Exclusive Q&A by Brad Balfour
What: Skittish Comedy Tour
Who: Sean ‘Foil’ Finegan, Sean ‘Hog’ Flanagan and Conor ‘Arms’ McKenna
When: March 20th
Where: Carnegie Hall
After a rousing run of international dates, Irish comedy stars Foil Arms & Hog bring their Skittish Comedy Tour to the US for dates this spring, including a stop at New York CIty’s Carnegie Hall on March 20, and return for more shows this fall.
The prolific Dublin-based comedy trio are viral video stars with over one billion views. While many fans know the Foil Arms & Hog for their online comedy sketches, they really shine in their live shows.
The name evolved from nicknames each of the members had for each other. Foil (Sean Finegan) is the comedy foil, Arms (Conor McKenna) is ‘All arms and Legs’ and Hog (Sean Flanagan) hogs the limelight. They met in the drama society at University College Dublin, where they were studying architecture, genetics and engineering, respectively. They were drawn together at first by a love of the TV show “Father Ted” and a common interest in comedy. This was just after the financial crash.
Formed in 2008, the group has said that it “was absolutely the best thing that could have happened. If the Celtic Tiger had still been going and all our mates were making shedloads of cash, we would have been under pressure to get proper jobs. Instead, we had the perfect excuse to play around for a while and see what happened.”
Now, after sold out world tours and shows at the London Palladium, New York Town Hall and the Sydney Opera House, the Irish sketch group embarks on their biggest world tour yet with their new show “Skittish” featuring sketch comedy, offbeat characters and masterful improv.
This Q&A was conducted over the phone and thus, I’m not sure whether Sean 1 and Sean 2 are really who they are. But if you read closely you can figure out which Sean is which.
Q: Who talks first on stage? Who is this? Who’s talking now?
Sean 1: The other Sean.
Q: Okay, call yourself Sean 1 and Sean 2.
Sean 2:, Sean 1 and Sean 2 can be me.
Q: And you kick his ass? You take the piss out of him?
Sean 1: Yeah, I have opportunities with that.
Q: Do you think the Irish are inherently funny? Is this Sean 1 or Sean 2?
Sean 2: Well, don’t worry if you get it wrong. We don’t mind.
Q: When you decided to form this group, did your friends and family tell you this is a really bad job choice? Did they think you would last this long? Did it occur to you to have a group with one Sean Finnegan and one Sean Flanagan. That it would be a difficult marketing choice as well?
Sean 1: That’s true.
Q: How do you describe your comedy to people? What are your sources for your stories since you’re doing sketch comedy? Is it mostly family, Ireland or your touring?
Sean 1: It’s called An Irish Intervention, where a family gathers around to have an intervention for their son who doesn’t drink alcohol. I don’t know what’s wrong with him.
Q: Which Sean is this?
Sean 1: This is Sean 1 talking now.
Q: Hey, I can tell. Okay, I’m starting to figure out the voices. That’s why I’m asking.
Sean 1: Right. Good man, good man. Perfect.
Q: Don’t put me to a blindfold test though.
Sean 2: Okay, we won’t.
Q: Maybe you could bring someone on stage, blindfold them and have them guess which Sean. That would be good.
Sean 1: Connor would probably feel left out, which I think we would really enjoy.
Q: Actually, the best way to do it is just have Connor do all the talking.
Sean 1: No, I think it should be Sean. I think it should always be Seans talking.
Q: Connor’s a background character? Oh, he’s like Teller of Penn and Teller?
Sean 1: He couldn’t make it for the interview because of family reasons, When you don’t make the interview in Fort Anton Hall, you get slagged.
Q: What comedians have influenced you or been inspirations?
Sean 1: The Marx Brothers are usually for the two other guys, Sean 2 and Connor. The Marx Brothers — that vaudevillian, black and white era really inspired them. I’m more of a modern guy, kind of a Jim Carrey kind of stand-up era guy. Tommy Cooper would also be a hero of mine because he’s very physical. He just has natural funny bones.
Q: Sean 2 has the most malleable face? Do you have the most stretchy face?
Sean 2: Oh, yeah. Yeah, I guess I do.
Sean 1: He’s definitely got the bendiest face. Yeah. Yeah, I’m the gurner [the maker of distorted facial expressions.
Sean 2: I’m the gurning champion of the group. Every great group has always had a good gurner.
Sean 1: I kind of resent the term gurning. It gives it a bad name. Like you gurn when you’re on drugs.
Q: Gurning doesn’t sound like a good word.
Sean 1: No, it’s not.
Q: Did you ever think you were going to play Carnegie Hall? You know the old joke about playing Carnegie Hall and all that.
Sean 1: I think we’ve heard that joke about 7,000 times. We’re going to play Carnegie Hall, which the first 1,000 were good.
Sean 2: I never considered it. It just seems like a place where very posh orchestras go to play Beethoven or whatever. The fact is that we’ve got three Irish guys coming around to have a bit of fun and a mess on the stage.
Sean 1: We’re going to eat crisps in the dark because that’s one of our sketches. And where we have to put them on the stage at one point.
Sean 2: I’m not sure they’re going to allow us to do it, but we’re going to try. I think we’re going to do it and then they might not let us back. But we’ll certainly play Carnegie Hall at least once.
