I’m just over the moon with baby luna and my gritty new crime role!
The image that actor Lisa Dwan posted on her Instagram account shortly after the birth of her first child spoke louder than any part she had played on film, stage or small screen. Quite simply, at the age of 43 and in the middle of Covid lockdown in 2021, her life had changed forever — and in ways that she had never planned and that were totally the result of chance. In the August 2021 photograph, Lisa is lying in her hospital bed, smiling serenely and looking relaxed as she cradles her daughter. ‘Luna Mary Dwan born at 11:44am today 6lbs 12oz,’ she wrote. ‘We are utterly besotted!’
‘Becoming a mum is the best thing that ever happened to me,’ the Athlone-born actor tells Magazine this week. ‘I’m very lucky in the sense that I had her quite late. I had an amazing time in my 20s and 30s. I toured the world. I did everything that I ever wanted to do career-wise and lovewise and travel-wise.
‘I was ready to have her,’ she reflects. ‘That’s not to say that people don’t have happy, meaningful lives without children — they do. But she has given my life a purpose that it didn’t have.’
The actress will hit our screens tonight in the lead role of RTÉ’s new drama, Blackshore.
It’s the station’s latest crossover drama
Becoming a mum is the best thing that ever happened to me. She has given my life a purpose it didn’t have
that combines crime, intrigue and family secrets and comes in the wake of the success of shows such as Smother.
Lisa takes on the role of Fia Lucey, a focused, ambitious detective who is riven with secrets and guilt from her own tragic past. But the past is brought back into sharp focus for Fia after a series of ‘undue force’ allegations sees her banished from her high-octane position to the rural outpost of Blackshore — a backwater that is uncomfortably close to her home town.
The strong character and gritty themes attracted Lisa immediately and she regards the role as a real challenge.
‘It was a thrilling show to work on,’ she says. ‘I was every day inspired by the hugely talented people that I worked with on Blackshore.
‘When I showed my partner the script, he was like, “oh my God, that’s you”.’
Focus and ambition in her career have certainly been hallmarks of Lisa’s approach to acting.
She is perhaps best known for her acclaimed interpretations of Samuel Beckett’s plays, bringing her one-woman shows across the world. Most recently she played Winnie in Happy Days, directed by Trevor Nunn, for which she won widespread praise.
She has also taken a leading role in the hugely popular Netflix drama series Top Boy, written by Belfast author Ronan Bennett. It’s another show with very gritty themes, about two drug dealers who ply their lucrative trade on a local authority housing estate in East London.
More recently, she starred in the BBC series Bloodlands, alongside James Nesbitt.
Acting has been a part of Lisa’s life from a very early age. She was just three years old when she discovered she had an innate talent for performance.
She had her first dance lesson at the age of three, and less than a decade later, when she was 12, she was performing with Rudolf Nureyev in Coppélia, when the star visited Ireland with the San José Cleveland Ballet. While still in primary school Lisa was appearing on the biggest stage in Ireland.
‘My first professional engagement was when I was dancing at aged 12 in what was then the Point Theatre,’ she recalls.
Ballet had been Lisa’s first choice of stage career. She left school at 14 after winning a ballet scholarship to the Dorothy Stevens School of Ballet in Leeds, and later attended the Lewis Ballet Company in London. However, Lisa had to abandon dance after a cartilage injury to her knee. After that, it was a series of acting roles.
‘I love being on the stage and to act and perform,’ she says.
Her father, Liam Dwan, was known as an amateur actor in her home town of Athlone, in Co. Westmeath.
‘My parents didn’t push me in any particular way. My father had a reputation for being amazing on stage. So, I kind of grew up hearing, “Saw your father on stage” but my parents didn’t push me one way or another. But it was something that I just had an instinctive passion for.’
With acting coursing through her veins and a sense of youthful adventure, Lisa embarked on her acting career.
In a previous interview she admitted to having been ‘a blonde, blue-eyed, pretty actress playing one vacuous role after another’.
But, determined not to be ‘just another beautiful blonde’, Lisa developed a strong affinity with the works of Samuel Beckett and his plays set her on a new artistic path.
‘I don’t miss the vacuous years — I love playing meaty, gritty roles and I really think roles are changing for women,’ she says.
‘I carved my own path by touring the world with my one-woman Beckett plays, which I produced and co-directed. So, I made my own way in the world doing that. It could be extremely lonely but also
immensely rewarding. But I have no regrets,’she a dds.
So with three decades of performing and acting behind her, it comes as a surprise to hear Lisa say she was born to beam um.
It was during lockdown that all of her stars aligned, when a ‘kind, handsome American man ’, who was at J ermyn Street Theatre in London on the same night as she was there to watch a trio of short Beckett p lays, s auntered i nto h er l ife.
‘He is phenomenal. His name is Paul. He also has a daughter who I ado recalled Lola. He works in AI ,’ she explains.
‘We were friends during the lockdown and something very deep transpired between u s.’
That d eep c onnection s aw t hem b ecome parents t o d aughter L una.
‘Luna w as b orn o n a b lue m oon a nd t here were a lot of connections between my p artner and I on the moon – and the p articular moon she was born on was a double b lue m oon,’ s he s ays, c onjuring u p a real s ense o f f ate i n t he b onds t hey s hare. ‘I worked in Beckett’s Happy Days right u p u ntil t he w eek s he w as b orn. The c haracter w as b uried u p t o h er waist, so I was nine months pregnant on stage buried up to my waist. I remember saying at the time that I have an obligation to keep both our hearts b eating. So I feel that way with keeping up workandalson ourishing h er.’
Bouncing straight back into work, Lisa took the lead role in B lackshore, which is set to begin on RTÉ t onight.
‘Fia i s a f antastic c haracter t o p lay,’ s he says. I’m very privileged to be Irish and working now and to be working with great t alent.’
Lisa has now settled down to a life of domestic bliss in London with partner Paul a nd b aby L una. B ut s he s ays s he s till gets back home to Athlone regularly to see f amily a nd f riends.
‘I get home as much as I can,’ she says. ‘It’s a bit more of a journey now with a baby, but we do make it back as much a s p ossible.’
With Paul hailing from across the Atlantic, s he e nvisions a f uture f illed w ith transatlantic t rips — b ut s he h asn’t e ntirely ruled o ut a m ove b ack t o I reland.
‘We c hat r egularly a nd, l ike a ll c ouples, share b ig d reams o f w here w e w ould l ove to l ive. B ut a t t he m oment L ondon s uits u s and o ur l ife. B ut w ho k nows?’
I worked in Beckett’s Happy Days up until the week she was born. My character was buried up to her waist, so I was nine months pregnant on stage buried up to my waist!