Sarah Greene: ‘I’ve been on male-heavy film sets – they’re not as safe as Bad Sisters’

How do you tell a story about domestic abuse and still make it funny?” It’s a question Sarah Greene and her co-stars have had to grapple with on the wicked black comedy Bad Sisters, which arrived with a dirty cackle on Apple TV+ in 2022. The first season, in which Greene played Bibi Garvey, a badass, one-eyed lesbian, followed four Dublin sisters as they conspired to despatch the abusive husband of their fifth sibling. They nicknamed their target John Paul “The Prick”, and the show opened at his wake, with him lying in his coffin and his widow pushing down his genitals to banish his perpetual erection. See what I mean about it being darkly comic?

“Abuse is not a laughing matter,” says Greene, who as Bibi was the Garvey sister most determined to see The Prick buried six feet under, “so we had that question at the forefront of our minds for pretty much every scene. Like, yes, let’s have humour, but if these were real women, what would they do in each situation?” Certainly the abuse itself is never funny – it’s chilling – but the sisters’ madcap, clumsy attempts at offing John Paul are often the stuff of black farce, be it shooting him in the head with a frozen paintball or drugging his trusty nasal spray.

Bibi is the coolest Garvey sister. She lost her eye in a car accident caused by John Paul, when a Mother Mary figurine stuck to the dashboard impaled her in the face. So she wears an eyepatch, paired with an umber bob and an inky wardrobe. Think Posh Spice meets pirate chic. When I meet Greene at a members’ club in London, the 40-year-old has a similarly striking look – but her hair has changed colour. This time, it’s red bob, gold hoops, ripped jeans. Only the coffee is black.

Made by and also starring Sharon Horgan – Ireland’s TV darling who brought the world Catastrophe and Motherland – Bad Sisters returns with a two-year time jump. The Prick has long been worm food (he was eventually killed by his wife), and the sisters have managed to cover up his murder – or so they think. Yet when a new body turns up in a pond, local detectives have more questions for the women, whom they’ve always had a hunch were guilty, setting off a wild and sinister chain of events.

While the first season was based on the Belgian series Clan, this second series consists of original material. But Greene wasn’t nervous about the show living up to expectations. “In a way, we were more comfortable,” she says. “We knew what the tone was, and the impact it had had on audiences. We weren’t trying to find our characters for the first time, so it was like meeting old friends again.” The actors who play the Garveys – Greene, Horgan, Anne-Marie Duff, Eve Hewson and Eva Birthistle – have become like sisters. “We annoy the crew because we talk so much. They’d be like, ‘We said action!’ And we’d still be chatting.”

Greene, who’s also starred in Normal People and Penny Dreadful, loved being on a show run by women. “I’ve been on sets where it’s very male heavy, and it’s not as safe a place as something like Bad Sisters, where everyone’s voice is really heard.” What bothers her about male-dominated sets? “Misogyny,” she says simply, running a hand through her blaze of red hair. “Just blatant misogyny. I’ve witnessed younger actors experiencing stuff – but I’m not going to name names or productions. After MeToo, people thought things would change, and they have, but things like pay disparity are a massive thing. Men do get paid more than us. That’s a fact.”

But filming Bad Sisters hasn’t exactly been a breeze for Greene. Wearing the patch is, “in short, super annoying!” she says, throwing her head back with laughter. “It took me a long time to get used to it. I found it really hard to take direction. People say your hearing should be heightened, but it wasn’t that. It was like a disconnect that I had. I didn’t feel like myself, which was a good thing, I suppose.” There were longer-term side effects, as well. “I lost all my eyelashes from the pressure on my eye. It just rubs them off – the friction. But they’re back now.” She leans forward so I can inspect her lashes, which have all returned with the help of a magic serum. Her left leg went funny, too. “It got really sore because I was putting too much pressure on it and my whole balance was off. But Bibi does look badass, so I’ll take it.”

