Jarlath Regan will return to the Literary and Historical Society at 1pm on Wednesday the 5th of November to receive the James Joyce Award - an award that he dreamt up. Regan has over 380k followers on Instagram and is coming to the end of his ‘In Bits’ tour which has seen him play everywhere from Killarney to Chicago. Regan spoke to The University Observer in the weeks leading up to the presentation in Fitzgerald Chamber, and a day before the release of his new book.
So what were you like back in UCD?
JR: I definitely showed up in UCD and was a very different person to who I am now. I didn’t really know why I was there or what I was doing there, I just knew I had to come to college. I didn’t have any idea where I was going and arts was just the most general thing I could do. It’s the least amount of hour you can do while still claiming to be in college.
How did you fill your other hours?
JR: I was utterly obsessed with basketball and playing for UCD. I was getting up at 7am and getting up and lifting weights and shooting hoops. I was definitely a jock, mixed with a debater. I loved debating and was deadset on being in the LnH.
With basketball, being part of the University Observer and auditor of the LnH you were obviously pretty involved. How does it feel to be coming back to get the James Joyce award, an award that you created?
The previous year, Brian Flanagan was auditor and he magicked up the idea of a fellowship. Lord of the Rings had come out and it sounded cool. It was the top dog award - you’re becoming a fellow of the LnH! He got some fantastic guests. What we needed, was a second tier prize that could draw people who we couldn’t quite offer a fellowship to but wanted to get them in the building.
The James Joyce award, like every other award, is dreamt up. And this one in particular was dreamt up, by me and my treasurer, smoking cigarettes in Roebuck. We had no idea what the name would do, and what it would become. We never dreamed people would prefer a James Joyce award to a fellowship. The full circle of me actually receiving it is absolutely hilarious, it’s thrilling, exciting and beautiful to me.
When we described it and we wrote the letter to the first person to receive it, who was Damien Duff, we wrote the letter and it say “You are being given the James Joyce Award for achieving excellence in the field of excellence”. So I get that it’s silly. All awards are silly - but still pretty cool.
As a final point on your time in UCD, you met your wife Tina in UCD, can you tell us about that?
JR: Everyone who goes to UCD, especially to study arts, will at one point or another have that person that makes their eyes pop out of their head. She was mine. I remember seeing her across theatre L and fully having the ‘holy shit moment’. I immediately started establishing if we had friends, if we had connections.
I started positioning myself in politics lectures to sit next to her. But every time I sat next to her she would look at me, scoot away and think “why on earth is this person trying to sit next to me”, not at all twigging that this was my attempt at flirting. Months went by and we ended up being at a residence party in Roebuck Hall and telling my friends after a few drinks that I was going to sort it out tonight. I said “I bet you she’s down at the bar” and I went for it as she was leaving. I literally grabbed her arm as she was leaving, and said “it’s me”. The man at the door tried to stop me as I had a pint in my hand and she was totally freaked out, but we’ve been together for 25 years since that day. We have a child, we’ve been married for 16 years and I’m the very luckiest of the lucky. Who gets to find the love of their life in the student bar during their first term in college? She’s now my manager and she’s an extraordinary person and I love her with all my heart.
The University Observer spoke to Jarlath Regan about his sold out comedy shows, incredible guests he’s had on his podcast, and his new book ‘The Gobshite Guidebook’ and his recent experience at the European Parliament. Read the full interview in Issue 3 of the University Observer on November 18th.