Mrs Brown's Boys returns for new season and Brendan O'Carroll reveals what's next in store for Agnes Brown
Watch Mrs Brown's Boys Series 5 on BBC iPlayer and add to your Watchlist
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Interview With Brendan O'Carroll (Agnes Brown)
What does the new series have in store for Agnes? What can viewers look forward to?
The mini-series focuses on the continuing life in the Brown family and surrounding households in Finglas. Cathy gets involved with a podcast producer, which obviously is commandeered by Agnes, Winnie and Birdy. Granddad decides that he wants to leave the family home for a care home, Agnes of course packs his bags for him. Winnie's husband's car, which has been lying up for ten years, is pressed into action by Winnie, leading to a disastrous driving test which ends with a huge shock for the Brown family. In Foley's lounge bar, Father Damien stages his annual Finglas talent show, with some hilarious entries. All capped off with a wonderfully hilarious "trip" as Agnes is confined to a mobile chair.
How do you approach writing for the show? Did you do so differently for this series than you do for the specials?
The writing of the mini-series is much more relaxing for myself and Paddy Houlihan, who joins me as a writer. With the Christmas Specials, I have to keep it within the Christmas period (including the Christmas trees which have emerged as their own event), unlike the specials we can focus on anything, within reason.
How did the ideas for the episodes this series come about?
The ideas for these episodes are no different from the previous 53 episodes. Believe it or not most of the story lines are based on true events that either happened to my family or have been told to me by people about their families. Everybody has a story, and it's quite common for someone in a family to say in the middle of a family disaster, "This is like an episode of Mrs. Brown's Boys".
Did you have a favourite moment filming this series?
Oh yeah, Having Agnes on that mobility scooter was such fun. She goes nuts, with hilarious consequences. Also in the "Talent Show" episode I love the interaction between Agnes and Granddad. Look, in every episode there is something that stands out for me, I love being Agnes Brown and I love her family, and her neighbours like Winnie and Birdy.
If you could play any other role in Mrs Brown's Boys what would it be?
This is a hard one. I love being Agnes. I'm not lying when I say... I could not play any of the characters better than the actors who play them now. In particular, the likes of Cathy or Mark, without them the gags don't work.
What does filming the show in front of a studio audience bring to it?
Filming in front of a live audience is essential to the show. So many times, at the end of rehearsals for a particular episode, our Director, Ben Kellett will say "All this needs now is the audience" and he is so right. They follow every move, every line and add so much to our performances. We would be lost without them.
What's the secret to the enduring success of the show?
I honestly don't know the secret to the enduring success of Mrs. Brown's Boys, I write and perform what I think is funny and just hope that somebody somewhere watching gets a laugh out of it. That's it, and, although I sometimes try to include a "family" message along the way, essentially it's just a bunch of actors trying to make you laugh.
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Educated at Horace Mann, a private high school in the Bronx, Lehrer skipped three years to keep himself amused. His application to Harvard took the form of a poem, the last stanza of which ran: 'But although I detest/ Learning poems and the rest/ Of the things one must know to have 'culture',/ While each of my teachers/ Makes speeches like preachers/ And preys on my faults like a vulture/ I will leave movie thrillers/ And watch caterpillars/ Get born and pupated and larva'ed/ And I'll work like a slave/ And always behave/ And maybe I'll get into Harvard.' He chose to study mathematics, judging that English involved too much reading and chemistry too much grubbing around in foul-smelling laboratories. Once there he began writing scurrilous songs with which to entertain his peers, and surrounded himself with pranksters who would later become eminences in their respective fields: Philip Warren Anderson, who won the Nobel prize in physics; Lewis Branscombe, who became the chief scientist at IBM, and David Robinson, who became the executive director of the Carnegie Corporation. In 1951 he staged the Physical Revue (a play of words on the Physical Review, a scientific publication), a musical drama incorporating 21 of his songs. Invitations to perform at parties poured in, and steadily he acquired a following. By 1954 he was selling records from the second floor of his house, and working as a defence contractor to avoid being conscripted. Despite his best efforts, the following year he was drafted into the Defence Department's cryptography division, which would later become the National Security Agency. He maintained that his only contribution to the NSA was a way to get around its prohibition against staff drinking alcohol at parties — jelly vodka shots. Lehrer gave his last public performance for many years at a fundraiser for the Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern in 1972. Looking for a sunny climate and a quieter life, he began teaching a course in musical theatre at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He would later teach mathematics there too. It was tacitly understood in his classes that nobody was to mention his career as a performer. Despite his on-stage effervescence he was a deeply reticent man, whose friends hardly got a glimpse into his private life. Once asked whether he had a wife or children, he replied 'not guilty on both counts'. Lehrer claimed that he stopped writing satire partly because 'things I once thought were funny are scary now. I often feel like a resident of Pompeii who has been asked for some humorous comments on lava.' Indeed, he famously said a year after he retired from performing that 'political satire became obsolete when Kissinger was awarded the Nobel peace prize'. Having relinquished fame so flippantly, he affected to care little about his legacy. When one would-be biographer came knocking, he rebuffed his offer to write his life story, but gave him the original recordings of his second album as though they were worthless to him. He felt no need to give an answer to those who wondered why one of the great lyricists of the 20th century would seem so indifferent to the fate of his own art. In 2020 he put his songs in the public domain. Yet as a younger man he did claim to feel a degree of emotional investment in the reception of his work, saying:'If, after hearing my songs, just one human being is inspired to say something nasty to a friend, or perhaps to strike a loved one, it will all have been worth the while.' Tom Lehrer, musical satirist, was born on April 9, 1928. He died on July 27, 2025, aged 97
