Chris Walley
Chris Walley is an actor, born 1995.
Cork produced him, and so did the role that made him. Walley was barely into his twenties when he was cast as Jock O'Keeffe in The Young Offenders, the 2016 Irish comedy about two bicycle thieves chasing a lost bale of cocaine, and the part has followed him ever since, first into the television series RTE and the BBC made out of it, and then into everyone's shorthand for him.
The performance earns the attention. Jock is a specific kind of Irish comic creation, a boy with total confidence and no information, and Walley plays him without ever winking at the audience, which is why the show survives the jump from film to sitcom. He then won an Olivier Award for the West End revival of The Lieutenant of Inishmore, which is serious evidence that the comedy is technique rather than luck.
Film has mostly used him as texture so far. He is a private in 1917, a crewman in The Last Voyage of the Demeter, and a supporting presence in Unwelcome and Pixie. Television has been better to him: DC Birdy Bird in Bloodlands and Sean O'Shea in Bodkin both give him room to be something other than funny. He is early enough in all this that the shape of the career is still genuinely open.
Movies (5)
TV (3)
Where to start with Chris Walley
The Young Offenders is the starting point, the television series grown out of the 2016 film of the same name (the film itself is not among the credits listed here). It is broad, warm, extremely Cork, and the double act at its centre is the whole engine.
After that, Bodkin makes the best case for him as a straight actor, a black comedy about a podcast crew in which he has to play sincerity against a cast of frauds. Bloodlands is grim Northern Irish crime drama and he is the decent one in it.
The film credits are supporting work: 1917 uses him for a handful of shots, The Last Voyage of the Demeter gives him rather more, and Pixie and Unwelcome are both odd Irish genre pieces worth a look if that register appeals.