Millie’s Maxol Magic makes world première

I think the public are fantastic, I’ll get them going out laughing!”

If any of the many words Millie Walsh speaks in the film that premièred in the Greville Arms on Wednesday, those capture the essence of the man’s exuberant presence at the Maxol garage on the Dublin Road in Mullingar.

Millie’s Maxol Magic, a film by Conor English and Ethan Scally was shown to a full house in the main function room at the Greville, and it drew laughs, cheers and genuinely warm applause in tribute to a man whose essential goodness mixes with a fantastic eccentricity to make a character the likes of whom is rarely seen.

Conor and Ethan began filming on January 10, 2020, and their movie shows two sides of Millie’s life. One is his typically busy days at work, where he runs around like a person 30 years younger (he was 69 at the time of recording), switching on lights, opening doors and display units, putting the clock in its place (“the clock is telling me what to do the whole time,” he says at one point), chatting customers, shouting hello to passers-by, stock-taking, and generally taking care of business.

The other side is a more relaxed Millie, at home, where he takes precious moments to wind down, and where he has a small altar for saying the prayers that mean so much to him; where he has his dinner every evening at 8 o’clock – except Tuesdays, when he eats earlier and then goes to visit the people at the St Camillus nursing home (or did before Covid put a stop to that).

Reflecting for a moment, Millie says: “I certainly don’t want to go from the Maxol station to the cemetery, and you can’t blame me for that, so I have it kinda set up here, geared to get the few years. You have to look at your life and say, do you keep going or what do you do, and in fairness to the company, they would never put pressure on me to retire, they would leave it me myself to stay as long as I want to stay. I think that I want to get a few years to myself.”

Addressing the camera, Millie says at various times during the film: “I do enjoy it. I like everything right. I always like to have the place clean, I love the craic with the people. It costs nothing to be nice,” he says.

When Ethan asks him for a highlight of his time with Maxol, Millie found it difficult to pick one: “I can honestly say I just enjoy every day I go up and put on that Maxol sign,” he replied.

The film is around 50 minutes long, and will be shown again at the new Omniplex Cinemas Mullingar on April 19.

After the screening, Conor and Ethan explained a bit of their motivation in making the film. Ethan said: “We were just talking about Mullingar, and thought we have to tell the stories, document them, and thought ‘who do we start with’ and Millie was the first name that came into our heads.

“We want to celebrate the characters that make our town the town that we love, and Millie, for the craic, the enthusiasm, any time you’re passing the Dublin Bridge, he just brings so much colour, so much laughter, to that area of the town. Any time I’ve gone to that shop, since I was this high, I’ve left with a smile on my face. You walk out with a different attitude than what you walked in with, and that’s why we wanted to portray a day in Millie’s life, and we also wanted to show you a little bit more, on the personal side.”

Ethan credited Conor with the “real brains behind this project”; “I was just there asking Millie one or two things – and I didn’t even have to ask him that much (huge laughs from the audience)”.

Ethan and Conor reiterated thanks to everyone for attending the screening; to Millie himself; to the Greville Arms and other backers whose support covered costs, and means all funds raised from ticket sales for Wednesday will be donated to the St Camillus centre in Killucan. They also thanked Andrea and Rachel, and Bernie Newman, who provided the footage from the early 1990s that is such an important part of the film.

The star of the show, appropriately, had the last word on the evening, and his first comment was a dig at Scally for his colourful language. Millie also thanked everyone, and paid tribute to the Camillians and the work Bro John and Fr Monks and their teams do. He said he had forgotten about the film, as more than three years had passed since it was recorded, but he enjoyed being part of it, and wished Conor and Ethan success in their future endeavours. “They’re two great lads, with great patience – they know where they’re going, and can I just say, God help the next victim!”

Millie thanked his wife and family and in particular Regina, who could not be present as she is ill; and the management and staff of the Greville Arms.

“Thank God the night went alright. I hope yiz have enjoyed it, because after all, the majority of you are customers! And I can assure you, any Christmas Day at 4 o’clock, you’ll all get free car washes!”