Saipan: Éanna Hardwicke on playing Roy Keane in fiery 2002 World Cup drama

For a remote island in the western Pacific Ocean, the former outpost of Saipan has hosted its fair share of prolific battles throughout history. As war raged in the Pacific in 1944, it became a key battleground when the US Marine Corps and Army landed on its shores for a bloody conflict against the Empire of Japan which claimed the lives of more than 30,000 troops in a month. 

Then, nearly 60 years later, came a conflict that was altogether less devastating but, like the events of 1944, had a considerable impact on a nation back home: the fierce battle of footballer Roy Keane and Ireland manager Mick McCarthy in 2002. 

When Keane was sent home from Ireland’s pre-World Cup camp in Saipan by McCarthy that year, its impact shattered and split a nation in the way that only great conflicts can. On one side stood the star captain and midfielder who had repeatedly criticised the Football Association of Ireland (FAI’s) preparations for the upcoming tournament in Japan and South Korea. Or in Keane’s opinion, the lack thereof.  

On the other stood McCarthy, the no-nonsense Yorkshireman (though Irish through his father and the captain of Jack Charlton’s Italia 90 squad) who made the bold call to finally send Roy Keane home after a 10-minute diatribe in which Keane branded him a “fucking wanker” and told him he could “stick your World Cup up your arse.” 

This enduring chapter in Irish history is immaculately presented in Saipan, the new film by directors Lisa Barros D’Sa and Glenn Leyburn which expertly captures the conflict between Keane and McCarthy, its impact back home, and – in many of the film’s unexpectedly hilarious moments – the unspoken fact that the situation was in many ways a comedy of errors. 

Steve Coogan is sublime as McCarthy, but it’s a film defined by the performance of rising Irish star Éanna Hardwicke, who delivers a tour-de-force as fellow Cork man Keane. He gives a transformative turn as the hardened and jaded midfielder, and it’s a huge contrast from the effortlessly warm 29-year-old who offers me a coffee within seconds of meeting him at a central London restaurant. 

“I read Paul Fraser’s script and I remember thinking, ‘This is not what I expected,’” Hardwicke explains. “It’s not a biopic of Mick McCarthy or Roy Keane and I had no interest in making such a film. What I did have an interest in, I suppose, was this thing that didn’t happen, Roy not going to the World Cup, and how it occurred on this Pacific Island 23 years ago.”

He adds: “It was quite a minor event globally, really, but it became quite seismic. I was interested in how that speaks to the Ireland that we live in now and perhaps the psyche of these men, these athletes, living under intense pressure. It was surprising, unusual and fresh.” 

There’s huge nostalgia in the film, too, Hardwicke explains. The conflict between the two men took place during the Celtic Tiger economy boom in Ireland, as a stand-up clip from Tommy Tiernan placed within the film reminds us. The eventual economic crash may have been devastating, but the film’s wider context allows it to act as a pretty powerful time capsule of a largely euphoric Ireland in the early 2000s. 

“If I close my eyes, I can see the exact green of the Ireland jersey and I can see the stickers for that World Cup sticker book,” grins Hardwicke, who was six at the time of the tournament. 

“I can see the sponsorships, the logos, the visuals and the sounds. That’s one of the great things that film can do, and certainly this film. It immerses you in a time you don’t get to live through anymore. It was such a seminal time, and I was only six. You have a couple of seminal memories when you’re a kid. For some reason, one of them is watching Roberto Carlos score a free kick. One of the others is watching Ireland play in the World Cup. The film brought that to life again for me.”

‘He’s a man from Cork, a man from Mayfield who found himself at the highest possible level in the biggest game on the planet,” was the brief that Hardwicke received from writer Paul Fraser when it came to inhabiting the psyche of one of Ireland’s greatest players at one of the most challenging moments of his career.  

It’s a performance that, all being well, should see Hardwicke become one of Ireland’s most prominent big-screen faces. He was educated at Dublin’s prestigious Lir Academy, a year below Paul Mescal, and, rather ironically, first found acting after he realised a footballing career wasn’t on the horizon. 

“I thought I’d be a footballer and if I can’t do that, I’ll be an actor,” he recalls. “Both very stable careers! But my mum’s a guidance counsellor and her ethos was always just find what you love and try and do it. She never put me off, and encouraged me to try acting classes. I just had that feeling that, you know, you hope that every child gets in some part of their life, which is like, ‘I enjoy being part of this tribe of people.’”

His debut came as a teenager in Irish playwright Conor McPherson’s 2009 supernatural drama The Eclipse, while more recently he was seen as a chilling murderer in the BBC’s BAFTA-winning The Sixth Commandment alongside Timothy Spall. That versatility is on display here too. Hardwicke is uncanny at showing both the introverted Cork man that is Roy Keane, but also the individual who isn’t afraid to come out of his shell and let his opinion be heard in all quarters if he believes it’s for the sake of the team. 

“You have to close your eyes, forget all the images you have of the person, forget the public figure and just play him in that situation,” reflects Hardwicke. 

“I was really lucky because it was such a public event and there was loads of interviews, but the blanks you do fill in are the stuff that happens behind the closed doors. The stuff we can’t know because we weren’t there.” 

Or, to put it another way, the pressure cooker tension and terse words exchanged between the men in the film. Many of their conversations are an imagining of how things might have panned out between Roy and Mick before their almighty showdown, but the chemistry between Hardwicke and an excellent Coogan allows it all to feel very, very real.  

“I’ve been a massive fan of Steve’s since I was a kid from watching Alan Partridge and The Trip, but then from his work in Philomena and playing Jimmy Savile in The Reckoning, he’s that rare actor that can play dramatically too,” he reflects. 

“One of the lovely, unexpected things about this was getting to rehearse with Steve and seeing his experience across all different mediums because, in a way, everything that happened with Roy was a really funny situation. It was terrible, of course, but so much of it was a catastrophe. And so much of why it was a catastrophe is quite funny. One football moment being turned into a national talking point. We wanted to play that situation in a way that can end up being comic rather than making a mockery of it. And what I learnt from Steve was so much about the precision that that requires.  

“He’s just extraordinary to work opposite because he’s so spontaneous and subtle and so much of what he does is outside of the lines as well. It’s all about these subtle looks. I was nervous because I think he’s brilliant, but then the great news is that someone like that can really bring you up.”

The film also stops short of taking a side. Hardwicke admits there is a “fatalism” in the story between the two men, but says that it’s ultimately a story about two men with different approaches and both with some very valid, albeit wildly different, points about the qualities needed in a team. And one that, some 23 years later, still remains a defining chapter in Irish history. 

“One of the things that I found really fascinating with the script was that it asked enduring questions about Irishness, both in a sporting sense, but also economically and politically. Do we see ourselves as minor players who are there to make up the numbers? Or, as Roy saw it, the desire to compete at the highest, highest level and not play down for anyone,” he explains. 

Hardwicke adds: “One thing I love about telling a story that’s only 20 years ago or so is that it’s just enough time that you can see what’s changed. 

“You’ve got enough distance and the Ireland we live in now, I feel at least on the global stage, is very different. I think there is a sense that, culturally and politically, there’s more of an independent mindedness. Whether it’s Kneecap or CMAT, a sense that people are taking to the stage and really taking that space.”

When this film is released, you sense that Hardwicke’s name, already in the ascendancy, will take up a whole new space of its own.