Sinead and The Dirt Birds

Dundalk native Sinead Culbert has become an internet sensation after clocking up over 71,000 views on Facebook for ‘ Tips from Da Town’, a video tutorial showing how to get that ‘ Dundalk Shtyle’ essential for a night out in Ridleys or Brubakers.

Sinead and her partner in comedy Sue Collins of The Nualas have struck gold with their ‘Dirt Bird’ sketches which they began posting on Facebook in July.

The majority of the sketches feature conversations between the fictional Dublin mums Carmel and Debs and competative mothers Eleanor and Eimear.

‘ Tips from Da Town’ sees them introducing Dundalk woman Dee who is presenting a video tutorial on how to apply make up with her friend Andrea as model.

The video has been shared over 71,000 times and was picked up by The Sun website.

‘I met Sue on the Irish comedy circuit and we began writing and performing together,’ says Sinead, who cut her teeth on the stage with youth theatre in Dundalk back in the 1990s.

‘We have written scripts for three sitcoms, one of which was optioned and developed by BBC 3, although it never went to full production. We worked with them for three years and it was like a comedy master class and we really honed our skils together.’

‘We had all this material that we had written over the years and were looking for a platform to show it when someone mentioned putting them up on Facebook.’

Since then they have posted a number of short sketches which have become hugely popular over a short period of time.

‘We both love doing accents and a lot of the material is based on conversations that we have our shelves about dieting and parenting,’ says Sinead, who is the mother of two children.

She feels that ‘modern life is so stressful that we just want to go out and give people a laugh.’

‘Stand up is a real challenge, you put yourself on stage and you are vulnerable and people either like you or they don’t.’

Having got her first experience on stage with the youth theatre group run by Mel O’Loan back in the 1990s, Sinead left town when she finished school.

‘I did youth theatre when I was 14 or 15 and I remember going to Dublin for a Youth Theatre Festival,’ she recalls.

She then did a year of theatre studies, before deciding to get a degree and then a Masters in Modern Drama Studies at UCD.

‘I was working a lot in Dublin on the fringe theatre, putting on shows in different venues such as The Crypt but it’s very hard to make money.’

She took a short show to the Edinburgh Festival which did very well and then focussed on writing comedy, getting nominations for her work.

Now, Facebook is giving her a whole new audience and she says that herself and Sue would love to take ‘ The Dirt Birds’ on tour.