My great gran of Green Gables Teen TV star reveals inspiration
Amybeth Mcnulty, 16, from Co Donegal, plays the lead in Anne With An E as an 11-year-old orphan who finds an unlikely home with a hardened spinster and her soft-spoken bachelor brother.
The couple mistakenly end up with Anne having applied to adopt a boy, but end up falling for the girl who uses her imagination to cope with her harrowing childhood being shunted from one cruel home to another.
The second season of Netflix’s series based on the 19th century children’s classic hits our screens this week with themes of prejudice, feminism, bullying and racism seen through the eyes of its starry-eyed now 14-year-old protagonist.
The Donegal teenager said the book touched a personal chord with her: “My great grandmother, Martha, was hired at 11 years old to be a worker to people.
“I dedicate the role to her because it definitely chimes in on some of the things that she would gone through.
“As far as I know it was two men and things would happen where they would say ‘go get me a glass of water’ and if she got back to them and there wasn’t still bubbles in the water from her pouring it in, she would have to go back downstairs and do it until she got it right.
COMPETITION
“She was on my mum’s side. My grandmother told me about it. It’s a shame I never met her, but I really did draw on her circumstances.”
The teen beat off competition from over 1,900 girls to land the role when she was 14 and has started to experience the first inklings of fame since the first season won huge plaudits last year.
She said: “I did get recognised a few times in Letterkenny which is still very strange to me.
“Girls my age say, ‘it’s amazing you’re doing it’. It’s kind of nice for me to say you can do this if you work hard and have a love for it.”
The series, the most recent adaptation of the 1908 novel, is the creation of Emmy-winning Breaking Bad screenwriter and producer Moira Walley-beckett.
Amybeth said the second series sees Anne settling into her adopted home and coping with issues in the world which still resonate in the 21st century.
She said: “She is not afraid she is going to get sent away so we see her become comfortable.
“She is 14 now so we get to see the trials that come along with that and we’re bringing in new characters and topics like bullying, sexism and racism which I’m excited for people to see.”
Amybeth is bowled over by winning the role of a life-time: “I’d been lucky to do radio drama and RTE things. The opportunity to work with Netflix was wild but I’m still just a wee girl from Donegal.”
On screen Amybeth draws parallels to a young Saoirse Ronan but she said she would be “humbled and honoured” to be compared to the triple Oscar nominee.
She said: “She has been my inspiration since I was young. I felt a connection to her because she started when she was very young and she’s an Irish actress.”
Despite her Irishness, Amybeth is not a natural redhead but she said she has grown very fond of her dyed titian locks.
“I’m normally a blonde. The red takes As Anne With An E
a long time to fade out but I prefer red hair so I’ll probably keep it for a while.”
While she has proved to be a master at the Canadian accent, she has the familiar experience of many travellers of being told she sounds Canadian in Ireland and very Irish in Canada. “I’m like ‘No, I’m Irish, I promise I’m Irish!’”, she says.
And it can have the reverse effect in Canada: “They can barely understand me when I’m talking normally there”, she says laughing.
After spending eight months on the Canadian set filming the second season, Amybeth, who is an only child, said she is delighted to be back home.
She added: “It’s just so lovely to be at home and in my own bed surrounded by people I’m so close to.
“I really appreciate the time I have at home. The support from all my family has just been so overwhelming.” And the teenager, who has been home-schooled all her life, has a remarkably sanguine approach to her future on screen, saying her dream would be a long career.
But she added: “If life doesn’t work that way and this is the last thing I ever work in I would be more than happy with that.
“But if life is kind to me and I get to do this for a longer period of time then I would absolutely love to.”
Anne With An E Season 2 is available to watch on Netflix from Friday, July 6.
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