Hollywood’s idea of an Irish movie? Leprechauns, American, English, Australian and Scottish actors sporting Lucky Charms accents, additional leprechauns, and more blarney than you can shake a shillelagh at.
To help you celebrate the extended St. Patrick’s Day weekend, here are some of Hollywood’s lamest, most dubious attempts at “Irish’’ movies:
‘The Irish in Us’ (1935)
Authentic Irish-Americans James Cagney, Pat O’Brien and Frank McHugh play NYC brothers — with Scottish Mary Gordon as their mother and English “colleen’’ Olivia de Havilland as Cagney’s love interest — in this hokey comedy that gets wheeled out every St. Patrick’s Day.
‘Parnell’ (1937)
In the biggest box-office flop of his career, Clark Gable’s famous Irish politician lectures the prime minister of England while sounding like he just got off a plane from Hollywood.
‘Three Cheers for the Irish’ (1940)
Irish-American matinee idol Dennis Morgan plays a Scottish-American cop who romances the daughter of Irish-American cop Thomas Mitchell (Scarlett O’Hara’s blarney-spouting dad in “Gone With the Wind’’) in this comedy that leaves no ethnic cliché unturned.
‘The Luck of the Irish’ (1948)
Cecil Kellaway was Oscar-nominated playing a leprechaun who helps journalist Tyrone Power find a more liberal employer and Anne Baxter in what amounts to a labored reworking of “Miracle on 34th Street.’’ Kellaway had declined to play Santa Claus in the earlier film, and his cousin, Edmund Gwenn, won the Oscar.
‘Top O’ the Morning’ (1951)
Barry Fitzgerald, the go-to Irish character actor in Hollywood’s Golden Age, was featured with crooner Bing Crosby for the third time in this soggy musical comedy about an American insurance investigator looking into the disappearance of, uh, the Blarney Stone. Here Bing and Barry sing “The Donovans’’ with Ann Blyth.
‘Darby O’Gill and the Little People’ (1959)
A young, bushy-eyebrowed Sean Connery is visited by a leprechaun in his sleep and just can’t disguise his Scottish burr, even though his lines in this bit of Disney whimsy appear to have been re-recorded in post-production.
‘Far and Away'(1992)
At the other end of the budget scale, then-married Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman show off their spectacular lack of chemistry and their awful Irish Spring accents as 19th-century immigrants in this Ron Howard epic.
‘Leprechaun’ (1993)
English-born dwarf Warwick Davis found his proverbial pot o’ gold in the title role of this cheesy horror flick with a young Jennifer Aniston and Jim Carrey, returning for a string of mostly direct-to-video sequels, including the immortal “Leprechaun in the Hood’’ with Ice T.
‘The Devil’s Own’ (1997)
Brad Pitt as an Irish Republican Army terrorist? Certainly his accent is scary.
‘Movie 43’ (2013)
Irish actor Colin Farrell, who rarely says no to a dubious project, reportedly had second thoughts about playing a potty-mouthed leprechaun in a segment of this notorious sketch comedy with Johnny Knoxville and Seann William Scott. So Scottish actor Gerard Butler did it instead.