How agreeable are you? Oh, I think I’m fairly agreeable. I suppose like everybody, when it suits me, I’m very agreeable. I have very little controversy. Plus, when you’re doing what you want to do and everything goes smoothly, there’s no need for controversy. I go with the flow most of the time.
What’s your middle name and what do you think of it? My middle name is Francis, after my father. I’d have no problem with it. I don’t use my middle name, I just use Daniel O’Donnell, because I’d be writing things and I just thought, ‘Ach it’s too much bother’. So, on my passport and everything it’s just Daniel O’Donnell, but my name is actually Daniel Francis Noel. I was born at Christmas.
Where is your favourite place in Ireland? Donegal is definitely my favourite place. I just love it. But I suppose if I had to pick somewhere else, another county, I would think west Cork is beautiful. Glandore and that. There’s just some beautiful little villages by the sea. I suppose, for me, being by the sea is the thing that attracts me most because I was brought up by the sea. Wicklow’s a beautiful county, too.
There’s so many beautiful places in Ireland. I travel a lot obviously, and the beauty of Ireland is that every 30 yards you have a new view. I chose to live in Donegal. I lived away for a while, but when I was able to move back. I moved back and I wouldn’t have any thought of moving somewhere else permanently.
The White Lotus review: Season three has its finger on the pulse to an almost excruciating degree
The fall and rise of Orla Kiely: ‘As horrible as it was, you just have to get on with it. There are things we won’t do again’
Competitive parenting in China: ‘School starts at 7.30am and I pick him up at 9.30 in the evening. We usually arrive home around 10pm. Then he studies again’
Describe yourself in three words. Calm. Fussy. Content.
When did you last get angry? I don’t get angry very much to tell you the truth. I can’t remember when I got angry last.
I’m in Tenerife at the minute, and one of those scooters passed me and I didn’t hear it. And almost only when it was passing me I realised that it was passing me and I thought, ‘God that could have hit me’. And I was annoyed for just a few seconds. He had gone too far for me to show my annoyance.
What have you lost that you would like to have back? I have no attachment at all to physical things. Absolutely no attachment. I can’t think of one thing that I couldn’t live without physically. So, from that point of view, I haven’t lost anything like that. I suppose friends that have passed away, family that have passed away. That’s the only thing that you would wish to have.
What’s your strongest childhood memory? Days at the beach at home. I loved the summertime and the beach. And just the freedom of it.
Where do you come in your family’s birth order, and has this defined you? I’m the fifth, the youngest. And probably, maybe, I got off lighter than the rest. I was young when my father died, so there was only me and my mother. I suppose from that point of view I was treated differently from the rest. My father dying when I was young didn’t have an adverse impact on me. I didn’t have a sense of loss. I was too young. The older ones certainly did, but I didn’t.
I was six when my father died. I suppose it made the bond with my mother stronger, because there was only me and her. Once I got to 10 everyone else was away. There was nobody a lot of the time at home. So my mother, I suppose, did spoil me. Sure, there was only the two of us.
What do you expect to happen when you die? Well, what I hope to happen is that we’ll go to heaven and it will be just beautiful, I hope. And that we’ll somehow meet those that went before us. We’re promised that and that’s my belief. For people that believe, I think that’s what helps them accept the loss of loved ones.
When were you happiest? I’m happy pretty much all of the time. I’m blessed that I have grandchildren. I was talking to them this morning. We’re going to Disney World and we have only five sleeps left and they’re excited. And I’m excited. They bring us great joy. We’re going with them for a couple of weeks. We’re blessed really to have that joy in our lives.
What actor would play you in a biopic of your life? He’d have to be fairly laid back, anyway. Ah sure, why wouldn’t I pick Paul Mescal? I don’t know if I’d wear the GAA shorts as short as he does. I admire him greatly. I don’t know him at all, but anything I see about him I just think he comes across just as a lovely person. He’s always laughing and always happy.
And it’s so nice for somebody like him to get the opportunities he’s got. It’s fantastic. Himself and Saoirse Ronan. Isn’t it great two young people from Ireland are so up there at the top of the profession.
What’s your biggest career/personal regret? I don’t really have a career regret, to tell you the truth. I’m glad, and I’ve been very fortunate the way it worked out, that I got to do what I have done for so many years. I couldn’t say anything about that.
I suppose, a personal regret? I’m not somebody who looks back on what I don’t have or didn’t have. I’m grateful for what I do have. I don’t long for the past; I’m grateful for today. I can’t say I’ve a regret and I’m not going to make one up.
Have you any psychological quirks? These are things I think you’d need to ask Majella to see if I’ve any odd things about me. I suppose for me I always like when I’m singing with somebody for them to be on my left. And I always like as soon as I get up in the morning to make the bed. I like to look back and the bed is made. I like a bit of organisation around me.
In conversation with Jen Hogan