Sean 1: There could be a very substantial sign, is all I’m saying.
Q: You could replace the Blue Man Group since you’re a trio.
Sean 1: That would probably be very good financially for us. They seem to be doing very well for themselves for a long time.
Q: Then you wouldn’t have to know which Sean and which one’s Connor.
Sean 2: That’s true. This is good. Would we have to shave our heads?
Sean 1: Okay, we’ll have to think about it then.
Q: When you come to the United States, you’re doing a full tour. Do you find that once you get out of New York, how do you attract the non-Irish audience? There’s a non-Irish audience that’s already aware of you, or do you tend to build on the Irish audience?
Sean 1: We always try to build on the local audience. We have this funny thing where we can always tell very quickly if those initial beats sell out real fast. That’ll leave everything to the last minute. And then when the gig sells out, it’s all the Irish people emailing us going, ah, I left it late, lads. I’m so sorry, but could you get me a ticket anyway?
Q: Which counties are you from? You went to school in Dublin, but do you have further roots elsewhere?
Sean 1: We actually grew up [near each other], and didn’t know each other when we were kids, but we grew up, I would say, like a 10-minute cycle from each other.
Q: You didn’t know each other until college or university.
Sean 2: Yeah, university.
Q: What did each of you study and did you find any comedy in that experience?
Sean 1: I did architecture. Sean 2: I’m engineering. Connor was genetics. I can’t speak to that. Did I find much comedy in architecture? No, I just wanted to get through it and just get down to the drama society where we were doing plays, and that’s where the comedy was. That’s where the fun was.
Sean 2: Bingo really has two degrees, but the rest of us only have one. he works harder than us academically. What can I say?
Q: When you were doing this, how long did it take for your parents to finally stop telling you, when will you get a real job?
Sean 1: My mom has never said that, but she says it’s quite a difference. She’s never stopped.
Q: She hasn’t stopped saying it?
Sean 1: How beautiful this room is laid out. My parents, we gave up the goats on that one a long, long time ago.
Sean 2: They went, this guy’s a bit unusual. He’s got to do something unusual. He’s not going to make it in engineering. He’s not going to be an engineer. The bridges I would have built would have fallen.
Q: They weren’t thinking that you might have been switched at birth or anything like that?
Sean 2: I think your mom has a flair for dramatics. I think it’s there.
Sean 1: It’s there. We got his mom to act years ago in one of the sketches for us, and she was brilliant. She actually stole the show, so we haven’t invited her back to another one since, but she’s very good, so I think that’s where he’s got it from.
Q: I was going to ask that next, which of your parents ended up on stage, but I see that they’re not going to end up there because you’re afraid of them stealing the act. Have you guys considered creating an animated series or some kind of a show that would be broadcast-able? I don’t mean online, I mean live action.
Sean 1: That sounds great. But, which Sean will get featured first?
Q: Do you have any stories that you developed into some sketches? Any from the Americans you’ve met?
Sean 1: We used to have this show. Oh, yeah, the green card game show.
Q: What about this show? What’s the process for you guys writing it? Do you actually sit down and write them as jokes? Do you write them like a screenplay? Do you improvise and then record it and then build from there? How do you create?
Sean 1: I think we, for the most part, stare at a blank page to be in the shower, come to you. And that can happen.
Sean 2: Or you’re driving around and maybe you get drunk in a room. that always seems funnier at the time, right? In your office, right?
Sean 1: The eight show, we just think it’s so much, then it changes every night because we don’t have a tent.
Q: Do you improvise much of the live show or do you find when you’re working together, you improvise? Like, doing a sketch that you’re recording.
Sean 1: We’re going crazy with our improv. It’s important to get involved.
Q: Do you record most of your stage shows?
Sean 1: Our show once a year. Every show that’s recorded is put on DVD or digital download to it eventually. When it forms the show, we record it all.
Q: Do you have some other projects like books or visual projects that you’re envisioning? Maybe a statue?
Sean 2: We were talking to people about the books. We’re not even sure what to do.
Sean 1: We were tinkering around with the books. There was one book about waiting for death. There’s all these silly things of productions, et cetera, but any of these extra projects are because we do one video, a new video online every single week. We keep getting distracted.
Q: What’s the best way to sign up for you guys?
Sean 1: Instagram, YouTube. All our tickets.
FOIL ARMS & HOG “SKITTISH” Tour 2025
3/18 – Washington, DC @ Capitol One Hall
3/19 – Philadelphia, PA @ Keswick Theatre
3/20 – New York, NY @ Carnegie Hall
3/21 – Boston, MA @ Shubert Theatre
10/9 – St. Paul, MN @ The Fitzgerald
10/10 – Chicago, IL @ The Vic
10/12 – Pittsburgh, PA @ Carnegie Library Music Hall
10/15 – Toronto, ON @ Meridian Hall
10/16 – Montreal, QC @ Olympia
10/17 – Ottawa, ON @ National Arts Centre
10/18 – Edmonton, AB @ Francis Winspear Centre
10/19 – Calgary, AB @ Macewan Hall
For more info go to: www.foilarmsandhog.ie