Dubai: Colin Farrell is a man who has always been in the right place at the right time.
At 19 he was approached by Louis Walsh and asked to be in Boyzone and at 21 it was Hollywood director Joel Schumacher who "gave the kid a chance".
"That's really how they talk," said Farrell yesterday at an In Conversation With... session at the Dubai International Film Festival.
"Hey kid," he continued in an American drawl, his UAE audience already laughing. "You wanna come to America?"
A native of Dublin, Farrell began turning heads in Hollywood when he starred in Schumacher's Tigerland more than ten years ago in 2000.
"I went to the US and it was a pretty lonely place," said the Irish actor.
"It's hard to get emotional when you're doing eight meetings a day where the most enthusiastic thing someone says to you is ‘Hey you're Irish — how's that?' It was depressing and nothing looked like it was going to happen half the time," he said.
"After three weeks of meetings — staying in a Holiday Inn — I didn't get anything. It was only when I came home that Josh was looking for actors for Tigerland and things started to change. I felt very lonely and didn't like it much."
Farrell agreed to hold the chat session after he was unexpectedly forced to cancel interviews on Thursday to promote his latest film The Way Back by Peter Weir.
Still running a high temperature Farrell arrived wearing a black shirt, almost unbuttoned to his waist revealing a smooth chest, and grey trousers.
Failed chance
And while he tried his best to steer discussion in the direction of his films, conversation kept coming back to his failed chance as a pop star.
"I swear I never wanted to actually be in Boyzone," he insisted as the crowd clapped and cheered, he was finally going to talk about the audition.
"I was bored," he added. "I was never good at studying. Just didn't don't how to apply myself. So I went along. Louis actually saw me in a club in Ireland. I was wearing leather trousers and a rubber t-shirt and he asked me there and then to be in the band. After two renditions of Careless Whisper it was all over. I've really never looked back. If I was in Boyzone I couldn't have been an actor. Take your pick."
