How To De-Stereotype A Film Like Dear Erin – And Other “Oirish” Films

Could they have hired an Irish actor instead of Matthew Goode, to get the accent right? Absolutely. Could they have shown the cosmopolitan side of modern Ireland, the towns and cities? Of course. Would that have ruined the whimsical fish-out-of-water rom-com formula they were chasing. Probably. But it could have produced this story in a meaningful way, maybe even add a bit of depth.

But this is not a piece on how to de-stereotype Hollywood Irish movies (although maybe it should be). This is a piece about how to de-stereotype our Hollywood Irish movie, Dear Erin. And if it was that easy to pour every tired cliché in, surely it’s just as easy to take them out.

1. Remove the dirt and fake blood from the hands

A sure-fire way to create the stereotypical Irish man is to signal he’s just been in a fight; regardless of the fact he’s now sitting in a pub writing to his long-lost love. So common is it for him to just knock someone out (for no apparent reason), that he still has the blood on his hands despite putting pen to paper (more on that later). I understand it is meant to evoke a character as rugged as the landscape, but here, it is totally out of place.

While violence is an appropriate trope in the likes of In Bruges (a film about actual hitmen) or The Wind That Shakes The Barley (a film set amid the Irish War of Independence, where there is indeed some fighting going on) it does not slot itself seamlessly into a movie in the rom-com genre. So step one, remove the fake dirt and blood. It adds nothing to the story and unless we’re following a character like Peter Coonan’s from Love / Hate, it’s unlikely our leading man would be bloodied up while writing his Dear Erin letter.

2. Get rid of the shamrocks

While there are some elements of Paddy that are true of a certain kind of Irish man, I don’t know if anyone has ever worn a bunch of shamrocks in their front blazer pocket, as if pulled directly out of the bowl our Taoiseach passes to the US President every St Patrick’s Day visit. It’s not a corsage, it’s a diplomatic offering.

While we’re at it, we could remove the cap, or make the wardrobe more modern. There’s nothing to suggest Paddy couldn’t own a pair of slim chinos and a Barbour jacket. Let’s raise the fashion stakes a bit and move away from the stereotype that Irishmen dress like farmers regardless of their occupation.

3. Bring the pint glasses down to one

We are not going to sit here and pretend like the Irish don’t like a drink. However, that doesn’t mean we sit in pubs with six half empty pint glasses around us, in the middle of the day, “amid the whiskey blur” as Paddy so delicately calls it. Our pub culture is so much more than a bunch of angry inebriated people in a space. Pubs are places for Irish people  to connect to one another, it’s where we tell stories, listen to music and enjoy one another’s company. Modern day pub culture in Ireland has shifted entirely – many go to the pub these days without ever having an alcoholic beverage, swapping their glass of Pinot Grigio for pints of blackcurrant dilute, or a pint of plain for a 0% Guinness.

And we forget the IPA culture in this country. If you think cafés are the only place to find a hipster named Cuan producing his own small-batch brew, you’d be wrong. And it’s great – we’re also now a country who has a culture of supporting small businesses – so let’s reflect that in our film.

For Paddy, sipping on a tumbler of whiskey is perfectly reasonable – but we suggest removing the littering of other glasses.

4. Dial back the accent

It’s not to say there aren’t people in Ireland with an accent like the one our Paddy, or that there’s anything wrong with that. It’s when it’s out of place, or when it’s being used irrespective of where the character is from that it becomes problematic (Address: Island of Ireland, County: Does it matter?). I can’t think of a Hollywood Irish character who has ever sported a legitimate modern-day Irish accent, and that’s an issue.

We don’t suggest where Paddy is from, but why not have him from one of the  cities? The Irish country-boy has been done to death. Ireland has dozens of regional accents, there are about three accents alone that hail from Dublin. Knowing the difference and applying that to characters is important, it develops characters with nuance and cultural cues. Gerard Butler in PS I Love You sounds like he used Siri as his dialect coach. Our version of Paddy seems like his dialect inspiration actually was Gerard Butler.

