Young Oldcastle man is keeping Meath on online comedy map

A young Oldcastle man has been entertaining the people of Meath and, indeed, the world with a series of short comedy films which he has been posting on YouTube. John Stewart, who also works freelance as a film editor, was one of the people behind the 'The Noel McCarthy Extravaganza', a short comedy film which was screened to much laughter and applause at the recent Le Cheile festival in Oldcastle. Along with comedy writer, Dave Tynan, John has been making short Meath-based comedy films for the past couple of years, most notably the series, 'Time Of Our Lives'. John was not involved in the first episode of that series but produced the subsequent three episodes which have proved extremely popular on YouTube. Twenty-eight years-old John grew up in Dublin until his family moved back to Oldcastle, his parents' home place in 1991. He works for a media monitoring company but his ultimate ambition is to be a film editor. "I started off recording songs and filming bands and gradually my interest leaned more towards the filming and editing side of things," he said. After filming some weddings, football matches and gigs, he decided to take some courses in editing at Filmbase in Dublin and qualified with level one and two Apple Pro certificates. "Since then, I have invested in setting up my home editing studio and filming equipment, working between Meath and Belfast with the ultimate plan of becoming a full-time editor," he added. John has also done freelance work editing for Green Ink, comedian Patrick Kielty's Belfast-based company. When approached by writer Davy Tynan and comic Noel McCarthy to produce episode two of the 'Time Of Our Lives,' he jumped at the chance. "We filmed four 10-minute videos over the course of last year, which I then uploaded to my YouTube page." The latest project was The Noel McCarthy Extravaganza, which Davy Tynan co-wrote with Ben Tiernan, whom he met at a writing class last year. They have penned another short film going under the working title 'Tommy' which John is hoping to begin filming in the next month, keeping County Meath firmly on the map for internet comedy. Last week, John set up a website, www.reddreamproductions.com, for people or companies wishing to avail of his services.