Russell Crowe praises Ireland’s ‘accepting and loving culture’ after filming here

The 58-year-old spent a few months on the Emerald Isle last year making his latest flick, The Pope’s Exorcist, which is based on the real-life story of the Vatican’s Chief Exorcist, Father Gabriele Amorth.

He said the opportunity to shoot the film in Dublin, Wicklow, and Limerick was a joy for the cast and crew.

“I had a good time making this movie and that’s partially got to do with where we shot,” the New Zealand native told RTÉ Entertainment.

“We shot in Dublin and surrounds. We shot at Trinity College, we shot at the town hall, we were on the north side for a while.

“We shot in Bray a lot and Marley Park and we went down to Limerick. It was a grand summer with lots of sunshine, and I did a lot of bike riding. I loved being where I was.”

Crowe said that the entire Pope’s Exorcist team was aware of Ireland’s complicated relationship with the Catholic Church and were careful to be “respectful to people’s beliefs”.

“I was aware of Ireland’s connection with religion because that was a daily conversation when we were making the movie.

“But I don’t think Ireland is that much less Catholic than it’s been. I think that people might have a connection to the church in Ireland that might different from other places.

“There’s a deep affection but at the same time, there have been troubling things that have happened and revelations that have come to light but thing is that the truth about that stuff was a known truth anyway, and it took a few things to happen for people to actually put on the table for everybody to start discussing it.

He continued: “That has been released to a certain degree when you have something like the Irish people coming together and voting for same-sex marriage. You start to see the nature of the country a lot more. It’s a very accepting and loving culture.

“As gruff as some people want to be, I find Irish people very warm. When we were shooting, for sure, we were aware of being respectful to people’s beliefs.”

The Hollywood star admitted he’s not a fan of horror movies and added that “a lot of unusual things” happened while making the film.

“When you’re working with dark subject matter, you do have to keep your objectivity and one of the thematics in this movie revolves around birds,” he explained.

“We’d been shooting down in Limerick and we came back to this house we were staying in on the coast outside Dublin and there was a dead bird on the doormat of the door to the house, so a couple of people I was with got scared by that.

“But I just went to a different place with it. There was a lot of creatures in the woods around there and we’d been there for a few days, and this was just a little welcome home gift.”

The Pope’s Exorcist hits Irish cinemas on Good Friday, April 7.