House of Guinness star felt drunk after necking eight pints on set due to 'placebo effect'
The long-awaited series delving into the fractious history of the Guinness family has finally dropped.
Netflix's eight-part saga finally dishes the dirt on the decorated and debauched history of the aristocrats of ale, and the Succession-like tensions over the fortune.
It provides an education on the dynasty behind Ireland's most iconic drink, while it also teaches viewers a thing or two about the fine art of putting multiple pints of Guinness away - properly.
So, as you can imagine, there was plenty of the black stuff sunk by the cast while filming the drama... and even if it was the zero per cent cans, the show's stars claim to have still felt the effects of it, as if they had been 'spiked'.
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Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight is the mastermind behind the TV series, which follows the journey of the four heirs to the Guinness empire as they deal with the fallout following the death of their father, Benjamin.
The siblings - played by Anthony Boyle, Louis Partridge, Fionn O'Shea and Emily Fairn - might have been baptised in beer, but it doesn't guarantee them a seat at the table...or a stake in their dad's will.
With the brewery's fate in their hands, the next generation of Guinnesses are forced to grapple with the threat of their dark secrets coming to light, all while navigating forbidden love and family politics.
Take a look at the House of Guinness trailer here:
Ahead of the series release this week, LADbible sat down with Game of Thrones legend Jack Gleeson and The Witcher actress Niamh McCormack.
Gleeson stars as wheeler-dealer Byron Hughes, who provides some much-needed comic relief to the series, while McCormack takes on the role of Ellen Cochrane, a rebel with a cause who is one of the leaders of the Irish Republican Brotherhood.
And both revealed that they wouldn't be surprised if some people tuning in think they were three sheets to the wind on set, as they both drank so much Guinness 0.0, it ended up having quite an effect on their performances.
The cast drank the non-alcoholic version of the black stuff while shooting the House of Guinness for obvious reasons, yet still ended up feeling 'woozy'.
Gleeson told LADbible: "Sometimes it can actually have a non-zero per cent effect. Weirdly, there’s like a placebo thing that happens where your body tastes the Guinness and sends signals to your brain saying, ‘This is alcohol’, even though it’s not.
"I did feel a bit woozy a few times on set...maybe they were spiking us."
McCormack, 24, explained that the alcohol-free Guinness had the same effect on her - especially when she had to sink several pints of the stuff in a row while cinched into a tight corset during one scene.
As the shoot was on a particularly hot day, too, each of these elements led her to one conclusion - "I am drunk."
"There was a scene where I have to down maybe seven or eight pints of Guinness while laced in a corset," McCormack told LADbible.
"It was the middle of summer, and I was like, I am drunk.
"Even though I wasn’t, it really is that placebo effect of going, ‘Oh my god, this is not real Guinness? It looks the same, it tastes the same'…"
Despite feeling a little off, the stars put on an extraordinary performance in the show, which also boasts an unapologetically Irish soundtrack that features the likes of Kneecap, Fontaines DC and The Mary Wallopers.
"It’s unlike anything anyone has ever seen before, I’ll say that," McCormack told LADbible about what viewers should expect.
You can raise a glass of the dry stout - or the alcohol-free version - to House of Guinness as it is now available to watch on Netflix.
Topics: Alcohol, Celebrity, Celebrity News, Netflix, Originals, TV and Film, Ireland
Olivia Burke