Автор: Neala Johnson

Had Cillian Murphy taken a different fork in life's path, you could be sitting here reading about a rock star, not a movie star.

Ten years ago, Murphy was busy on the Irish music scene, playing in a band with his younger brother, Páidi.

The future star of such films as 28 Days Later... and Batman Begins was at that stage a rhythm guitarist.

"Then we got rid of the singer because he was a plonker, so I started doing the singing as well," Murphy says.

With Murphy as frontman, the band was offered a deal by a London record label. They knocked it back.
"There was a number of reasons for that. First, it was a pretty s---ty deal," he says with a laugh.

"Second, my brother was still at school, and it was just not right."

In hindsight, he's glad they didn't take up the offer, "because it's a tough industry, a nasty industry in a lot of ways.

"Lots of my friends are still involved and a lot of them are still living hand to mouth. I love playing music, but you have to be Coldplay to be comfortable, it seems."

So the Murphy boys went back to school. Páidi grew up to be a product designer; Cillian managed 1 1/2 years of a law degree before his need to perform got the better of him.

"I suppose you have a performance gene and it needs to come out," Murphy says.

"It was coming out through the music, but then I saw a play—a version of Clockwork Orange—in a nightclub, and it was amazing.

"I met the director and asked if he had any parts coming up, and he said 'Well, I have this little play . . .' "

That play was Disco Pigs, a tough tale about what happens when childhood sweethearts grow up.

Murphy toured it around Ireland, then to London. After a few bit parts in other movies, he took the lead in the 2001 film version of Disco Pigs.

Music had to take a back seat.

Performance, he says, is a means of self-expression.

"You can do that through music or acting, and I found that this became more important to me.

"It was gradual, it wasn't an epiphany. I did a play, then stopped and went back to music, then got another part . . . I gradually began to acquire the passion for it."

Murphy's movie breakthrough, 28 Days Later..., came a year after Disco Pigs.

The zombie film set in a deserted London was a sleeper hit in Britain and America, revived Trainspotting director Danny Boyle's career and made a star of Murphy.

But the Hollywood offers that came his way were predictable: more zombie flicks and teen roles.

So Murphy hid in the theatre and waited for one decent film script (preferably attached to a top-line director) to float to the top.

It's the way he still approaches his career, hand-picking mainstream fare such as Wes Craven's Red Eye or Batman and smaller films such as Girl with a Pearl Earring, Neil Jordan's fantastical transvestite tale Breakfast on Pluto and The Wind That Shakes the Barley, the Cannes-topping film he chased in order to work with director Ken Loach.

The Wind That Shakes the Barley took Murphy, who now lives in London, home to Ireland's County Cork, where he was raised. He even lived with his parents, sleeping in his childhood bedroom, during filming.

"Ken cast people from Cork because it's a Cork story. So you can rely on your instincts because it's in your DNA, it's part of who you are," Murphy says.

The film is set during Ireland's 1920s civil war, when young men fought to free their country from the British Empire, then turned on each other. Like most Loach films, it is heavy going but rewarding.

And it got 30-year-old Murphy thinking about the history of his divided nation.

Ireland's "Troubles" still have a strong resonance for the younger generation in the south, he says.

"Some of my friends know a lot about it, some of my friends couldn't care less.

"Before I got involved in this film I would have had superficial knowledge of it, but wouldn't have read any of the books.

"But it's become a phenomenal runaway hit in Ireland and everyone's gone to see it, young and old alike, so it's obviously striking some sort of chord.

"So maybe people are a bit more energised to find out about it."

One Barley scene in particular brought the plight of the Irish fighters into sharp focus: Murphy must shoot one of his own, a teenager accused of treason.

"People who talk about the glorification of the IRA . . . that scene answers that," he says.

"What was extraordinary is I was 29 when I shot the film, but a lot of those kids who were involved back then were 20 or 21 . . . look what I was doing when I was 20 and 21, d'you know?

"They were sacrificing their lives for what they believed in, for a free Ireland, and that's extraordinary.
"We had to treat their memories with respect and sensitivity."