Barry Keoghan to play outlaw Billy the Kid in gritty new movie from the team behind Normal People

Meet the Billy Barry Kid...

Currently creeping out audiences in the critically-acclaimed Irish gangster thriller, Calm With Horses, Barry Keoghan is already planning some very exciting post-lockdown projects. In addition to starring alongside Angelina Jolie and Salma Hayek in Marvel's The Eternals, the Dublin native has now confirmed that he'll be playing the part of wild west legend, Billy the Kid, in a new movie produced by Element Pictures. Having killed eight men by the age of just 21, the notorious outlaw is a Hollywood favourite and Keoghan will be joining the likes of Paul Newman, Kris Kristofferson and Emilio Estevez in portraying the gunfighter on the big screen. Whether there'll be vampires involved or not, it's just too early to tell.

Into the (wild) west...

Speaking with Barry (from a socially-acceptable distance) to mark the recent digital release of Calm With Horses, we asked him all about his upcoming new role as the infamous bandit...

"Yeah, I’ve been trying to get it made the last three years, four years. I’ve been pushing it towards a director that I really like, that’s Bart Layton who did American Animals. And Hunter Andrews is writing it, he’s the script writer and Ed Guiney [of Element Pictures] is going to produce it. So that’s going to be a fantastic project where we’re gonna tell the story from, y’know, not the cliché Western. Just really humanise Billy the Kid, because he had to live up to the legend of being this character while he was still alive and he was only a kid! He was quite young and he had the weight of the world on his shoulders, so we really want to humanise it and make it gritty – a different spin on a Western."

And will Barry be playing the Billy the Kid himself?

"Oh yeah! I’m Billy. I’m Billy! No one else is playing Billy, I’m Billy!"

So there you have it, that’s as definitive as it gets. Barry is Billy. As Barry exclusively confirmed, Ed Guiney and Element Pictures – the internationally-renowned Irish production company behind Normal People, Room and The Favourite – will be involved in making the movie, commenting that "we are developing this film with Barry and are very excited about it.” They're not the only ones. With Barry and Element Pictures involved, this new movie is already shaping up to be one of the most exciting Irish projects in years. You can check our full interview with Barry Keoghan right here or just hit Play below. And yes, we obviously tried to squeeze as many Marvel spoilers out of him as possible. In the meantime, make sure to check out Calm With Horses right now on Video On Demand (VOD) platforms. They include iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Sky Store, Virgin Movies, Talk Talk, BT TV, Curzon Home Cinema, BFI Player, Rakuten TV and Volta. Clip via Element Pictures Distribution