LIMERICK is brimming with excitement as a major Hollywood production is being filmed throughout the city across this week.
And acting legend Liam Neeson has been at the centre of the buzz, after being spotted filming in the city’s Georgian quarter this Tuesday morning (December 3).
The Antrim-born star was spotted filming on Catherine Street on Tuesday morning, where the modern city street had been transformed into 1980s Massachusetts.
A number of local landmarks have been transformed for the Hollywood caper, an adaptation of comic book 4 Kids Walk Into A Bank.
Gleeson’s Spar on Catherine Street has been turned into ‘Caruso’s Mini Mart’, an 80s-style US convenience store, while the Sarsfield Credit Union directly across from Gleeson’s currently hosts signage for a ‘City Grand Bank’.
It is understood that the former Ulster Bank at 95 O’Connell Street is to be used as the eponymous bank at the core of the heist flick, with works currently underway to transform the interior before shooting.
A number of US cars bearing Masseuchetts registration plates were spotted dotted across Catherine Street and Glentworth Street as filming got underway, including a vintage Lincoln Continental, Chevrolet Caprice Classic, Volvo 200 Series estate, and vintage Fords.
The film, a pitch black comedy, also stars Talia Ryder, Noah Jupe, Whitney Peak, Jack Dylan Grazer, and son of Reese Witherspoon (Legally Blonde) and Ryan Phillippe (Cruel Intentions), Deacon Philippe.
Produced by Wild Atlantic Pictures and directed by Frankie Shaw, the comic book caper follows Neeson’s Danny, a former bank robber who has turned over a new leaf, who gets dragged back into his old ways when figures from his past catch up with him and he is once again roped into a bank heist.
It is up to his daughter Paige and her friends to save the day in the unlikliest of ways – robbing the bank themselves.
Excited crowds gathered to watch the filming take place on Tuesday morning, with one onlooker, Theodore Somo, telling the Limerick Post that the production is set to “put Limerick on the map”.
Another film fan expressed his excitement at the prospect of a close-up encounter with Neeson, the Oscar-nominated leading man behind the hit-making billion-dollar Taken franchise.
It is understood that a number of local businesses across the city are helping cater to the major Hollywood film behind the scenes, including providing hubs for hair and makeup as the shooting goes on across the week.
Neeson’s Shannonside visit comes hot on the heels of another picture set to put Limerick firmly in the frame. The former Royal Cinema on Cecil Street was brought back to life in recent weeks for One Night Only, the latest blockbuster from Limerick’s own David Gleeson – writer and director of Cowboys and Angels, which Limerick City also provided the backdrop for.
