'It's cheaper to bring 100 people to Ireland': Why the Irish film industry is booming

BBC News

17-07-2025

Helped by generous tax breaks, Ireland's film and TV production sector has never been stronger.
When Irish director Dearbhla Walsh started her career in Ireland in the late 1980s, opportunities for budding film-makers were limited.
"There was no work in Ireland," says Walsh, "To aspire to be a director was almost a fantasy."
Today, the picture is decidedly different. Ireland has emerged as a major force in the global film industry in recent years, both in the development of its own films and television series, as well serving as a location and production hub for international productions.
Walsh was the lead director of Apple TV+'s dark comedy Bad Sisters, one of many TV shows shot and set in the Republic of Ireland in recent years that, alongside programmes including Normal People and Bodkin, have drawn the attention of global audiences to Irish stories. This year actress Sharon Horgan received her second consecutive nomination for an Emmy Award for her portrayal as Eva Garvey in Bad Sisters.
Irish films have also gained international recognition, with both The Banshees of Inisherin and The Quiet Girl being nominated for Academy Awards in 2023. A new generation of Irish screen talent has found the spotlight, including Saoirse Ronan and Paul Mescal.
"I think Ireland is having a moment," says Walsh, "Irish people have a greater confidence. They're able to create from home and sell stories about Ireland."
The film and TV sector contributes more than €1bn ($1.2bn/ £845m)to the Irish economy annually and directly supports the equivalent of around 10,000 full-time jobs. That's according to a report from Screen Ireland, the development agency for the Irish film industry.
Walsh, who is currently working in Los Angeles shooting Apple TV+'s upcoming drama series Margo's Got Money Troubles starring Michelle Pfeiffer and Nicole Kidman, has built an award-winning international career as a director.
With Bad Sisters, Walsh says she relished the opportunity to tell a story from an Irish perspective. "It was incredibly exciting for me to come home and tell a story that I really felt I understood," she says.
The growth of the Irish film industry has been attributed to three decades of sustained investment, support and training along with generous tax incentives.
The Irish government offers a standard 32% tax credit for film, TV and animation, one of the highest in the world. The way this works is that Irish film production companies can claim back 32% of their production costs against their business tax bill. In California the equivalent rate is 20%.
US actor Rob Lowe recently commented that "it's cheaper to bring 100 people to Ireland" than to film in Los Angeles. His popular American quiz show, The Floor, is actually recorded in the Irish town of Bray, 20km (12 miles) south of Dublin.
Meanwhile, lower budget Irish movies get an even higher tax break of 40%, which was introduced in May 2025.
And the Irish government has boosted Screen Ireland's annual budget by 3.3% to €40.85m (£34.41m/ $47.77m) in 2025, its highest ever level.
"Our ambition for Ireland is that it's a home for screen storytelling at the highest levels, and a leading European hub for film-making," says Désirée Finnegan, Screen Ireland CEO. "But most of all, we see it as a home for the film-makers and story makers themselves."
Irish film producer Alan Moloney, who was the executive producer of the Irish-British-Canadian movie Brooklyn (2015), says the investment by Screen Ireland been successful for two main reasons.
First, it has strategically focused on developing indigenous talent. Secondly, it has attracted international productions, such as Netflix series Wednesday, which recently became the biggest international production to ever film in Ireland.
"Now we have an industry that is competing at the highest level, and we're punching way above our weight," Moloney says.
Moloney co-founded Dublin-based production company, Big Things Films, alongside Oscar-winner Cillian Murphy in 2022. Big Things is behind the award-winning film Small Things Like These and the upcoming Netflix movie Steve, both starring Murphy.
"[Cillian and I] had both grown up through the Irish film industry," says Moloney. "Whether the industry was having this boom or not... our interests were always going to be there."
Moloney also leads a consortium of film industry and property development professionals behind a new film and TV studio planned for Dublin, set to be Ireland's largest yet.
He believes the industry has the resilience to withstand Trump's threat in May to apply a 100% import tariff against movies made in foreign countries.
"We came through Covid intact. We came through the [Hollywood writers'] strike last year intact. We'll come through this intact," Moloney says.
Ruth Treacy, producer and co-founder of Dublin-based production company Tailored Films, is similarly sanguine. "There's a big chance [the tariff threat] won't end up coming to pass," she says. "I would have said to colleagues, let's not panic, because creating more panic destabilises the industry further."
Treacy – whose company is behind new Irish thriller Bring Them Down, starring Barry Keoghan, and Oscar-nominated 2024 Trump biopic The Apprentice – adds: "Some people mentioned that maybe [Trump's tariff threat] was a backlash against The Apprentice. But, much as I'd like to think we impacted him that much, I really don't think that was on his mind."
Looking at the Irish film industry in general, Treacy says its growth has brought with it a shift in the types of content being made.
"The level of ambition changed," she says. "It stopped being about what you might describe as kitchen sink or Irish rural drama. It's not necessarily about looking inwards at ourselves, but more about looking outward at the world."
Irish horror is a now burgeoning genre, with upcoming release Fréwaka, billed as the first ever Irish-language horror film.
Irish-language productions in general have had a breakthrough, with the success of films like The Quiet Girl [An Cailín Ciúin], which was the first in the Irish language to be nominated for an Oscar.
Ciarán Charles Ó Conghaile is the co-founder of Fíbín Films, the Galway-based company behind Irish-language broadcaster TG4's crime-thriller series Crá, which became the first Irish-language drama on BBC, and has been sold to multiple countries.
"There's a richness to the Irish language. But I think it's not about the language, it's the storytelling," Ó Conghaile says. "What [the Irish industry] does well is we have lots of pathos and levity in our work. We also have a distinctive Irish humour."
Irish animation is another a key growth sector within the industry, employing over 2,500 full-time professionals.
Rebecca O'Flanagan, producer at Treasure Entertainment, which is behind the Irish film Good Vibrations and TV thriller Smother, sees Ireland's cultural heritage as a key factor in the industry's success. "I don't want to go too far down the cliche of saints and scholars, but I do think that Ireland is a creative nation."
For Ó Conghaile, Irish film and TV has only scratched the surface. "I'm just excited about the stories that have yet to be told," he says.
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