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Though the latest Irish Stew guest is Aileesh Carew, CEO and Museum Director of Dublin’s EPIC The Irish Emigration Museum, this interview takes place in Philadelphia, upstairs again at Fergie’s Pub. Both Aileesh and cohost John Lee came to the “City of Brotherly Love” for the Irish American Business Chamber and Network’s Ambassador’s Awards where Aileesh would accept the Uachtarán Award for EPIC as an organization that has shown exemplary leadership in philanthropic contributions of time and talent to non-profits in Ireland.

"We are so honored to be recognized by the Irish American Business Chamber and Network, an organization that really understands and deeply cares about the Irish community, the links and the legacy,” she says.

The award comes at an especially meaningful time for EPIC.

“To receive the award and be recognized in our 10th anniversary year is very special to us,” says Aileesh, who has been with EPIC almost every step of the way. “EPIC’s purpose really is to tell the impact of the Irish around the world. Over 70 million people claim Irish heritage and we can chart at EPIC 1,500 years of immigration. It's the legacy of what the Irish people have achieved around the world."

Philadelphia was an important destination for Irish emigres and many played key roles in the birth of the American republic.

"John Dunlap was the printer of the Declaration of Independence. He was born in Bann in County Tyrone. He immigrated to Philadelphia as a boy and built one of the city's most influential printing businesses. He actually printed the Declaration working through the night on July 4th, 1776, and went on to print the first 200 copies of the Declaration of Independence."

Over its ten-year history, the interactive EPIC experience rose quickly in the ranks of not only Irish but European destinations, awarded Europe's Leading Tourist Attraction three years in a row.

Take that Eiffel Tower!

But rather than counting their laurels, Aileesh and her team are charting the course for the next ten years.

She says, "If you stand still, you go backwards, so we’ve embarked on a 10-year master plan. We're about to unveil three brand new galleries including “Isle of the Senses”f that will chart and evoke the Ireland the people left behind, what people take with them in the smell, the touch, the sense, and in their hearts.”

This is Irish Stew’s second EPIC episode having featured its first director, John Patrick Greene, for episode that dropped in 2022.

Next week Irish Stew shares the buzz around the Capital Irish Film Festival in conversations with the great cinema talent at the annual Solas Nua event.

Links

• Irish Stew Newsletter Signup - on home page

EPIC The Irish Emigration Museum

• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook
• Instagram

Aileesh Carew

• LinkedIn

Irish Stew Links

• Episode Page: Aileesh Carew
• Website Home Page
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• Media Partner: IrishCentral

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 14; Total Episode Count: 155

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No Ordinary Heist had just finished rolling when Irish Stew cohosts Martin Nutty and John Lee took to the AFI Silver Theatre stage on the second night of the 2026 Solas Nua Capital Irish Film Festival in metro-Washington, DC. Before a near-capacity crowd of almost 400, the podcasters-in-residence led the post-screening Q&A on the gripping new Irish thriller inspired by the 2004 Northern Bank robbery in Belfast, still one of the largest bank robberies in British and Irish history, with £26.5 million in cash stolen.

On stage with John and Martin are the film's Belfast-raised director and co-writer Colin McIvor and Dublin-based producer Ruth Carter of Picture Locked Productions. The conversation explores the riveting human stories of the film set against the backdrop of a city emerging from The Troubles, the meticulous casting of Eddie Marsan and Éanna Hardwicke in leading roles alongside memorable Irish supporting talent, and the editorial choices that kept audiences white-knuckled throughout.

"The old cliche is that you create your heroes and then you trip them up every two minutes. Just what else can you do to screw it up for them," Colin says explaining the creative philosophy behind the film's tension.

The discussion broadens to explore the thriving all-island filmmaking ecosystem, with Ruth noting the increasingly seamless collaboration between Northern Ireland Screen and Screen Ireland saying, "We're really lucky in Ireland because we have such great support both in the South and in the North. They really go with an all-Ireland approach as much as they can."

Reflecting on how far Northern Ireland's film industry has come since 2004, Colin adds, "It's hard to believe that when I was a student coming through, that we would be where we are. We have got a place in the filmmaking industry now."

An engaging night of Irish cinema, covering everything from the craft of tension-building to the state of all-island filmmaking, all in this episode of Irish Stew.

With thanks to the Northern Ireland Bureau for their support of this screening and Q&A, Solas Nua and Festival Director Maedhbh Mc Cullagh for naming Irish Stew in the Capital Irish Film Festival Podcast-in-Residence and to John Collins for recording this episode.

