Get confidential with Sinead Keenan

By Mark Kebble on December 14th 2009

What’s your involvement in David Tennant’s demise as Doctor Who? “I can’t really say.” What’s the part you have filmed for Victoria Wood’s Christmas Special? “It’s a sketch show, but that’s all I can say.” What can we expect in the new series of Being Human? “It’s a running thing with the BBC, don’t say anything!”

Hmm… Live City & Islington may be struggling to get much out of Victoria Park actress Sinead Keenan, but what’s clear is that she’s very much in demand. We’ve met actors in the past who have signed confidentiality agreements on one new show or role, but never have we encountered someone with three to their name. Take a bow Sinead. “It all started for me at the end of March,” she looks back at what’s been a hectic year, “and it hasn’t really stopped since, which I am delighted about. In acting, you can have a part and then there’s a lot of resting time.”

Talk about beginning with a bang. Her first assignment in 2009 was the small matter of David Tennant’s last two episodes as the Doctor, before he passes the baton over to Matt Jones. The hype is unbelievable and doesn’t Sinead know it. “Doctor Who is an institution,” she coos in her Irish accent. “I knew Doctor Who was big, but the fan base it has is incredible and so diverse. Filming at the end of March was strange, having just come out of Christmas and back to a Christmas tree!” OK Sinead, enough of the chit-chat, what CAN you tell us about your character? “I play a character called Addams, who is a shape-shifting alien. I appear to be human in the first instance, but then I reveal myself to be an alien… And that’s all I can tell you, but I do know there won’t be a dry eye in the house.”

No sooner have we seen her involved in a dramatic part of TV history than she’s back on our screens in another institution. “When I was growing up, she used to always be doing shows,” Sinead says warmly about Victoria Wood. “This is the first Christmas special in nine years. Mine is a little piece with Victoria, Julie Walters and, quite randomly, Delia Smith.” Wow, tell us more? No, of course, Sinead’s lips are sealed.

Comedy has played a big part in her development as an actress, which included a leading part in ITV’s Moving Wallpaper, a spin off of the soap Echo Beach that preceded it and starred Jason Donovan and Martine McCutcheon. The soap didn’t wash, but the comedy did. “It was a first, to have one programme as a behind the scenes almost deriding it [not almost, it did in our eyes, hilariously so].” Then there was the more recent The Amazing Dermot, where Sinead popped up as a children’s TV presenter in rehab and bumping into Rhys Darby’s failing illusionist in a one-off Channel 4 Comedy Showcase. It was certainly promising enough to warrant a series.

Funnily enough, children’s TV was what sprung to Sinead’s mind when she was approached to take a role in a new BBC drama. “Before I got the script, I was told it was called Being Human and was about a werewolf, vampire and ghost, and I went, ‘Oh dear, is it for CBBC?’,” she laughs infectiously. “But it’s so well written by Toby [Whithouse], it was a no brainer to say yes to it. The whole ghost, vampire and werewolf thing is almost incidental – it is about being human. They are doing their best to live like human beings.”

Sinead plays Nina, who becomes the girlfriend of George [played by Russell Tovey], the werewolf of the trio. She’s involved in a heart-in-your-mouth conclusion to the first series where, after being scratched by George, there’s a very distinct possibility she may become a werewolf too. “The second series starts 27 days later,” Sinead does reveal a plotline to us, “which is full moon time again. The first episode is all about whether or not she has been infected. Will she or won’t she?” We won’t be getting an answer today.

Live City & Islington wonders if all this recent exposure has led to curious glances around the streets of east London. “I do get people coming up to me, but because I am Irish they think I’m someone else.” That’s when we realise Sinead speaks in an English accent in everything we’ve seen her in to date – it happens so seamlessly that we haven’t thought to ask her about it. “I’m very lucky in that I’m at ease with accents, I don’t find them troubling… Although people are probably reading this and saying, ‘I don’t think so’! When I first went in for Being Human, I read something in my own accent. They called me back in, but asked if I could do it in an English accent as Aidan [Turner, who plays vampire Mitchell] had just been cast and he was using his own Irish accent, so they thought it might be a bit weird with two of us speaking that way.”

Sinead got the part, but ironically, come the read through, the makers decided she could use whatever accent she wanted – but still she plumped for English. “If you can do it, it makes you more marketable in the UK,” she explains her decision. “People see you and hopefully think of you as an actor rather than an Irish actor. Of course there’s nothing wrong with that, but you don’t get pigeonholed.”

With such a crazy year – and a couple of months of setting the Sky Plus – where does she go from here? How can she follow up such a dramatic burst of work? “That’s such a hypothetical questions as I have many hopes and dreams. This business is so fickle.” At a push? “Ideally I’d like to get back to theatre, it’s been two years since I did a play. I would love to work at the National, or somewhere like the Bush Theatre, or go back to the Royal Court [where she performed in 2003 in Loyal Women]. I’m at a stage of my career where I’m not really that fussy – it could be film, TV or stage, as long as it’s good stuff, something that interests me.” Live City & Islington just hopes she will be able to talk about it.

The second series of Being Human returns to our screens in January – you can find out more at www.bbc.co.uk/beinghuman

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