Get To Know The Cast & Crew: Méabh de Brún

In the second of our Patreon-exclusive Q&As, we chat with Méabh de Brún - who plays the part of Carpenter in The Silt Verses.

Méabh is an award-winning actor, playwright and writer, living and working in Kerry, Ireland, while working on her first novel. Find out more about her amazing work over at meabhdebrun.org, and give her a follow on Twitter. 

(Q: Welcome, Méabh! So first up - could you please introduce yourself, and what character do you play in The Silt Verses?)

My name is Méabh de Brún, and I play Carpenter in The Silt Verses.

So, we're going to have an 'aul chat for ourselves! Come on, come in here, sit down by me now! Come here to me. Okay, so, let's talk about Carpenter.

(Q: Yes! OK, so what drew you to playing this character?)

I was drawn to Carpenter immediately, because I think she is so incredibly fascinating as a person.

I mean, I suppose I should preface by saying, I was so eager to be a part of The Silt Verses that I auditioned for literally every character and I would have played the sound of a creaking door if they had let me, but yes Carpenter was the dream and now I’m living it.

Actually they rejected my creaking door audition, they said it lacked nuance, so.

So, immediately, you know, Carpenter is a very antisocial, sarcastic, misanthropic person and it is absolutely delicious to play a woman written that way.

But additionally, there’s the brilliant effect of the writing of this show, whereby we get the best of both worlds through her internal monologues.

So I think at the beginning of the show, she is a very stoic, silent person, and we definitely see her kind of come more into her own as the season goes on, but throughout the whole thing you get this  fascinating dichotomy of dealing with a mysterious character, whose inner thoughts we are privy to.  

And it's so effective in building her up as this complex person when we hear the difference between her thoughts and her actions, and we get those tidbits relating to the story of her past and her present, and Jon is such a skilled writer,  he writes the show in such a skilled manner, that every episode is chock full of information, yet Carpenter’s life and her motives are still shrouded in mystery for the listener.

So I don't know about anyone else, but I'm just going to say it. You love this character immediately, you’re on a  journey with her, yet at the same time, even though you’re right beside her, you’re still desperate to find out what’s really going on with her. It’s just such brilliant writing.

And she is just incredibly cool. She’s a complete badass.

I get to play the brooding, damaged anti-hero and that’s incredible for me. It’s a gift.

(Q: So the next question is, 'Tell us a little about how you feel playing this character.'  And obviously you have no strong feelings at all this topic.)

One way to describe how I feel about Carpenter is that, I love her?

I love her so much, she is the best.

In my opinion, and I have no idea if I’m destroying Jon’s vision- presumably not, he’d have fired me by now if that was the case, probably. But in my opinion, Carpenter is the funniest-

Can I swear on this?

I can probably swear on this. I mean you shouldn’t be letting minors listen to The Silt Verses really, should you?

Ok for safety’s sake I will assume I cannot swear, and I will say that Carpenter is the funniest motherfricker on the planet, and it is simply not her fault that no one shares her sense of humour. I think she is hilarious, and I think she is a total badass. She can do absolutely no wrong in my eyes. She is perfect.

Is there a point to be made about her misanthropy stemming from unhealthy childhood trauma? Yes.

Do we all sometimes feel like we’re going to set someone on fire if they make us continue having a conversation with them for one more minute? Also Yes.

She is entirely reasonable. She is entirely relatable. She is perfect. No notes.

(Q: Without revealing any spoilers, where do you hope this character ends up?)

Without revealing spoilers, I hope that Carpenter ends up in a… beautiful cabin. In nature. Maybe beside a river, but maybe not beside a river… who knows? I’ll never tell.

And also it has to be incredibly far away from all forms of civilisation, but also somehow mysteriously within a ten minute drive to a local diner, so she can have pancakes and a cappuccino every morning for breakfast.

(Q: Have you voice acted before, and if so, what kind of voice acting have you done in the past? What’s been the most interesting role you’ve ever played?)

I’ve voice acted before, both in audio drama and more commercial stuff.

I’m very lucky in that I have always been able to play really interesting badass women, and that I’ve usually been able to keep my own accent while I do it which is always a joy.

Currently, I’m also involved in Omen, the new podcast from the producers of Girl In Space. I play a fantasy pirate named Lola, and yes it is exactly as fun as it sounds.

