Ross O'Carroll-Kelly

‘Oh my God, Ross, our daughter is being bullied,’ she goes. I had a feeling she had the wrong end of the stick

SO IT'S, LIKE, DAY 32 on the set of Mom, They Said They'd Never Heard of Sundried Tomatoes, the movie that this American crowd are making based on the old dear's misery-lit novel of the same name – and Iacobella, the assistant director, wants to see us. Us as in the star's parents? I find Sorcha chatting to one of the make-up girls, recommending Life and Teaching of the Masters of the Far East by, like, Baird T Spalding?

“I mean, yeah,” she’s going, “it is a self-help book? But it’s also, like, a novel? It’s about these, like, scientists in India and Tibet who come across these – oh my God – really, really spiritual locals who teach them, like, important messages? It’s the book that Jessica Biel read when she split up with Justin.”

“I, er, hate to interrupt,” I go, “but Iacobella wants to see us.”

The make-up girl – not even worth describing – takes the hint and focks off.

“Who’s Iacobella?” Sorcha wants to know.

I’m like, “Iacobella. She’s, like, the assistant director?”

“I don’t think I know her.”

“You definitely do. She’s, like, black?” Sorcha gives me a look then – similar to the one she gave me when I turned up for our pre-marriage course with a hickey on my neck that couldn’t be matched to her dental records.

“Black?” she goes.

I straight away know where this is going. I’m like, “Sorcha, don’t even attempt to tell me that that’s racist.”

“What, to define somebody by their – oh my God – skin colour?”

“I wasn’t, like, defining her? It’s just that, well, it’s the most obvious thing about her, isn’t it?”

“What, her ethnicity? Maybe it is to you, Ross.”

I end up totally losing it then. “Well, how would you describe – okay, just for the sake of argument – Rihanna to your grandmother? ‘Yeah, she’s a little singer with red hair.’ That could be Mary focking Coughlan!”

Of course you’re never going to win an argument with Sorcha when it comes to the whole, I suppose, world affairs thing. This is a girl who’s debated in Irish and won awards for it. She looks at me – I think it’s a word – pityingly? She goes, “Oh my God, you are so anti the whole diversity thing, Ross.” To which there isn’t even an answer.

“Mr and Mrs O’Carroll-Kelly,” this voice behind us suddenly goes. I turn around and it’s Iacobella herself. And she’s blacker than a clamper’s conscience. I flick my thumb at her and give Sorcha one of my told-you-so looks, which she decides to ignore.

“How lovely to meet you,” Sorcha goes, giving her the handshake and shit-eating-grin combo that she learned on that evening course she did in the Smurfit Business School. “We were just coming to see you.”

I airkiss the woman. Both cheeks as well. I actually think she’s a ringer for Zoe Saldana. So who’s racist now?

“I thought we might talk somewhere more private,” she goes.

Sorcha looks at me, straight away worried, then we follow Iacobella into this little, like, portacabin office. She takes one side of the desk and we take the other.

“What’s all this about?” Sorcha goes, on the immediate defensive.

Iacobella’s there, “Look, you know the director loves your daughter. He thinks she’s a natural.”

“He told us she was more talented than Anna Paquin was when she won her Oscar,” Sorcha goes.

I’m there, “Michelle Trachtenberg was also mentioned.”

“Sure,” Iacobella goes. “She’s, like, years ahead of the curve in terms of her acting ability. But certain, om, matters have arisen and I’ve been asked by the producer to, er, take charge personally to see if I can’t find a solution.”

God, she’s sexy. I’m harder than the UCD water tower here.“What are you talking about?” Sorcha goes.

“Well, let’s just say certain issues of bullying have been brought to our attention.”

Sorcha turns suddenly white – although that’s probably racist as well in her book. She’s like, “Bullying?”

“And we are required by law to investigate such complaints as they arise.”

Sorcha turns and looks at me. She has her two hands over her mouth and tears are – I suppose – welling in her eyes? “Oh my God, Ross, our daughter is being bullied,” she goes. I had a feeling she had the wrong end of the stick. “The same thing happened to Megan Fox. I read about it.”

Iacobella clears her throat, sort of, like, embarrassed? She’s like, “Om, Honor is not the complainant in this instance. She’s the subject of the complaint – or rather complaints.”

Sorcha is pretty much speechless – a rare enough event. “Our daughter isn’t the kind of girl to bully someone,” is all she can think to say.

I just stare at a fixed point on the floor – same shit I used to pull at school if a teacher went, “The feebleness of the female characters presented in Hamlet is proof of Shakespeare’s misogyny,” and then looked around for someone to debate it with him. I don’t want to get involved. Because I obviously know our daughter better than Sorcha does.

“She hasn’t been raised that way,” she goes. “Oh my God, she was a junior member of Amnesty International before she was even born.”

Iacobella suddenly produces, like, a file. If you rolled it up, you could stun Cian Healy with it, it’s that focking big.

She storts reading from it. “On the fourth of June, complainant says she arrived on the set wearing a purple top with orange pants – I believe the phrase is colour-blocking – and Honor O’Carroll-Kelly shouted, within earshot of the entire production team, ‘My eyes! My eyes!’ ” Of course, I end up having to hold in the laughter. I can nearly hear her saying it.

“On the 20th of June, a second complainant claimed that Honor interrupted her, mid-scene, and said, ‘Why am I working with this woman? Have we run out of humans?’ Quite a number of witnesses to that one. The eighth of July, complainant says Honor told her that she had teeth – and I quote – ‘like a focking rocking horse’.”

I just burst out laughing. I can’t help it. Sorcha gives me a serious filthy. “Oh my God,” she goes, “that’s one of your lines, Ross.”

I’m about to deny it when she suddenly stands up. Iacobella tries to calm her down.

“Look,” she goes, “we want Honor in this picture. But can you ask her to maybe tone it down a bit?” Sorcha shakes her head. She’s like, “No. I don’t like the little girl that she’s turning into. I’m taking her off the movie.”

rossocarrollkelly.ie, twitter.com/rossock