It was undoubtedly true that Maeve and Orla took on a huge amount of work themselves when they really were too young to do so. For this, they received praise from teachers – and TV funnymen – but also near-constant ribbing from their siblings, who quite unfairly discerned in their efforts a certain self-importance.
Because we were (and still are) a mercilessly sarcastic shower of cynics, for years afterwards their award became a byword for deluded self-congratulation and was recalled exclusively in mocking tones. This ignored the fact that, eight weeks after our mother’s death, they spent the run-up to Christmas making trips out to the caravan in our back garden, scouring Argos catalogues so they could source and collect all of our Christmas presents. They’d worked out Santa wasn’t real only the year before, meaning they had, in some sense, lost Santa and Mammy within twelve months, and were now being asked to perform some of the functions of both. Looking back now, it seems odd that this job fell to two eleven-year-olds, considering a fifteen-year-old, a sixteen-year-old and an eighteen-year-old were also available, but the logic behind it was never really explained to me. It was said that the older kids were too focused on exams, but the few weeks before Christmas aren’t exactly fever pitch for scholastic activities. In any case, the twins did it. And, in return, we teased them for decades afterwards.
While the film crew, like everyone else, centred their focus on my older siblings, I made myself busy behind the scenes, picking up cables and peering through cameras in a way that suggested this was my fourth shoot this week, but with a punctilious edge that implied I thought standards were slipping. I would repeat things I heard them say, as if I too thought we needed a brighter lamp for the kitchen shots, and had myself just been thinking they needed to hurry up with the externals before evening set in. When they started keeping their conversations, and equipment, away from me, I brought out the big guns: telling tantalising dinosaur facts just within earshot of those crew members who seemed the most discerning, hoping to bait them into asking for the full experience.
‘Hey kid,’ I imagined they’d shout, lowering a boom mic so as to focus more intently, ‘what was that you were saying about the wingspan of a pterosaur?’ This never came to pass. I eventually gained better access by going straight to the top and shadowing the producer, Marion. I think I can say she would have been completely lost had it not been for the guided tour of the house I offered, entirely free of charge, listing every room and its contents in a detailed but efficient way, giving her the basics of each in well under forty minutes. She must have found my incessant questions very enlightening, since she seemed anxious to get through as many of them as she could as quickly as possible, and was always telling me how little time she had. I was particularly interested in what, exactly, a producer did (many things), how many things she’d produced (plenty) and if a producer was more important than the director (they were, according to Marion). I also wanted to know if she had one of those director’s chairs, and if it was called a producer’s chair, and if I could have one, and if she’d ever filmed a volcano, or in space, or if this would be shown in America, and if she had ever been to America, and if I should go to America to maximise my potential as a TV star. She let me wear headphones and look at the notes for the production, and showed me other tips and tricks of the trade. It was the first time I’d ever seen that ‘let’s wrap this up’ gesture TV people use for segments that are going on too long, when she made one towards a cameraman as a way of telling him to stop letting me look through the viewfinder for the eightieth time that day.
It was exciting to have these people in our house, but also mildly unnerving. Occasionally, I’d be aware of them moving something, a pot or a fruit bowl, so it wouldn’t be in frame. This was probably just so the viewer’s eye wouldn’t be distracted by something in the background, but I took it to be a judgement on the feng shui of our home, as if it were unimaginably gauche to have a fruit bowl on a countertop when it was so better suited to being on the table instead. I made mental notes of their decisions and for years afterwards would unconsciously make these same adjustments if I passed, say, a cup that was too close to the television, or three chairs packed tightly together when it would be more aesthetically pleasing for them to be ever so slightly spaced out.
In reality, I guess they tiptoed around me because our story really was that sad, and they were probably very moved, if not moderately freaked out, by how excited I was to be part of all of this. They may also have been wondering just how best to get closer to this marvellous young man who surely had such a huge career ahead of him; to nurture his genius, or maybe hang on to his coat tails and follow him to fame and fortune. I expected immediate stardom and requests for paid work doing public appearances; opening youth centres, doing in-store events at shopping malls, that kind of thing. I imagined myself being charming and precocious on late-night chat shows and studiously refusing to mention my siblings unless they were extra nice to me in the days beforehand.
All I wanted was to be something like a low-level god, pampered in easy wealth and adored by everyone I met. Like most children, I had watched the careers of child actors like Macaulay Culkin and Mara Wilson and seen a template I wanted to pursue for myself. I had little to no interest in, nor aptitude for, anything in the dramatic line. It’s just that unlike, say, medicine or international finance, acting seemed like something for which children could be famous. I figured I’d just sort out the work side of the deal later, while keeping the fame and fortune part as my guiding light. Besides, it seemed obvious that most child actors weren’t particularly good, so I could leverage my appeal on my amazing personality and all this wisdom I was picking up about shot choices, light rigs and cup placement.