Chelsea O Connor is becoming one of Ireland’s rising stars on the acting scene – with a new movie on the way and a top secret HBO in the works, Goss.ie caught up with the actress.
The German born blonde initially started modelling but her passion for acting prevailed and she went onto study the Acting for Camera in the Gaiety School of Acting.
From that she developed her skills in Bow Street formally known as The Factory. The 25-year-old actress has credits from Love,Rosie and has just finished filming Bully whom she starred alongside Love/Hate Garda Kieran McCabe.
Friends: Kieran gives Chelsea tips and advice |Â VIPIRELAND.COM
You have just finished filming Bully, what can you tell me about it?Â
I literally just wrapped yesterday on a feature film I was working on with Kieran O’Reilly from Love Hate. I literally just wrapped yesterday, they are doing their last day on Wednesday.
It’s based around a boy played by Kieran McCabe and hes not got the best life, he’s got an alcoholic father, hes getting bullied in school and stuff like that and then trusts a teacher in the school who is played by Kieran O’Reilly and I basically play his girlfriend but shes the only good thing going on in his life so I’m the only bit of light in his life sort of speak in the film. That’s the basic scenario, he meets a girl online. It’s very controversial the film but that’s basically it.
I find there’s not a lot of controversial films in Ireland and I suppose it can either be hit and miss. I think a lot of people are afraid to do controversial films here because it’s a very small country , they don’t really get seen to a lot or they don’t get made, I think Stephen Gaffney the director, he’s a bit mad anyways, he had the film and it was suppose to be a short film then he realised that there was so much in the script he could make it into a feature so that’s what he ended up doing. It’s been interesting.
You said you worked on the film with Kieran from Love/Hate, how did he get involved?
Kieran O’Reilly is a very good friend of mine and I got cast in the film and I got him in touch with the director cause he seemed interested and he got the part straight away as the teacher. He’s a bit of a bad guy so he wanted to play someone that was a good guy.
Have you worked together before?
No we are in Bow Street together, we both go to the after studio in Bow Street with Maureen Hughes and Jimmy Marcus and we met through that and then we just got very close friends after that and he’s helped me out so much and he’s given me such great advice, working with him on set was very fun and we got to do a couple of scenes together and stuff like that, it was fun. He’s just full of great advice and he’s a bit older than me so he can give me more of an older approach in the industry so it’s been lovely.
Bully: Chelsea stars as the girlfriend of a troubled teen
I hear you are planning on moving to London to pursue acting?
Since November I’ve been going over once a month and i went over for fashion week with my mum and we went to a few shows and it was just lovely and every time I go over I fall more and more in love with the city. I suppose my family are from their, my mum is originally from London and my dad as well, so it;s like me going back to my roots in a sense, I just love it, it’s so fast paced. Everything about the city I love. Every city has its bad kinda woes but i just think when you find a city that suits you, it suits you so i’ve had meetings with a couple of big agents over their so just waiting to see what happens but they want me to move over and get settled in first so it’s been quite busy that last couple of months but it’s been good.
Why did you choose London?
I’ve always said London is somewhere where a lot of Irish actors they all live over their because they make a name for themselves over there and it kind of falls back over to Ireland, word gets over and maybe they get more work because they are getting well known in London but every Irish actor that I know has moved over to London, they absolutely love it over there and they fly over whenever they need to. Its been really nice, the reason why I go over every month is to suss it out and see which areas I like the most to move into.
You are in talks with HBO for a series in America, what is it and how did it happen?
I’m in talks at the minute about a pilot over in America, I think LA. I haven’t been given to much information about it either because it’s very hush hush but they have been very interested in me they found me on spotlight which i was quite surprised about because of all the amount of actors on Spotlight but they found me and contacted my management over in the UK and they asked to see me and i sent over a tape so I’m still waiting to hear back, they are in talks with my management at the minute for a possible role over there. It’s very exciting but nerv wrecking, going through different emotions
