Paul Mescal Recalls Meaty First Role in Sausage Commercial: I Was Poor and Needed to Pay Rent
Before earning his first Oscar nomination, Paul Mescal had something more like Oscar Mayer on his mind.
The “Aftersun” star addressed an infamous 2018 commercial for Irish sausage brand Denny, admitting the resurfaced ad is “a little bit of folklore in Ireland now.”
Mescal took the role of an Irish teen who is determined to travel the world after he learns over a beans and bangers breakfast that the sons of the Denny brand founder taught people how to cure bacon around the globe.
“I trained in drama school for three years, and took it so seriously. It was like, I loved the craft of it, and then I was poor,” Mescal said during BBC Radio 4’s “Today” (via Insider). “My agent was like, ‘I don’t know how you’ll deal with this, but we’ve got a sausage advert that you can go on.’ I was like, absolutely. I need to pay my rent.”
Mescal shared that he swallowed each sausage on every take, accumulating about 15 links in a morning.
“They do this thing where they come around with like a bucket that you’re supposed to spit them out into, and that just felt rude to me,” Mescal said. “But I learned my lesson that it’s better to do that than have to eat 15 sausages in a morning. That was an experience.”
He added, “If I ever feel like I get too big for my boots, it kind of pops up somewhere that we shouldn’t forget that I was promoting sausages when I got out of drama school.”
With Richard Linklater’s “Merrily We Roll Along” and Ridley Scott’s “Gladiator” sequel both in the works, it’s clear Mescal won’t be Seizing the Denny again any time soon. However, his Irish roots are never far behind, especially following the BBC recently mistaking Mescal for being a British actor.
“I think Irish people are incredibly proud and that’s a really nice kind of buoyant feeling and then at other times it can be like, ‘Don’t get too big for your boots,’” Mescal told British GQ, “It’s like tall poppy syndrome. I’ve witnessed it with other Irish actors or musicians. It’s kind of ironic because the fact that I’m saying this will lead to a portion of like, Irish mammies and daddies who will be like, ‘Well, look at him off on his high horse drinking a pint in London.’”
He admitted, “Had I lived in London or LA or New York, there would be a clearer path. I knew there were Irish actors, but none of them came from Maynooth. So it was the school musical. I enjoyed that. I didn’t know you could have it as a job. I got through schools playing Gaelic football.”
To see all of Mescal’s upcoming (non-sausage related) projects, click here.
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