NORMAL People actor Paul Mescal has spoken about how he is "incredibly passionate" about GAA and of his pride at bringing the game to an international audience.
The Irish actor, who has been catapulted to fame for his role as Connell Waldron, also joked that "there’s no better item to be photographed in than a pair of Maynooth GAA shorts".
The 24-year-old, who hails from Maynooth, stars in the hugely popular new series Normal People, the TV adaptation of Sally Rooney's novel that hit television screens five weeks ago alongside co-star Daisy Edgar-Jones.
Speaking yesterday to Marty Morrissey on RTÉ Radio One, Mescal also spoke about raffling off one of his famous 'Connell chains' for the Pieta house charity.
"The chain definitely wasn’t on the list of things I thought people would notice," he said.
"It’s grown arms and legs like for a while it kind of became its own entity. I'm raffling off one of my own for Pieta House and we've raised over €53K as of now.
Read More: Normal People’s Paul Mescal to raffle off his chain for charity
"That's only a week into it, I couldn’t have imagined that response.
"I’m over the moon and incredibly grateful to everyone who’s donated so far because it’s an incredible organisation very close to my heart."
Mescal, a former Kildare under-21 Gaelic footballer, has also seen the O'Neill’s shorts his character wears in the show attract much attention.
Asked it is part of a plan to introduce Gaelic games to a global audience, he said: "It’s hilarious".
"I’m aware that, sometimes on my way to the shops I’m being photographed," he said.
"But, to be honest, there’s no better item to be photographed in than a pair of Maynooth GAA shorts.
"One of the things I’m incredibly passionate about is GAA, and I get to bring that to not only a British and American audience, and a domestic audience here, but now the show’s been bought in Brazil, Switzerland . . . the distributors have picked up I think it’s 22 countries.
"So they’ll get to that scene (where Connell’s playing Gaelic football) and wonder 'What in God’s name are these mental people playing?’"
Receiving international fame as a result of his new role, he said it was something he was still getting used to.
"It’s nuts is the only way I can describe it," he said.
"We kind of experience the fame side of it through social media and when you put the phones and laptops aside it’s hard to see what it looks like in reality because the world is standing still at the moment."
"Some of it requires a bit of adjustment."
