Iconic Sligo landmarks and the influence of WB Yeats feature in film with Pierce Brosnan

The film was partly shot in Yeats country in Sligo, with stunning aerial shots of Drumcliffe Church and graveyard, the Lake Isle of Inisfree and Ben Bulben.

The influence of Yeats and the power of his work is discussed by President Michael D Higgins, Ambassador Daniel Mulhall and Pierce Brosnan.

Carlow director Frank Mannion spoke to an all-star cast with Irish connections, including President Michael D Higgins, Us President Joe Bien, Prince Albert 11 of Monaco, Bob Geldof, Pierce Brosnan, Jessie Buckley, Sharon Horgan, Jeremy Irons, Andrew Scott, Rachael Blackmore, Michael Smurfit and Usain Bolt and others as he found out their thoughts on Ireland and the Irish.

And he found that Sligo’s own WB Yeats and Jack B Yeats were big influences on a few of the afore mentioned and some of the film was shot in Drumcliffe in Sligo.

But making the film Mannion found that Ireland’s greatest export is not U2, Guinness, Kerrygold or whiskey…it is its ten million people who have left these shores and it has given the country incredible soft power from JFK to current US President Joe Biden.

“The film came out on Monday and is a feature documentary that celebrates everything that is good about being Irish.

“Pierce Brosnan is one of the main features and we also talked to Daniel Mulhall ex Irish ambassador to Britain and there is a strong Sligo connection here as we talked about WB Yeats and the power of his poetry.

“Daniel Mulhall has written a book called “Pilgrim Soul” which is a line taken from the lovely “When You Are Old” and it’s about WB Yeats.

“My mother was an English teacher and her great love was WB Yeats and it was crucial to me-not just to honour my mother but for Yeats-not just as a poet but as a man whose career is extraordinary really.

Yeats has a very well deserved reputation as a poet and he was a Senator and his interests were so wide and varied and he has to figure in a film called “Quintessenially Irish.”

“We also talked to Michael Smurfit who has the biggest collection of Jack B Yeats paintings in the country if not the world and I interviewed him on his boat in Monaco and he talked about his absolute passion for collecting Jack B Yeats paintings.

“The first major painting he bought was one of Jack B Yeats for love rather than for the name.

“And when he bought Straffan House and turned it into the K Club he had a special Jack B Yeats room for all of the Sligo artist’s paintings.

“Michael Smurfit has also donated a Jack B Yeats painting called “The Bar” to the Irish Library in Monaco.”

He added: “We filmed in Drumcliffe Church and we had some really nice aerial shots of Ben Bulben and when we were talking about WB Yeats we panned out over the “Lake Isle of Inisfree”.

“Sligo is such a beautiful county and it is not hard to see why it inspired WB and Jack B Yeats so much in their respective careers.”

‘Quintessentially Irish’ is a love letter to everything great and Irish with a distinguished cast including the former 007 Pierce Brosnan, two Presidents, a Prince, a pop star and an unconventional Irish Lord.

Director Mannion looks at the influence of the Irish diaspora with exclusive access to the White House, designed by Kilkenny architect James Hoban, and the Palace of Monaco where Prince Albert II discusses his mother Grace Kelly’s Irish heritage.

Why do we celebrate St Patrick when he was Welsh? Why did James Joyce only have a British passport?

How did a Donegal man, Ricky Simms, become the super-agent for Usain Bolt and Mo Farah? Did the Irish really invent whiskey before the Scots?

How did the Irishman Pierce Brosnan come to play the English spy, James Bond? Why do so many Presidents from JFK to Joe Biden claim Irish heritage?

What’s behind the ‘Green wave’ at the Oscars? This is answered in an entertaining and starry film.