This is a fantastic achievement!
American talk shows are obviously overflowing with famous people talking about their recent career highlights.
Everyone from Ellen to James Corden to Conan to Jimmy Kimmel fill up the US stations each evening with celebrities and musicians and funny folk, and when they aren’t just talking about new projects, they can also be huge platforms for some lesser known acts to get a big push into the public spotlight.
Which is where Sean Finnerty comes in, who was recently interviewed on FM104 to talk about his huge achievement:
“I’m pretty sure I’ll be the first ever Irish comedian to perform on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. It started with Johnny Carson, and then Jay Leno, and now it is Jimmy Fallon.”
“What happened was, I was invited to take part in this competition called Stand Up NBC, which was a diversity showcase here in America. So I was basically the white guy in this diversity showcase! So I flew to Houston, did a two minute audition set, and then I moved on to the semi-finals.”
“Then I was asked to take part in an audition showcase for Fallon, and I found out they only host that once a year!”
While there have obviously been some funny Irish people on the show before (Chris O’Dowd and Sharon Horgan immediately come to mind), they aren’t actually comedians… just really funny people who are also actors!
Finnerty serves as the announcer for Season 9 of Amazon Prime’s Fireball Run, and he has also performed at Electric Picnic, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the Boston Comedy Festival, and Laugh Your Asheville Off.
He has spent the last seven years gigging in the United States, he goes further into how he got the chance to appear on the late night TV show, and also shares some of his more difficult gigs he’s done over the years.
Sean Finnerty will be joining Captain America: The Winter Soldier star Cobie Smulders and Creed star Michael B. Jordan on Friday 11 January.
You can check out his full chat with Cormac Moore on FM104 right here.
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