'The Irish take their ghost stories with them': Uncanny creator Danny Robins tells us about his Irish roots ahead of terrifying new tour

Irish Post

2 days ago

FOR someone who has found success by allowing other people to tell their personal stories on his paranormal series, Uncanny, it's perhaps no surprise that Danny Robins learned a lot about his Irish roots through stories handed down through his family over generations.
"All the family I haven't met over in Ireland existed as stories," says the third-generation Irishman, who will embark on a new Uncanny live tour in September. "I felt like I was surrounded all the time by these brilliant tall tales and legends about all these different people. I knew that we had a great aunt who was a nun and a great uncle who was a monk and there were all these brilliant characters in the family, who you heard stories about all the time."
One story in particular stands out, with Robins' pride in his Irish roots clear from the enthusiasm with which he relays these colourful tales.
Danny Robins' grandparents emigrated from Ireland to Manchester (Image: Tim P. Whitby / Getty Images)
"The family legend is that my grandad's mum was this eccentric character who was an opera singer and who was apparently the first ever female driver in Cork," he says. "She used to career around in a very old-fashioned car, perhaps slightly under the influence of sherry, so I'm told!"
Robins reveals that his mother's family are all from Cork — 'a mixture of O'Sullivans and O'Learys' — while his grandparents were 'movers and shakers on the Cork social scene'. His grandfather played rugby for Munster and his grandmother was picked to play hockey for Ireland but never turned out due to the onset of the Second World War. His grandfather fought in the conflict after the couple emigrated to England and later set up a GP practice.
"They went from being part of quite gentile, well-off Cork society to living in a really quite rough and poor part of Manchester," says Robins. "My grandad was a GP in an area where there were a lot of economic problems and worked to try and make the world a better place." Paranormal profession
His grandfather's vocation may have been in saving lives, however, Robins' own career has taken him to the other end of the spectrum, very much in the realm of those who have shaken off this mortal coil. The writer and broadcaster is the creator of the wildly successful BBC podcast and TV series, Uncanny. He was already an accomplished comedy writer, working on everything from The Basil Brush Show to Mock the Week and creating the award-winning children's BBC comedy drama, Young Dracula.
"I've done comedy shows and travel journalism and music documentaries and all sorts but I feel like I've really found my niche now," says Robins. "I've found the subject that has always fascinated me, that I've been obsessed by since I was a kid, love talking about and in giving myself over to that I'm just allowing myself to make the kind of programmes I'd want to listen to or want to watch. Finding an audience of people who feel the same way, it's just been magical really."
Shona McGarty, Jay McGuiness, Laura Whitmore and Colin O'Donoghue during last year's Irish run of Robins' acclaimed play, 2:22 A Ghost Story (Image: Leon Farrell / Photocall Ireland)
The paranormal has served him well, with his 2017 Haunted podcast capturing the ears of the Beeb, for whom he wrote and presented the 2021 Battersea Poltergeist drama-documentary. The podcast was based on the real-life story of Shirley Hitchings, who was reportedly tormented by a poltergeist in 1950s London. A request at the end of the series for listeners' own stories sparked a deluge of paranormal tales and from that, the Uncanny podcast and subsequent TV series and live show, I Know What I Saw, was born, while Robins also created the drama-documentary Witch Farm podcast for the BBC in 2022.
On stage, Robins' award-winning 2021 supernatural play, 2:22 A Ghost Story, is preparing for a second British tour later this year, having also racked up six successful West End runs. The show, which sees two couples debate the existence of ghosts during a dinner party as they await recurring eerie phenomena that begins at the same time every night, had a successful run in Dublin last year with Irish stars Laura Whitmore and Colin O'Donoghue among the cast. The upcoming British tour, which kicks off in Manchester in August, will star second-generation Irishwoman Stacey Dooley. For Uncanny fans though, what is most eagerly-anticipated is the brand new Uncanny live tour, Fear of the Dark, with Robins saying fans should 'definitely expect a show that is unlike any other podcast live show'. The 'serious' paranormal show with Belfast roots
For those unfamiliar with Uncanny, each episode sees a listener tell their own, deeply-personal story of the paranormal. However, this is not your stereotypical ghost-hunting show where presenters run around castles in night vision goggles, wielding spirit boxes and thermal cameras as psychic mediums seemingly channel ghosts on demand. If those shows are the equivalent of a cheap Hollywood jump-scare, Uncanny provides the genuine chills you might experience watching a tense, atmospheric chiller where the fear is in what you might uncover. Meanwhile, Robins — who admits to never yet having had his own paranormal experience — is aided not by a team of monomaniacal devotees but by two open-minded experts representing both Team Sceptic and Team Believer, usually Dr Ciarán O'Keeffe and Evelyn Hollow respectively.
