You don’t have to be a mother to fall hard for the cult of perfection: most women, at some point in her life, have found themselves on a crusade of self-improvement.
Comedians Sinead Culbert and Sue Collins, aka Dirt Birds, have had enough of women being sold this particular pup. They want to lampoon the whole idea of having it all, yet also offer women a way through it, in their own inimitable way.
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Which is precisely why their new book, Dirtbirds’ Self-Help Guide: How To Have Confidence When You Feel Lower Than A Snake’s Arse, is likely to hit a nerve. Occupying the same warmly charming realm as the popular Aisling fiction series, the Dirt Birds’ debut is at once a salve for, and a battle cry against, womanly perfection.
“It’s an antidote to the Insta-perfect world,” says Culbert. “It’s calling that out for what it is, which is a crock of sh**e. As mothers, you have to have the patience of Mother Teresa, the body of Elle Macpherson, 800 kids who all look fabulous, and an amazing career. I mean, Sue and I do have the bodies of Elle Macpherson… but really, we have to be constantly exposed to this stuff.
“I constantly feel like I’m not this amazing mother,” she adds. “I remember my mother being absolutely aghast because I said to my two kids once, ‘I make mistakes too and I’m not perfect’. She was like, ‘Sinead, that gives them a lot of power, you know’. But fair play to you if you’ve never shouted at your kids – you’re either on Xanax or a robot.”
“We did an event last weekend and we were saying, the woman who takes the perfect photograph on a day out and posts it online has probably taken 600 photos, then has to edit them, while her kids are starving beside her. Like, are you really enjoying quality time with your family?” says Collins.
Even the book’s chapter titles are likely to raise a smile. Among them are ‘Fitness Tips For Women Who Can’t Be Arsed’, ‘How Not To Look Like A Bag Of Sh**e On Your Wedding Day’, ‘When The Kids Wreck Your Head During The Summer’, ‘A Survivor’s Guide To Getting An Extension’ or ‘Are You A BFF (Best Friend Forever) Or A TFT (Total Fecking Traitor)?’ It’s the sort of ticklish and sweary read that will instantly ring familiar. Think a gin-soaked chat with your saltiest, filthiest friend.
“We’ve been lampooning the whole mindfulness thing, but not in a big way because we’re kind of into it ourselves,” admits Collins.
The book release arrives on the back of a hugely successful run of Facebook videos, which the pair started posting in July 2016. It wouldn’t be unusual for a Dirt Birds video – among them, sartorial style guides/beauty tutorials and sketches featuring competitive mums – to rack up 80,000 views on their first day online. It was only a matter of time before a live show materialised (they’ve broken records, incidentally, for the amount of wine served at several of the show’s venues).
“It’s the truth of them,” Culbert asserts, in a bid to explain why the video sketches have gone viral. “We write about stuff that stresses us out and affects us, like the rare moments of joy in a mother’s life, like when someone takes your child unexpectedly, or they come home from a playdate and the other parent says, ‘Don’t worry about dinner, they’ve already been fed’. When children come through the door and say they have no homework, it’s like winning the lottery. It’s the really simple things.”
Timing, too, is very much on their side. “We talk about a lot of the stuff that affects women, and there’s such an appetite for it right now,” observes Culbert. “Women come up to us in the supermarket or toy shop and are saying ‘thanks a million. That’s exactly how I feel now’. Some people tell us they’ve been struggling a lot in their lives right now, and our sketches are their go-to relief. It’s actually very moving.”
They may be hitting the zeitgeist now, but Dirt Birds has been well over a decade in the making. Culbert and Collins met during a stand-up gig around 12 years ago, where they were the only two female comedians on the bill. Culbert had found her way into the business via youth theatre in Dundalk – she then did a year of theatre studies, before obtaining a BA, then a Masters in Modern Drama Studies at UCD. After a successful stint at the Edinburgh Festival, she began pivoting towards comedy.
The daughter of musicians Audrey Park and Archie Collins, Sue co-founded the comedy/musical trio The Nualas soon after her mother’s death. A riff on The Spice Girls and other girl bands of the era, The Nualas counted Tara Flynn and Anne Gildea among its founders: Karen Egan and Maria Tecce have also been members before the touring outfit wound down in 2018.
“We’re always laughing about this because Sue always made out that I stalked her,” recalls Dundalk native Culbert. “I approached her after the gig and asked her if she wanted to do something together. In her head, that amounts to ‘being stalked for months’.”
Adds Collins, herself a mother of four: “I only had two kids then. I do remember the phone ringing and fair play to her, she was like, ‘hi, I’m Sinead, we’ve met briefly before’. We met up in The Cake Cafe in Camden Street and five minutes in it was like we’d known each other for years.”
The pair got working on a script, which promptly caught the attention of John Ross, a producer at BBC3. Together, they developed a comedy series script for almost three years, providing Culbert and Collins with the most effective writing masterclass they could have wished for.
“Like many projects, it didn’t get made, but we learned an awful lot through that process,” recalls Collins.
Nowadays, the pair collaborate creatively over the phone, writing their online sketches, live shows and the book while kids, dogs and husbands clamour in the background.
“That’s the reality of it,” shrugs Culbert. “We’re cooking dinner with the other hand, and kids are coming in and out. My husband, who’s Dutch, also works from home, and yet somehow the kids don’t ever go near him.”
There had been online chatter that the two were in talks with Netflix, but this, alas, proved no more than a rumour.
“I mean, it’s definitely the dream,” says Collins. “We’re always working on something.” Currently, the Dirt Birds are writing with playwright Elaine Murphy, the woman behind the award-winning Little Gem.
“Dirt Birds has become so successful that we don’t have to do many other gigs, and we know that makes us very lucky,” says Collins. “But it’s a lot of work, filming and posting your sketch every week, then writing a live show every year, then a book, then a series, and we’re constantly being asked to do events. That said, we were trying to get things made for years and we were hitting brick wall after brick wall.”
As with many comedians who build their following online – among them Emma Doran and Foil, Arms & Hog – the Dirt Birds have found that Facebook is the ultimate democratic platform. They can create work relatively inexpensively and without the say-so from TV or film executives, then mainline straight into their audience.
“Several people had said, ‘put stuff up online and people decide for themselves if it’s funny’,” recalls Culbert. “People are very discerning and clever. We know ourselves if some sketches are better written or have higher quality jokes, because they’ll be the exact ones that go viral.”
“It’s just a very interesting platform as it’s got a little world of its own,” adds Collins. “Like any art form, as long as you stay true to yourself, and write what’s relatable, it will land with an audience. It’s a lot of work but we’re getting better all the time, and that’s an exciting feeling.”
The Dirt Birds Self-Help Guide is published by Hachette Ireland. For more information on Irish live dates throughout October, November and December. See dirtbirds.net
* Shot on location at The Hendrick hotel, Dublin
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