Chris O’Dowd on religion, The Big Door Prize and why Aussie rules players are ‘rough as f---’

Chris O’Dowd reveals his surprising love of all things footy and his new series from one of the writers of Schitt’s Creek.

David West Read and Chris O'Dowd at the premiere for The Big Door Prize in Austin, Texas. Picture: Michael Loccisano/Getty Images for SXSW

Given the choice, Chris O’Dowd isn’t sure he’d like to know his own destiny.

Recently, his wife of 11 years, British writer, director and TV presenter Dawn O’Porter, had a birthday celebration and invited a palm reader. As the prognosticator set up in their dining room and their friends came and went oohing and aahing after their readings, the Irish star of The Program, The I.T Crowd, Bridesmaids and The Sapphires resisted.

In hindsight, he thinks his reticence might have been tied up with the imminent release of The Big Door Prize, his new dramedy from one of the writers of Schitt’s Creek that arrives on Apple TV+ next week. The deep questions it raises about destiny, free will and midlife crises had already messed with his head, so he figured that any extra mystical shenanigans might just send him over the edge

“Something about it felt like I’m too f---king untethered as it is,” the father of two says with a laugh over Zoom call from Los Angeles. “If anybody gives me a push I’ll be out at sea.”

The premise of the show – in which O’Dowd plays set-in-his ways, middle-aged dad Dusty – follows the turmoil in a small US town after the sudden arrival of a device that spits out a card to reveal the ‘potential’ of anyone who feeds in a couple of dollars. All of a sudden, seemingly happy citizens are making radical career and life changes and proudly sharing their new callings with friends and families, given the courage to do so by the mysterious Morpho machine.

Chris O'Dowd in a scene from The Big Door Prize.

“I’m really not sure about it,” says O’Dowd when asked what he’d do in the same situation. “I would have thought I would want to and I would probably do it, but I wouldn’t want people to see the card. I don’t want any weight attached to it. I don’t want you asking me next week how my astronaut shit is going.”

A former altar-boy who grew up in the small Irish town of Boyle, O’Dowd has long been an avowed atheist and once described religion as a “weird cult”. When he played an abusive husband who had been sexually abused by a priest as a boy in the 2014 Irish drama Calvary, he said he didn’t have to track down historical victims because he already knew so many. He says he thinks that the lure of supernatural inspiration or guidance – whether it be organised religion or some other kind of supernatural spirituality – is baked into a deep-seated desire to be told what to do.

“We live in a time when there’s still loads of monarchies around,” he muses. “There is a certain amount of people that just like the idea of having nothing to think about but to be told. Surely, there must be. I’m sure there’s some kind of DNA reason for that, especially when things aren’t going well.

“They say religion is the last hope for the destitute and I suppose there is a truth in that. And in many ways, the Morpho machine does represent any kind of oracle that we choose to follow. And we do choose follow it – we don’t have to get the card. We don’t have to go to church.”

Dawn O'Porter and Chris O'Dowd at the premiere for The Big Door Prize during 2023 SXSW Conference and Festivals at Stateside Theater on March 11 in Austin, Texas. Picture: Michael Loccisano/Getty Images for SXSW

The Big Door Prize is based on the 2020 M.O. Walsh bestseller of the same name, which O’Dowd read “when we were coming out of the worst of the pandemic”. He says that the “reset” aspect of the TV version has been given an extra resonance by the Covid-induced lockdowns and disruptions, which gave many a chance to deeply ponder the things that were most important to them and what made them truly happy.

O’Dowd studied politics and sociology at university in Dublin and fell into acting after he accompanied a friend to an audition. He subsequently dropped out to go to the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art and, after 20 years in film, television and treading the boards on Broadway and the West End, says he already had a complicated relationship with his chosen profession before Covid shut everything down.

“I have this thing where, when I’m in the middle of an acting job, I’m like, ‘God, how do I do this? It’s such a mad job and it’s so silly and we’re in a car park in the middle of nowhere and my family are 3000 miles away and what the hell am I doing?’,” he says.

“And then when I haven’t been doing it for three months, I’m like, ‘oh, geez, I have to get back on set or I’m going to go mad’. And then you get the complete release of doing the stage. I was on the West End last summer and that’s just such a release. Whatever that thing is that we want, that makes us do this job, it’s so pure when it’s just you and the audience. I think that’s the draw to me. I don’t have any interest in doing f--king photo shoots, or being on billboards or any of that.”

Chris O'Dowd and Deborah Mailman in a scene from film The Sapphires, which the Irish actor shot in Australia.

If the Morpho machine existed for real O’Dowd’s ‘potential’ card might well read professional footballer. He was a goalkeeper for Roscommon County as the under-16 and under-21 levels, and is a passionate evangelist for the game to this day. With a sister and nephew who live in Melbourne – as well as several months spent around the footy-made Albury-Wodonga region filming The Sapphires – he also developed an interest in all things AFL.

“I never went to see a game,” he laments, “but I’d love to. My nephew and godson is obsessed and playing really well at the moment, I was watching some videos of him on WhatsApp, he’s around 12. I love the game.”

And as for the hybrid international version of the game he grew up with and Aussie rules?

“That is crazy,” he laughs, “and you guys are rough as f---. Our lads, we think we are playing a hard game and then you come in with the elbows and stuff. Animals.”

The Big Door Prize streams on Apple TV+ from March 29

Originally published as Chris O’Dowd on religion, The Big Door Prize and why Aussie rules players are ‘rough as f---’