Barry Keoghan refuses to discuss how he got a scar he has publicly displayed for the first time.
The Irish actor, 32, who shot to fame in films including ‘The Killing of a Sacred Deer’ and ‘Saltburn’ showed off what looked like the aftermath of a nasty injury on his left wrist during a cover shoot for Hunger magazine, which said the star wanted to “lay bare the scars that have shaped him – inside and out”.
Barry said after the photoshoot how it left him “emotional”, adding: “I won’t go into how I got this scar, but I’ve got a scar that's like a millimetre away from my main vein on my left arm.
“I waited to do this with (photographer Rankin) to show that. You know, it just felt right.”
Referring to a tattoo in tribute to his mother Debbie who was killed by a heroin overdose when he was aged 12, Barry went on: “On one wrist you’ve got my mum's name and then on the other wrist you've got this constant reminder, this scar.
“(Rankin and I) both looked at each other and went, ‘Wow! That’s it’.”
Barry also has a scar that goes along the length of his arm, which he got after he was afflicted with a flesh-eating bug that almost led to him having his limb amputated.
The actor was stricken with necrotising fasciitis, which can flare up if a wound becomes infected, and it left him hospitalised and so ill just before he started shooting ‘The Banshees of Inisherin’ alongside fellow Irishmen Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson its director Martin McDonagh feared he may not be able to make it onto set.
Barry is a father to two-year-old son Brando, who he has with his ex-girlfriend Alyson Kierans, from whom he split from in mid-2023.
He recently hit back at trolls who branded him a “deadbeat dad”, saying: “By God, didn’t the f*****’ internet do their work! ‘Deadbeat father’, blah, blah, blah!
“It’s just because I don’t post my child 24/7 or give the Internet what they want. My son isn’t a talking point.”
