.”
The On Chesil Beach star explained that taking part in SNL was a “daunting, but an amazing experience.”
The live show is fast-paced and involves various writers and actors, on the episode Saoirse took part in, fellow Irish stars U2 also appeared.
“You’ve got these great comic actors, like Kate McKinnon, but also all these writers, about 30 of them, who are working ’til like 5am finishing sketches. Everyone who’s done it had just said to me, you have no control over what’s going to happen, and you kind of just have to go with it, which was kind of a difficult thing for me because I was like, ‘But we need to have a plan!’. But once you do that you’re fine.
“So I went in on the Monday, met everyone, Tuesday they had sketches, Wednesday we did the read-through, and it’s moving so quickly that you don’t have time to get that nervous. The song was the only thing I was nervous about because it’s so difficult, but once I got through that I was fine. And it also helped having the band there, U2, that made me feel much more relaxed.”
Thankfully Saoirse has redeemed herself by making incredible movie after incredible movie, including The Lovely Bones, Hanna, Brooklyn, Lady Bird, and loads more.