Links

No Ordinary Heist

• IMDb
• Wikipedia

Colin McIvor

• IMDb

Ruth Carter

• Picture Locked Productions
• IMDb
• LinkedIn
• Instagram

All Irish Stew Libations Episodes - Ten episodes. All in one place.

• Capital Irish Film Festival Episodes

Irish Stew Links

• Episode Page: Fergus Carey
• Website Home Page
• Facebook
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• Bluesky
• Mastodon
• Media Partner: IrishCentral

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 13; Total Episode Co

North Dublin native Fergus “Fergie” Carey didn’t just open a bar in Philadelphia, he helped invent a neighborhood, a scene, and a sense of community that stretches from Center City to the Irish arts world and back again. In this on‑location episode recorded upstairs at Fergie’s Pub on Sansom Street, Irish Stew cohost John Lee traces Fergie’s journey from Burgerland on O’Connell Street to becoming one of Philly’s best‑known publicans and civic connectors.

Fergie recalls the bleak job prospects of 1980s Dublin, his short, ill‑fated stint in Houston, and the sudden sense of being “revered because you’re Irish” when he finally landed in Philadelphia and started a job at El Taco Grande the very next morning. He walks us through bartending at McGlinchey’s, the leap to open Fergie’s with his Palestinian partner Wajih Abed in a rough‑and‑tumble City Center street, and the chaos of a first night saw the Guinness run dry in 40 minutes.

We explore how Fergie built a career as co‑owner or founder of beloved spots like Monk’s Café, The Goat, The Jim, and soon The Monto, while never losing sight of the core lesson he learned in fast food: you’re managing people, not walls. He talks about keeping a pub current yet grounded in tradition through his self-invented live-band karaoke, Quizzo evenings, Saturday trad sessions, ballad nights, and the hugely popular “pub sing.”

We also hear about Fergie’s deep engagement with Philadelphia’s civic and Irish cultural life, from Inis Nua Theatre Company and Beckett in the back room, to his tours to Ireland and charity concerts like his recreation of The Last Waltz.

We spoke on eve of the Irish American Business Chamber & Network’s Ambassador’s Awards Luncheon, the signature annual Irish event on the city’s calendar, after which those in-the-know kept the craic going at the nearby Fergie’s Pub.

Among them were local business and civic leaders John Cummins and Adele Farrell who will share their insights on the Irish American Business Chamber & Network and tales from their own Dublin-to-Philadelphia success story on a future episode of Irish Stew.

Links

Fergie’s Pub

• Website
• Facebook
• Instagram

All Irish Stew Libations Episodes - Ten episodes. All in one place.

• Libations Episodes

Irish Stew Links

• Episode Page: Fergus Carey
• Website Home Page
• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• Bluesky
• Mastodon
• Media Partner: IrishCentral

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 12; Total Episode Count: 153

A language returned
Mollie Guidera returns to the Irish Stew for a second conversation. Since her first appearance in November 2023, she has published The Gaeilge Guide and grown Irish with Molly into the fastest-growing Gaeilge community in the world — more than 10,000 students across 75 countries. But what Mollie is really doing is harder to quantify: dismantling the barriers that sit between Irish people and their own language.

The problem was never the language
Fourteen years of compulsory classes, taught through the very language you were trying to learn, left a generation feeling guilty for failing at something that was never properly taught. Mollie's argument is simple: the language is logical, patterned, and far more learnable than people believe. The problem was always the delivery.

Hidden in plain sight
We spend time on Hiberno English — the way Irish survives in everyday speech. "Is the dinner not ready yet?" Nobody in America says that. Say it in Irish and it makes perfect grammatical sense. From Wilde to Joyce to Sally Rooney, the Irish literary tradition is Hiberno English in action — a colonized people turning the language of their oppressor into a thing of beauty.

The key holder
The episode carries the presence of Manchán Magan, who passed away last year. Mollie recalls asking Manchán for advice on a documentary about her offshore students — Hong Kong, Moscow, Alaska — and his reply coming back immediately: go for it. His wife's words at the Irish Book Awards said it best: Manchán opened the door and showed us all the way through. We just have to walk.

The language is yours
Fluency is a myth. What matters is showing up consistently, with curiosity, and without shame. The language is yours. It always was.

Episode Quote
"People have this negative reaction to Irish — and yet this regret for not learning it. There's a very complicated relationship. But I don't think the language itself is complicated."
— Mollie Guidera

Links

Mollie Guidera

• Website: Irish With Mollie
• Book: The Gaeilge Guide
• Podcast: Irish with Mollie
• Instagram
• TikTok

Irish Language Resources

• TEG: Irish Language Certification
• An Siopa Leabhar - Irish Language Book Store

All Irish Stew Irish Language Episodes - Ten episodes. All in one place.