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Greene is straight and able-bodied; Bibi is gay and disabled. Greene says the debate around authentic representation is “always something to be mindful of”, but adds: “at the end of the day, I definitely want to play this part. I’m not a lesbian, but I don’t think that should stop someone from playing a lesbian. You’re really closing the doors then.” She doesn’t think there should be a “clear-cut” rule about which actors can play which characters, but admits that the possible contention around her casting had crossed her mind. “I was definitely nervous about it,” she says, adding that one of the problems with the authenticity debate is that it encourages people to make presumptions about an actor’s sexuality.

The actor was just six years old when she decided she wanted a career on stage and screen, after seeing a performance of Cinderella. She grew up in Cork and was not from a performing arts family: her mum stayed at home while her dad worked in telecommunications, and the family lived in an old farmhouse where they inherited pigs, chickens, cats and dogs from the previous owner. As a child, Greene starred in local musical theatre and pantomimes, before going on to attend Cada Performing Arts school in Cork and then the Gaiety School of Acting in Dublin.

She had a solid stage career from that point on, but it was her fearless, foul-mouthed performance as anarchic tough girl Helen, in a West End and then Broadway staging of Martin McDonagh’s play The Cripple of Inishmaan in 2013, that really opened doors for her. The role earned her both an Olivier and a Tony nomination, and when Anna Wintour saw her perform, she was so impressed she invited Greene to the Met Gala. From there, her screen career flourished, and roles in horror drama Penny Dreadful and crime series Dublin Murders followed.

Yet it was her compassionate performance as a single mum in Normal People that really turned heads. She played Lorraine, the wise mother of Paul Mescal’s tortured heartthrob Connell, and was seen by many as the moral compass of the series, which was a stratospheric lockdown hit. In some circles, Lorraine was even more popular than Connell’s silver chain. One headline gushed: “Why Connell’s Mum, Lorraine, Is The Real Hero Of Normal People.”

Greene wasn’t surprised by the intense reaction to the show. “It was a very strange time,” she says. “We were told not to touch each other, not to hug each other, not to kiss. Then we’re watching two people fall in love and doing all the things we at home were told not to do. I think everyone was longing for connection and really fell in love with Paul and Daisy [Edgar Jones].” She has watched their trajectory – from total unknowns to “incredible, massive stars” – with interest. Would she like that level of fame? “No I wouldn’t. And I don’t think I ever would have been comfortable with that.” She looks around the busy room we’re in. “I like sitting in a restaurant and not having people eavesdropping on my conversation next to me. So I don’t think I would cope very well with that level of fame. But they’re really handling it really well.”

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Horgan cast Greene in Bad Sisters after she appeared as hot mess Aine in Frank of Ireland – a Horgan-produced comedy, written by brothers Brian and Domhnall Gleeson. “I think she realised from that show that I could be funny,” says Greene, who was eight months pregnant with her son Eli, with her partner, Snow Patrol’s Nathan Connolly, when she was offered the role.

She found Bibi’s steely nature tough to inhabit, partly because of the way motherhood has brought her own emotions closer to the surface. She recalls rehearsing for a Bad Sisters karaoke scene and weeping. “I was like, ‘Bibi doesn’t cry, I need to stop!’ I had to do a lot of getting rid of tears before they called action.”

Greene had planned to take a breather over the summer after filming ended on Bad Sisters, and spend more time at home with Eli; Connolly had a summer of festival dates stacked up with Snow Patrol. But on her last day on set, she received the script for the forthcoming TV adaptation of Nick Cave’s wild father-son road trip novel The Death of Bunny Munro. She was offered the role of Libby, a character whose suicide leads to the unravelling of her husband (played by Matt Smith), and couldn’t say no. So she spent this summer filming it. “Nathan and I have always said that if I’m like, ‘Oh, I have to do this,’ then we’ll figure it out,” says Greene. “But I need to decide what happens with Eli in school, whether I take him out. These are big choices.”

She’s at a place in her career now where she’s getting offers without the need to audition. “I’m in a really fortunate position,” she smiles. “But the project has to be really good, because the sacrifice is big.” When you’re getting cherry-picked for shows with names like Sharon Horgan and Nick Cave attached, a little sacrifice, I suspect, is surely worth it.

‘Bad Sisters’ season two is out now on Apple TV+