(Q: What’s your favourite genre of literature?)

My favourite genre of literature is anything that takes a step to the left of reality, a little bit.

So if it does feature, you know, normal events or it follows a realistic storyline, I would like it to play with form a little bit, like present the story in an unusual manner. Like Arundhati Roy’s The God Of Small Things or Patricia Lockheart’s Priestdaddy – great book.

Other than that, I’m like, oh god, at least give me a ghost or something. So you know, I love horror, I love speculative fiction, dark fantasy, magical realism… I’ll read anything really.

As long as you give me a ghost or something.

(Q: Do you have a favourite work of horror fiction?)

My favourite horror story is The Yellow Wallpaper. I know it wasn’t originally written as a horror, it was a feminist critique and intented as literary fiction, but I think a lot of people do class it as gothic horror which I don’t believe detracts from its messages at all.

I’m sure that’s not a particularly unique favourite to have, but it remains one of those stories that—

I think it’s because it was written in the past, it took me by surprise when I read it. I often find that I read older classic horror stories and they’re based on fears and prejudices that inspired horror long ago, but now aren’t as effective.

Like The Doll, by Daphne Du Maurier. So that starts off with the male narrator talking about how he has “witnessed such horror” and he thinks he might be “going mad with despair”!

And I won’t spoil it – I think you can get it, it should be online to read - but you do get to the end and you’re like….. Aaaah, you’d want to cop on to yourself a bit now, like. Different folks different strokes, lad.  You know, he's dealing with a woman and her "terrible perversions" and at the end you're like 'honestly good for her!'

So to be honest, I was lulled into a sense of false security by The Yellow Wallpaper, and by the first person diary entries of a very cheerful seeming narrator. You know, it’s a classic! I knew the rough outline of how it ended. I thought I was just ticking a box on my ‘must read classic horror’ list.

But my favourite part of The Yellow Wallpaper is the ending, and it took me- Not by surprise, but by shock. The imagery of what happens at the end of the story is so absurdly disturbing, as is the tone in which it’s told, and it- ooh, it really hits me somewhere.

(Q: If you could be any monster of horror (book, story, film, or even lore), which would you be and why?)

If I could be a monster of horror in a book, story, film or lore, I think….

I think if I was going the folkloric route I’d pick the Dullahan, in Irish folklore. It’s a headless rider on a black horse that carries its own grinning head under its arm, the edges of the mouth touching both sides of the head, and the eyes constantly rolling

So where the Dullahan stops riding, a person is due to die. The Dullahan calls out the person's name, drawing away the soul of their victim, at which point the person immediately drops dead.

Now, listen to this! The Dullahan is believed to use the spine of a human corpse for a whip, and its wagon is adorned with funeral objects. It has candles in skulls to light the way, the spokes of the wheels are made from thigh bones, and the wagon's covering is made from a worm-chewed pall or dried human skin.

I mean, the aesthetic!!

(Q: That is absurdly cool. OK, next question; is there any horror story - book or film - which you wish you'd written?)

If there was any horror story book or film I wish I had written… I guess the first one that comes to mind is the 2017 film The Endless.

For anyone who hasn’t seen it, I don’t want to give a single thing away, but essentially it’s about two brothers who go back to the UFO death cult they grew up in to get closure, and one brother thinks they were always just a hippie commune, and the other brother thinks that he got them both out just before they were killed.

And I genuinely don’t want to give anything away, but it’s not a horror in the way you’re probably thinking it’s a horror. Like the people in it are not, and are never, the source of horror. The people in it are lovely. The source of horror is the growing inexplicable phenomena, and the fact that… maybe the cultists are right?

Oh! And A Dark Song, that is a brilliant film. That is incredible. So in that film, a woman hires an occultist to train her to perform this ritual that will grant them each one wish. They have to shut themselves up for months in a big old rented house, just the two of them stuck there together in the middle of nowhere.

And again, I don’t want to spoil a single thing, but they only know that the ritual has begun when strange things start happening in the house, and they can’t leave the house until it’s completed. The tension is incredible, it’s just the two of them for the whole film and they're both incredible actors . It is a masterpiece.

(Q: What would be your favourite character to voice, of any genre?)

