Karl MacDermott interviews one of his own creations - former mobster Johnny Schillaci, the central character in the new RTÉ radio sitcom Here's Johnny, about life in Ireland

Former mobster Johnny Schillaci is unhappy. Like a lot of recent immigrants to our shores, he has become disillusioned with the way things have turned out. But for him Ireland was not some promised land. He was forced to come here. By the FBI. "Yeah, to use a cliche, the feds made me an offer I couldn't refuse. Life in the slammer or life over here - what would you pick?"

I ponder this as Johnny looks down on his macchiato in a small Italian cafe off Ormond Quay. I decide to share with him my contention that present-day Ireland is in fact a kind of spiritual slammer full of empty materialism, bargain-basement celebrities and chancers on the make, a hellish post-Catholic Alcatraz from where there is no escape.

Two minutes into a passionate delivery of my theory though, Johnny just stares at me blankly and tells me to shut the frig up. He declares that we are here to talk about him and his series. There is a tense moment between us. Finally, I ask him what this radio series is about.

"It's about me and my life in Ireland with my wife Maria, since I moved here under an assumed identity last April," he replies. I ask if it's ok if we talk about his new identity, given the potential consequences of its unveiling.

He tells me he doubts if the people he ratted on, Joey Carbone and his brothers, Vinny, Tommy, and the black sheep of the family, Wolfgang, read The Irish Times. So what is this new identity? "A writer," he replies wearily. "The feds figured I'm in Ireland, everyone's a writer, so I'd blend in, but it hasn't worked out. I'm going friggin' nuts."

He starts to elaborate. "They made me writer-in-residence in Kilmainham. Every Wednesday I gotta sit in some freezing community hall and all these sad people with pathetic dreams are coming up to me with their poems and short stories, asking me to give them guidance. What the frig do I know? I'm a wise guy from Jersey! I don't know nothing about writing. I've never written a word in my life, apart from the odd ransom note and blackmail letter over the years."

Suddenly I am distracted by a pyramid of jet black hair - and the woman underneath. A vision out of Goodfellas Central Casting - angora sweater, tight leopard skin pants, and high heels - she saunters toward our table. It is Johnny's wife, Maria. She gives Johnny a big kiss. As she joins us, he introduces her and asks me if I find her attractive. Taken aback, I respond with a non-committal grunt. Johnny is offended.

"You don't find her attractive? What's wrong with her?"

Feeling uncomfortable and a little under pressure, I decide to tell him that I do find Maria attractive after all. In an instant, Johnny becomes demented.

"You find my wife attractive? I don't want you talking to my wife. I don't want you going near my wife. I don't want you looking at my wife. You. Look that way now!"

He points toward the counter. Contemplating the possibility of conducting the rest of the interview addressing a cash register, I am relieved when Maria intervenes and calms things down. There is a long pause. Johnny gets up to go to the loo. Maria looks at him sadly as he leaves.

"Johnny has a lot of things on his mind this weather. He's worried about his Irish exams."

"Johnny studies Irish?" I ask incredulously.

"Yeh, a new thing they brought in, for people on witness protection schemes. That Minister brought it in, Eamon O'Sieve, or whatever the frig his name is, the guy who always changes the names of places. Johnny's got an exam in the beginning of February and if he doesn't get it, we'll be sent back to America. And you know what that means. We'll be . . "

"Ag codladh leis na héisc," Johnny announces dramatically as he returns and takes his seat.

I'm impressed that he knows how to say "sleeping with the fishes" as Gaeilge. I enthusiastically ask him what other Irish phrases he knows.

"Eh, sometimes when I'm around the house, and I'm not doing nothing, Maria starts ag briseadh mo liathróidí - busting my balls," he replies.

I tell Johnny I am confident he'll have no problem with his Irish exam. But he then tells me that his teacher Mr Breathnach is a great fan of Martin Scorsese movies, and those phrases are the only two things he has actually learned in class.

Wrapping up, I ask Johnny how he thinks the radio series will do. He replies by telling me he is doing some publicity initiatives of his own to help garner an audience. "I'm going round to every house in the country and I knock on people's doors and I tell them very politely to listen to my show, on Tuesday nights in January. And if they don't, I tell them I'll break their friggin' legs."

I wonder aloud if that approach might be a bit too in-your-face.

"I said nothing about the face. The acid in the face thing only happens if they say they'll listen to it and don't, and I find out about it subsequently."

I tell him, half in jest, that he might have to break a lot of legs out there because not many people listen to the radio any more. But Johnny ends in an upbeat manner.

"Yeah, I know, but I'm going to change that. In fact the radio people are thinking of taking me on in their publicity department, to make the publicity a bit more aggressive. You know the way, back home in the States, they don't do torture but 'enhanced interrogation technique' - well that's what I would be doing, not publicity, but 'enhanced PR technique'."

Here's Johnny by Karl MacDermott starts tonight at 7.02pm RTÉ Radio One