In these movies, the thick, exaggerated accent does all the heavy lifting. He doesn’t need a backstory or a city of origin, if he sounds like he’s been raised by fairies living within the clints and grikes at The Burren.

5. Show Paddy looking Erin up on… oh I don’t know, the internet?

There is no part of Ireland that would need to rely on writing a letter to find someone, particularly one addressed to Erin, America. We’re no longer relying on the last working dial-up connection in a converted phone box. We don’t even have to rely on internet cafés anymore. You can get WiFi or 5G in every corner of the country, including the pub snug in Kilkenny, which is probably where Paddy is.

If Paddy really wanted to find Erin, there are different ways – maybe a look on Instagram, Facebook, or even LinkedIn at worst. Even a plea for help on TikTok would do the job: “Looking for the American girl who asked if Galway has a shopping centre – pls help” and Erin would be trending, located within hours. Paddy could enlist his Alpha Gen niece to help him pull it off – and the audience would get the feel good family bonding moment in the film as well.

Yes, the letter-writing trope is romantic. It worked for Dear John – but that was set in the early noughties and one of the characters was deployed to a war zone. This isn’t 2004 and Paddy’s not in Kandahar – he’s just in Kilkenny with decent broadband.

6. The Finnegans vs The O’Malleys

The “fighting Irish” stereotype has already been covered. However, there are sophisticated ways to use to feuding family trope – that leans more Shakespearian than Hollywood Oirish – think The Capulets and the Montagues. Imagine two Irish families locked in a decades-long feud for reasons no one can fully explain. But instead of falling into the usual trap of rival farms or duelling pubs, why not try something new, something fresh? Let’s say the Finnegans and the O’Malleys run competing Chinese takeaways in the same town, each claiming to serve the superior spicebag (a story reminiscent of this one from Dublin two years ago, A Tale of Two Takeaways). The O’Malleys swear by extra chilli; the Finnegans insist theirs is “authentically unauthentic.” Both claim they came up with it, even though neither of them did, and there’s been war ever since.

It’s petty, it’s ridiculous – and it’s the perfect backdrop for a modern-day Romeo and Juliet storyline. Erin has family roots with the O’Malleys, Paddy is set to inherit the Finnegan fortune. How can it ever work? There’s your movie.

If we’re a bit fatigued from spicebag chat from the last few years in the Irish media, let’s switch it up with another beloved institution; the humble fish and chip shop. Macari 66 vs Leo Burdocks. Hey, this movie writing stuff is kind of easy…

Dear Erin… a movie that can be made?

It’s unclear whether stripping Dear Erin of all its clichés leaves anything of merit in its wake – but maybe that’s the point. When the stereotypes are gone, all that’s left is story. And maybe that story has potential.

Picture this: Paddy, once a hotshot in tech sales, finds himself redundant and reluctantly back in his rural hometown to help his elderly father run the family Chinese takeaway. It’s the same place where he first met Erin – a visiting American tracing her roots to the rival takeaway shop. She stayed for a few weeks, they shared a few spicebags, playfully teasing each other for their respective family businesses, a few laughs, a kiss, and then she was gone – back to Boston or Chicago or wherever her “big city problems” stemmed from.

Now Paddy’s trying to settle into the quiet life he once ran from, navigating delivery orders, deep fryer disasters, and existential crises over the consistency of curry sauce. Meanwhile, Erin’s back in the States. But something about the trip – and about Paddy – stuck with her.

We follow them both as they circle each other across the Atlantic: misfired texts and missed chances. There’s space for humour, heart, and the chaos of cross-cultural love – without leaning on paddy caps, postcard clichés, or questionable accents.

So yes – maybe Dear Erin can be a movie worth making. Just lose the fake blood, trim back the whimsy, and for goodness sake, give the man a fighting chance with some WiFi.

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