Páraic draws on an action-packed life for stand-up comedy le Gaeilge

Páraic Breathnach, Macnas co-founder and currently manager of Galway Arts Centre is a man who doesn’t like the word ‘can’t’.

So when Kevin Healy, of Galway Comedy Carnival and the Róisín Dubh pub informed the Connemara man that it wasn’t possible to perform stand-up comedy through Irish, Páraic went on the defensive.

“I told him it was possible, and he said ‘do it then’,” says Páraic, who took up the challenge.

He first dipped his toe in the comedy waters during last year’s Seachtain na Gaeilge and was so successful that when the Rubberbandits were doing a show at the Town Hall Theatre in May, Páraic was asked to support them. He prepared a 15-minute set but actually did a half an hour. The audience were happy, the Rubberbandits were happy and Páraic was happy.

Then Kevin Healy booked him for a slot at last year’s Comedy Carnival. Now the new kid on the funny block is back with a new stand-up show. Páraic will present Straight Outta Conamara in the Róisín Dubh next Monday and Wednesday, February 8 and 10, in the pub’s upstairs venue.

This will be a bilingual routine, with Irish featuring prominently as Páraic tells the story of his long and difficult journey from the windswept shores of Carna in South Connemara to Henry Street in Galway City.

He’s never been afraid of taking on new challenges, but Páraic says he’s not actually sure that he likes doing comedy, because unlike theatre, it’s unpredictable.

“There’s a buzz off it when it goes well and when you get it right. But there are a lot of variables. It depends on the audience, it depends on the first line, it depends on the first laugh.

“Even though you do the advance writing, rehearsing and reading like you would for a theatre piece, you serve it in a less formal context. You are riding on emotions – your own and those in the room. It’s a funny thing.”

He certainly has a droll sense of humour and an ability to cast a caustic eye on the world and his own life. And he isn’t afraid to pull his punches.

Recalling his performance at last year’s Comedy Carnival, he guffaws as he says “it was like a Connemara man being given a new red Ferrari and driving off at a great pace. Then he misses the first bend and goes into the ditch. He spends the rest of the night digging it out”.

He’s exaggerating and embellishing obviously, because otherwise he wouldn’t have been invited back to the Róisín.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.