My favourite character to voice of any genre ... I think  would love to have a crack at one of those big, larger than life, you know, that Disney villain type? I think that would be so much fun to play. You know, someone like Ursula or something? Just one of those huge, over the top villains. Not really a singer, but I'll have a stab at a musical number! I would love that, that would be so much fun.

(Q: In your writing, what and where do you draw inspiration from?)

I draw a large amount of inspiration from mythology and folklore. I think it’s an important means of understanding how people understood the world around them, and certainly in Ireland at least, it still has an influence to this day.

You know, we have trees here that grow in the middle of the road that no one is going to move because it's a fairy tree. We've got farmers who plough around a hillock in their field because that's a fairy fort. There's ghost stories and... it's still prevalent! It's still prevalent all over the country today.

But on top of that I do think that a lot of historical folklore is an untapped mine of stories and entertainment. It does seem of late that every single film is either a reboot, a remake, a prequel or a sequel or something, and sometimes you get very frustrated and you're like 'okay well if no one can come up with original ideas, here, do you want some of these?!'

Because they're great, they're so entertaining, you get a lot of bang for your buck. Folklore has a bit of everything in it, folklore and mythology. You want blood and guts? It's got it. You want romance? Sure, why not! You want endless battles between immortals? Go for it. It's an absolute mine for entertainment I think.

(Q: What do you like to do when you’re not voice acting?)

When I’m not voice acting, I like to do acting acting! I act on stage and a bit of screen, or at least I did, and hopefully when all of this is over I will one day do acting acting again.

I also write! I’ve published short stories, and I’ve written and performed in my own plays. I went on tour around Ireland last year with one of my plays and it won a couple of awards, and I won a couple of awards for it. I’m incredibly grateful I got to have that experience before everything went to absolute shite.

(Q: Do you have any other special talents?)

Do I have another special talent? I do. I’m hyperflexible so I can pop pretty much every joint in my body.

So, one second now, let me see can I-

[POPPING NOISES]

Now! Was that like ASMR? Was that nice? Probably not, it was probably disgusting. That’s my talent. I've got it on my C.V.

I can also play the flute. It's not really as impressive.

(Q: And finally...what would your advice be for anyone trying to get into voice acting?)

My advice for anyone trying to get into voice acting is that right off the bat you’re going to need the right mic and the right set up.

Your computer mic is not going to hack it. Do a bit of research, see what people are getting. I have a blue snowball microphone. It was €70.00, I know, kick in the guts, but I’d say I’ve had mine for three years now, and it’s never given me any trouble.

Except when I forget to switch my settings from the computer microphone to my snowball microphone, and I ruin an entire take, isn’t that right Jon and Muna who definitely have not witnessed that amazing piece of incompetence on my part.

So! You’ve got your mic, and the snowball is so user friendly, all you need to do is plug it into your computer and you’re ready to go.

So you’re going to need software to record and edit your takes on. Everyone is going to tell you audacity, and I’m going to tell you the same thing. It’s incredibly user friendly as well, and it’s well worth watching a tutorial on the basics, but all you’ll need to know his how to edit out your yawns and coughing, and your multiple, multiple swears. Gotta take those out. Oh, and also you'll need to know how to turn up and down the gain for when you’re shouting.

And finally – figure out how to build your blanket fort! Any recording that you do in an open room is going to sound muffled and echoey. You need to record surrounded by soft surfaces. The pros use those booths filled with squishy…. sponge stuff. But we use blanket forts, and then it’s the weirdest slumber party ever for everyone.

Finally, if you want to get into audio drama then the best way to start auditioning is to get on twitter and start following podcasts and other audio-drama actors. I have never, ever met a group more generous with spreading information and recommending people for roles. It’s a gorgeous community, it really is. And I think there’s a boom in audio-drama lately, I think it is really coming into its own as a podcast medium, and I’m thrilled to be a part of it.

Oh yes, and one last thing. Make the faces when you’re doing the lines. The audience can’t see you, but does make a difference.

That was me, Méabh de Brún. Thank you so much for listening, as you can probably tell myself and Carpenter are so, so incredibly similar, we both hate talking so much(!) But thank you for hanging in there, and thank you so much for listening to The Silt Verses, I am thrilled to be a part of this brilliant show.