Nor are the subjects unreliable narrators or attention seekers but rational professionals you wouldn't normally expect to entertain the existence of ghosts, let alone have a chilling tale of their own locked away. Indeed, the very first episode of Uncanny heard from Ken, a top genetic scientist telling his story of an eerie apparition and poltergeist activity during his time in the Alanbrooke halls of residence at Queen's University Belfast in the 1980s. The episode, Room 611, went viral, sparking national headlines, uncovering corroborating stories and historical records and even creating the show's catchphrase: "Bloody hell, Ken!"
Robins will be joined on the upcoming Uncanny: Fear of the Dark tour by the show's regular experts Dr Ciarán O'Keeffe, representing Team Sceptic, and Evelyn Hollow, representing Team Believer (Image: Sama Kai / Dave Benett / Getty Images)
"It's what set up the whole world of Uncanny really, the fact that you had a very ordinary and very sceptical person who didn't believe in ghosts telling you that they felt they might've seen one," says Robins. "I always think of Belfast because it does feel like a place that's synonymous with Uncanny. There's quite a few different Irish people that come into the Uncanny picture at various points and I know in the next series that comes out in the autumn, we've got a really good Irish story as well."
He adds: "Uncanny is still entertaining but it tries to take the subject a little bit more seriously. It also keeps an open mind so it's not just preaching to the converted. We're there, saying, 'It might be a ghost but it might not'. You hear from sceptics and believers and that has made it easier for a lot of people to talk.
"There's a lot of people who wouldn't have felt comfortable going on some of those slightly louder, brasher more fantastical paranormal shows. I just felt there was a massive amount of people, you could almost say a kind of silent majority out there, who've had strange experiences and who didn't know how to talk about it. A lot of the emails I get are from people who say, 'I haven't even discussed this with my partner', people who didn't know how to talk about it, didn't know where to talk about it, were worried they'd be judged, that they'd be laughed at, ridiculed, even have their mental health questioned. Uncanny's created a safe space, it has legitimised being able to say this out loud." 'The Irish are natural storytellers'
As well as Room 611, there are other Irish tales featured on Uncanny, all told by level-headed, rational, down-to-earth guests. They include The Ghost who Hated Parties, which recounts how an imposing presence terrifies visitors to a student house in Waterford in the 1980s. An Angel Called Bernie sees a software engineer and former Irish soldier tell how his grandmother intervenes from beyond the grave on numerous occasions to save people's lives. The Beast of Langeais hears from two men from Belfast, a teacher and a former police officer, who encounter a devilish hoofed creature during a school trip to France in 1983. Meanwhile, The Haunting of Tanfield House sees the daughter of staunch Catholics who emigrated from Ireland recall a terrifying childhood exorcism after she encounters poltergeist activity in a student house in Surrey. With yet another Irish tale included in the next series of Uncanny, Robins isn't surprised at the proliferation of stories from the Emerald Isle.
"I think Ireland is a place with a really, really rich tradition of ghost stories, some fantastic ghost stories stretching back into folkloric things, tales of fairies and banshees and all those kind of things and I feel like we've only touched the tip of the iceberg in terms of exploring stories from Ireland on Uncanny," he says.
