HE WAS a criminal in the show and it seems fiction does indeed reflect reality—though maybe not on the same scale.
A Reddit user took to r/Ireland this morning to regale users with a hilarious story of the time he bumped into the actor Gerard McSorley in a pub in Ireland.
The Father Ted actor, who played Fr Todd Unctious in the Christmas Special ‘A Christmassy Ted’, approached Reddit user u/Padlington and his friends as they were smoking ‘the quare shtuff’ in a smoking area.
Their short meeting led to plot twists and revelations that wouldn’t be out of place in the popular Channel 4 sitcom.
In a wonderfully Irish colloquial manner, the user wrote:
“I feel like everyone has some sort of Father Ted related story, so here’s mine.
So about 3 years ago, as part of my apprenticeship, I was sent to a Fás Centre in Gweedore, Co. Donegal for about 6 months.
Met a lot of new people, and it was a genuinely great place, if you get the chance you should head up! Anyway, I had just moved up there and was renting a house with 5 other lads.
One night, we decided to go to the pub a little bit further from where we were living, and meet up with a few locals. The pub was hopping, craic was 90.
Me and two of the boys go outside the front door for a smoke, and a bit of fresh air, when a man walks up to us.
“Well lads, that wouldn’t be hash ye’re smoking is it?” He says to us.
The boys freeze, obviously thinking it’s a guard.
Your man says, “Ah don’t be worrying, I’m not a guard”
The boys calm, and say that they’re just smoking some weed. They offer him some, and he has a few drags.
He proceeds to tell us, that he is actually the actor who played Father Todd Unctious.
Sure obviously we thought that was class, being in Father Ted and all that.
So he goes on his way and we’re sat outside the pub laughing away.
The boys switch to cigarettes, and I’m still just getting some air.
10 minutes pass from the departure of our Father Ted friend, and a guard comes up to the smoking area of the pub.
He asks had we seen “Gerard McSorley, The actor from Father Ted.” I said nothing thinking I would somehow end up in trouble, and the lads said they hadn’t seen him.
“We were told he was headed up this way by a local, there’s a warrant out for his arrest.” says the guard.
We ask what for, but the guard won’t tell us.
A day or two passes, and I had told my dad that I met this actor from Father Ted.
Within minutes, he sends me this glorious article.
Our little Father Ted friend, had a warrant out for his arrest, for kicking over some flower pots, outside a bank.
Not only that, but when summoned to court, didn’t show.
Just to really get the point across, SUMMONED TO COURT. For kicking over flower pots.”
Believe it or not, McSorley had a few weeks earlier gotten into a disagreement with a bank manager in his hometown of Bunbeg, County Donegal, and took his anger out by kicking over some flower pots which were situated outside the doors of the bank.
He never showed up to his court case—possibly thinking it wasn’t a big deal—and was then technically a fugitive.
Eventually McSorley was brought to justice and paid a finance-crippling €40 for the damages.
At least he wasn’t trying to steal the Reddit user’s Golden Cleric Award this time.