• Irish Language Episodes

Irish Stew Links

• Website
• Facebook
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• Bluesky
• Mastodon
• Media Partner: IrishCentral

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 11; Total Episode Count: 152

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Award-winning director, producer, and writer Ruán Magan joins Irish Stew for a timely conversation ahead of his double appearance at this weekend’s Solas Nua Capital Irish Film Festival, where he’ll present two very different visions of Ireland on screen.

Ruán reflects on a creative life that has taken him from early collaborations with his brother, writer and broadcaster Manchán Magan, through decades of boundary-pushing work that has reached audiences around the world. He talks about growing up in a family steeped in story, language, and history, and how that background propels him toward projects that dig beneath the surface of Ireland’s past and present.

One of his festival offerings is the new documentary “Daniel O’Connell – The Emancipator,” which marks the 250th anniversary of O’Connell’s birth and revisits the life, legacy, and global impact of “The Liberator.” Ruán describes the film as “a chance to step back from today’s noise and remember how one determined Irish lawyer changed the democratic DNA of the modern world,” connecting O’Connell’s campaigns for Catholic Emancipation to later movements led by figures like Frederick Douglass, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King Jr.

He then turns to his Irish-language drama “Báite,” a feature that takes his fascination with Irish history and identity into more intimate, psychological territory. Ruán calls it “a story where the past seeps up through the floorboards of ordinary lives,” using the rhythms of the Irish language and the coastal landscape to explore guilt, memory, and the pull of old ghosts.

Throughout the episode, Ruán shares his approach to filmmaking as “trying to make the invisible visible—whether that’s buried history, an overlooked revolutionary, or the quiet truths people carry inside them.” He talks about balancing scholarship and emotion, why collaboration matters, and what keeps drawing him back to Irish subjects for a global audience.

Irish Stew will be the Podcast in Residence at the Capital Irish Film Festival, Feb. 26 – Mar. 1, appearing on stage after the Friday 6:30 p.m. screening to discuss Northern Irish film with a panel of Northern Irish filmmakers.

Links

Solas Nua

• Website
• Capital Irish Film Festival
  • Báite
  • Daniel O'Connell: The Emancipator

Ruán Magan

• Website
• IMDb
• LinkedIn

Irish Stew Links

• Website
• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• Media Partner: IrishCentral

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 10; Total Episode Count: 151

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For it’s 150th episode, Irish Stew podcast welcomes back a clear-eyed optimist for troubled times, Michael J. Dowling. Glucksman Ireland House is honoring him with the Outstanding Public Service and Lifetime Contribution to Public Health Award at its New York City Gala on Tuesday, March 3, 2026.

After decades of work transforming Northwell Health into an American healthcare leader, Michael has segued into a CEO Emeritus role, but it sounds nothing like retirement.

“Life is a series of changes, a series of journeys,” says the former top-class hurler from Knockaderry, Co. Limerick. “I have stepped down, but I haven’t stepped away. I could never retire. I enjoy the battles. I'm working at Northwell full-time for the next two years on the succession with the new leadership team.”

On the episode hosted by John Lee, Michael shares his well-honed views on compassionate leadership, how to address social media’s effect on youth mental health, the promise of healthcare progress, the impact of the Irish on U.S. history, immigration’s enduring value, why the US must continue to be a beacon for democracy globally, and his commitment to Irish America.

“I want to spend a portion of my time continuing to build and enhance the Irish influence in the United States and vice versa.”

Listening to the episode, it’s easy to see why New York University’s Glucksman Ireland House chose to honor Michael at its Gala at New York’s Mandarin Hotel. For Michael, the admiration is mutual.

“Glucksman House is at the center of Irish and Irish‑American studies. It reminds us about heritage, history, and contribution,” he says. “Loretta Glucksman is an icon, an extraordinary individual. And it's not just her work here in the US, it is her work in Ireland, too, and all she does to bring people together and promote a sense of humility, strength, and kindness to the world around us.”

What’s next for Michael Dowling? He tells of his work in youth mental health addressing the perils of “so many young people living in a virtual world and not living in the real world,” the book he’s writing on leadership fueled by optimism, and his plans to deepen involvement with Irish institutions in the US and in Ireland.

“We need more people to be spokespersons about the values of decency and respect and humanity and caring,” he says.

Irish Stew is off to DC this weekend to be the Podcast in Residence at the Solas Nua Capital Irish Film Festival, Feb. 26-Mar. 1. Filmmaker Ruán Magan, who has both a feature film and documentary in the festival, headlines the next episode of Irish Stew.

