Chris O'Dowd

Chris O'Dowd interview, Moone Boy

Chris O'Dowd takes a break from Hollywood to return to his roots in Sky1's new comedy Moone Boy.

You'd never guess that IT Crowd actor Chris O'Dowd was now hobnobbing with the likes of Judd Apatow and Jack Black judging by this charming little comedy based on his inauspicious upbringing in late 1980s/early 1990 Ireland. It was born from the Little Cracker short that O'Dowd wrote for Sky1 in 2010 and sees him play the imaginary friend of 12-year-old Martin Moone (David Rawle), a boy who spends his days drawing, formulating crackpot schemes and generally trying to negotiate life with his scatty family.

Interview: Chris O'Dowd

Finding a date to actually sit down with O'Dowd proved next to impossible. The man is busy. But ShortList eventually locked him in a room for an hour to talk about sitcoms and an embarrassing encounter with Jerry Seinfeld.

Another full-series offshoot for one of Sky's Little Crackers, Moone Boy riffs on the childhood of IT Crowd and Bridesmaids star Chris O'Dowd. Newcomer David Rawle stars as the adorably hapless Martin Moone who, when not trying to give mouth-to-mouth to dead chaffinches, is trying to protect himself from the school bullies by setting his sister up with a bullier of bullies, with shambling assistance from O'Dowd's imaginary manchild friend. A touch too twee for its own good, it's destined to be pigeonholed as the latest of Sky's ever-rolling conveyor-belt of gentle comedies, though in fairness the writing feels far sharper than Mount Pleasant.

Following on from the success of the comedy short Chris O'Dowd wrote for Sky1's Little Crackers strand, the actor has now turned that re-imagining of his childhood into a charming, if limited, six-part series. Co-written with Nick Vincent Murphy and set in O'Dowd's home town of Boyle in the west of Ireland, the stories centre on fresh-faced Martin (David Rawle) as he tries to negotiate life with his three disinterested older sisters, distracted parents and two school bullies - but at least he has an imaginary friend, Sean (O'Dowd), a grown man with a beard, for company.

A quick chat with Chris O'Dowd

Bridesmaids star Chris O'Dowd plays an 11-year-old boy's imaginary friend in Sky1's Moone Boy, a new, self-penned comedy inspired by his own childhood growing up in Western Ireland.

Chris O'Dowd on The IT Crowd: 'We need closure'

Chris O'Dowd has suggested that the characters from The IT Crowd will return in some form.

Chris O'Dowd interview

Chris O'Dowd, star of Bridesmaids and The IT Crowd, recreates his Irish childhood in Sky1's whimsical comedy Moone Boy, which he's co-written and also appears in.

Nick Frost talks Cuban Fury

"It's a romantic-comedy but with fantastic, real dancing," Nick Frost explains. "We're going to go down the Strictly Ballroom route. The dancing will be fiery and passionate and beautiful to watch, with me and Chris O'Dowd pratting about when we're not dancing."