Uncanny began life as a podcast before being adapted for television in 2023 and a first live show, I Know What I Saw, in 2024 (Image: Uncanny / Facebook)
"One of the things I love about coming across is when we ask people for their local ghost stories and the things that have happened to them. Last time when we came to Dublin, we had some fantastic stories and I'm looking forward to hearing more again. There's loads of ghost stories but there's also just loads of brilliant stories. I think it's a way that people in Ireland express themselves. I think the Irish are natural storytellers, they have a gift of the gab, a wit and enjoyment of language and I think some of the greatest literature ever written has been written by Irish writers. Growing up and reading things by a whole host of different Irish writers, I definitely felt a kinship with it. I love that enjoyment of language that you see in a lot of work that's emanated from Ireland."
Likewise, Robins sees that love of storytelling kept alive in the English cities where Irish people flocked to over the centuries, just as his own grandparents did.
"I see a huge interest [in the paranormal] in Ireland," says Robins. "I sometimes say that there are a certain parts of the country that seem to love their ghost stories more. A part of the country that I always find I get great ghost stories from is Liverpool and of course [there was] a massive influx of Irish people and the same true of Manchester. Places over here in the UK where Irish people have settled, you get a lot of ghost stories. It's like the Irish take their ghost stories with them. It's one of the great things the Irish have given to the world, this huge treasure trove of stories that have emanated from this island." 'A really big, epic night out'
So popular is Uncanny within those Irish hubs in Britain that the upcoming Uncanny: Fear of the Dark tour has had to add extra shows at venues in Greater Manchester and Liverpool to meet demand. The extensive tour gets underway in Salford on September 18 and takes in other cities with traditionally large Irish populations, including Birmingham and Glasgow. Dublin and, of course, Belfast are also on the schedule. However, while the tour will no doubt seek to replicate the successful format of the Uncanny podcast and TV show, Robins promises it will be so much more, an immersive experience utilising the full capabilities of its theatrical venues. He promises this will not merely be a normal Uncanny podcast episode recorded on stage in front of an audience.
"This is way more theatrical in that this really brings these real-life ghost stories to life in a very theatrical way using video projection, amazing sound effects and illusions," he reveals.
"You'll see things flying across the stage like poltergeist activity, so it's a proper theatrical show that embraces all the magic that you can achieve in a theatre. The first live show, I Know What I Saw, featured two real-life cases that were brand new and had never been heard on the pod or the TV series before. We examined them together and got the audience involved in contributing their theories. Fear of the Dark has taken that one step further. We're featuring a whole selection of new cases and will be looking at not just ghosts but UFOs, cryptozoology — that idea of strange beasts that may or may not exist, like the yeti and the Loch Ness Monster and Bigfoot — and examine these cases doing some experiments live in the theatre to test sceptic theories. We'll be looking at some classic cases of paranormal history as well, so very much like the TV series come to life on stage in front of you.
Robins with the Best New Play Award for 2:22 A Ghost Story at the 2022 WhatsOnStage Awards (Image: David M. Benett / Dave Benett / Getty Images)
"It's going to be a really big, epic night out where, whether you're interested in the paranormal or not, there's going to be so much to talk about — these fascinating human interest stories, amazing science, amazing history and hopefully a night that will really get you talking. That question, 'Do you believe in ghosts' or 'Do ghosts exist', it's the one question you could ask of anyone, anywhere in the world and spark a great debate. There'll be a chance for the audience to tell us their own ghost stories, we'll probably dive into some local stories and then you can ask us your questions."
And for Robins, who listened to those stories of his own Irish heritage with awe and wonder, returning to the Emerald Isle will be like coming full circle.
"It feels in a weird way like coming home, there is a huge cultural lineage for me stretching across the generations," says Robins, who obtained his Irish citizenship last year.
"My mum was the first one of her family to not be brought up in Ireland and it's a place I feel a deep connection with and I can't wait to get there again. I've got lots of family in Dublin as well and I feel like I'm connecting, plugging into my family origins when I come that way. When we head to Belfast, I feel like I'm tapping into the very birthplace of Uncanny with the Room 611 story, so they're both destinations on the tour that have huge significance for us."
For tickets and more information on Uncanny: Fear of the Dark, please click here. To book tickets for 2:22 A Ghost Story, please click here. All Uncanny podcast episodes can be found on the BBC website by clicking here and are also available on the BBC Sounds app, while the Uncanny TV series is available on iPlayer by clicking here.