Links

Glucksman Ireland House

• Website
• Gala Tickets for Tuesday, March 3 at the Mandarin Hotel

Michael Dowling

• Northwell Health
• LinkedIn
• X

Irish Stew Links

• Website
• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• Media Partner: IrishCentral

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 9; Total Episode Count: 150

Filmmaker Nuala O’Connor joins Irish Stew cohosts Martin Nutty and John Lee for a “Global Irish Nation Conversation” on her documentary In Time: Dónal Lunny, her filmic tone poem in black and white on the enigmatic innovator of Irish music.
Co‑founder of the seminal groups Planxty, The Bothy Band, and Moving Hearts, Dónal introduced the flat-back bouzouki to Irish music and broke through with new time signatures, revolutionizing the sound and status of Irish trad music without breaking its fundamental architecture.

Previously an RTÉ radio producer, Nuala is now an Emmy Award-winning writer and director whose work in music and arts documentary filmmaking spans more than three decades.

The director explains how the title In Time carries intertwined meanings that mirror the musician’s life and work. “You know sometimes things come to you for no reason and then they seem to be very reasonable after they’ve arrived,” she says of the name. “There’s the idea of time signature in music. Dónal explored time signatures previously unheard in Irish music and he has been at the forefront of Irish music for so long, you know, literally in time.”

The episode also delves into Dónal’s deep relationships with fellow musicians, his creative collaborations with his Planxty bandmates, and newer sonic explorations as he is still pushing boundaries in his late seventies.

He also pushed boundaries in his personal life which the film unflinchingly shows and the podcasters explore.

Nuala explains that she wanted to paint a portrait of an artist still very much in motion, not a nostalgic retrospective, a commitment captured powerfully in the film’s climactic scene where an ailing Dónal and his Planxty colleague Christy Moore reunite.

“I took Dónal out of hospital, drove him to where we shot that, and then put him in the car and brought him back to hospital after,” she says, “I honestly didn’t know, will he be here when the film comes out?

In Time: Dónal Lunny will screen on Day 3 of the Solas Nua Capital Irish Film Festival, Feb. 26 through Mar. 1. Irish Stew will once again be the festival’s Podcast in Residence and will record an episode on stage with filmmaker guests following the Fri., Feb. 27, 6:30 PM Northern Ireland Spotlight screenings of Three Keenings and No Ordinary Heist.

Links

Solas Nua

• Website
• Capital Irish Film Festival
• In Time: Dónal Lunny

Nuala O’Connor

• IMDB

South Wind Blows Productions

• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

Irish Stew Links

• Website
• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• Media Partner: IrishCentral

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 8; Total Episode Count: 149

In this conversation recorded at the 2025 Capital Irish Film Festival, host Martin Nutty sits down with two trailblazing Irish filmmakers who are pushing boundaries in their respective genres.

Aislinn Clarke discusses her groundbreaking Irish-language horror film Fréwaka, exploring how her childhood love of horror (she saw The Exorcist at seven!) and her father's commitment to preserving the Irish language converged into a unique cinematic vision. Clarke reveals the gift of discovering the perfect location for the film in Ravensdale Forest, and why horror fans have always embraced foreign language films. With international distribution through IFC Shutter and more projects in development, Clarke is proving that Irish-language cinema can compete on the global stage.

Tanya Doyle takes us behind the scenes of her five-year documentary odyssey Eat, Sleep, Cheer, and Repeat, which follows Ireland's cheerleading team to the World Championships in Florida. What began as a search for a film about women in sport became an intimate portrait of athleticism, identity, and belonging. Doyle shares the moment she knew cheerleading was the story—watching a young competitor vomit from sheer physical exertion—and defends the sport against anyone who questions its legitimacy. With 160 hours of footage to wrangle and characters lost to COVID shutdowns, the film became a testament to resilience both on and off screen.

Both filmmakers discuss the challenges of funding independent cinema in Ireland, the intimacy of the editing process, and the importance of creating spaces where diverse stories can flourish. Whether you're interested in horror, documentary filmmaking, Irish language revival, or women in sport, this episode offers rich insights into the craft and passion of contemporary Irish cinema.

Links

Films

• Preview: Eat, Sleep, Cheer, and Repeat
• Preview: Fréwaka

Aislinn Clarke

• IMDB
• Instagram

Tanya Doyle

• IMDB
• LinkedIn
• Griffith College

Solas Nua

• Capital Irish Film Festival

Irish Stew Links

• Website
• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• Media Partner: IrishCentral

Episode Details: Season 8, Episode 7; Total Episode Count: 148