Letterkenny teen lands extra role in Liam Neeson movie

A LETTERKENNY teenager landed her dream job as an extra in the new Liam Neeson movie currently being filmed in the county.
Zara Neely from Corky and her uncle Martin were on the set of the highly anticipated blockbuster ‘In The Land of Saints and Sinners’ recently.
Speaking to the Donegal News the 15-year-old said it was very exciting filming scenes alongside Hollywood A-Lister Liam Neeson and the pair even got the chance to snap a picture with actor Colm Meaney who is also starring in the thriller.
‘In the Land of Saints and Sinners’ is being filmed in various locations in south Donegal including Glencolmcille and Kilcar. It is set in the 1970s in a remote village where a newly retired assassin finds himself drawn into a lethal game of cat and mouse with a trio of vengeful terrorists.
Zara, who is a student at Loreto Convent, said she jumped at the chance to appear in the movie when she saw the advert back in March. After an availability check to see if she was free from May 6 to May 9 she got booked for the film.
“This is my first movie but I have done other acting projects and I worked in Oakfield Park as an elf. That gave me great acting experience and I used to do speech and drama,” said Zara.
Although she couldn’t give too much away about the scenes she was involved in the transition year student said they filmed at a GAA match with the Taken star just a short distance away.
“Liam Neeson was on set both days. I was a few feet away from him. He was right next to me, it was really cool,” she said.
“We met Colm Meaney. He was really nice. We had just left the set and we were driving down through Killybegs and saw him walking along. We pulled over and asked if he was comfortable taking a photo with us. He was so friendly and relaxed.”
As the film is set in the 1970s there was plenty of costume changes throughout filming.
Zara travelled to Killybegs for her costume fitting and was given a coat, skirt, jumper and pair of heeled boots to fit the time period and also got her hair and makeup done. Meanwhile the men had to grow moustaches to get into character.
A love of acting runs in the Neely family and Zara’s uncle Martin is no stranger to the industry.
“He has done a lot of projects and he makes his own movies,” said Zara.
Looking to the future the young aspiring actor hopes more opportunities like this will come her way.
“It is something I would love to do. I know it is a hard career to get jobs in,” she said.
Back at school last week there was excitement in the classroom as Zara’s friends were keen to know how she got on. “Everyone has been so excited and asking questions,” she said.
“The teachers were asking how is filming going.”

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