Barry Keoghan discusses the flesh-eating infection that nearly led to his arm being amputated

The "Banshees of Inisherin" actor was still in the hospital days before filming was scheduled to begin.

Prior to scoring his first Oscar nomination, Barry Keoghan survived a frightening health scare.

The Irish actor opened up about the situation in a recent interview with GQ, revealing that he endured a case of necrotizing fasciitis — otherwise known as a flesh eating infection — right before he started filming 2022’s The Banshees of Inisherin.

Not only was amputation considered to treat the infection in his arm, Keoghan also recalls asking doctors if he would die, to which they replied, “Well, we don’t know.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention necrotizing fasciitis is a rare bacterial infection that spreads quickly in the body and can cause death. The infection develops when bacteria enter the skin through cuts, scrapes, burns or insect bites. Even with surgery and treatment for the infection, the CDC says that up to 1 in 5 people die from the disease which can cause organ failure and sepsis.

Martin McDonagh, who directed Keoghan in the film, said he visited the actor in the hospital days before shooting was set to begin.

“I’m not sure if he was on a lot of meds, but he seemed to shrug it off,” McDonagh said. “We were only about four days out from shooting, and his arm was puffed up. But he was like, ‘Yeah, no, I’m going to be fine—I’ll see you on Tuesday.’”

Despite it all, McDonagh adds, “I went to the hospital thinking, s--- is he going to die? Let alone, is he going to make the movie. But I came out of there energized and looking forward to it.”

Keoghan recalled McDonagh’s hospital visit as a prophetic moment: with the heart monitor beeping in the background, the Banshees director told him, “Just remember this when you’ve been nominated for an Oscar.”

Keoghan indeed earned an Academy Award nod for Best Supporting Actor, though the win ultimately went to Ke Huy Quan. On the bright side, Keoghan got to keep his arm and was honored just to be nominated.

Keoghan has discussed the illness in the past and previously revealed that it kept him from attending any rehearsal for the film. Luckily, McDonagh stepped up. “Martin was there to guide me through it and remind me that we’re in a good place to do this,” Keoghan told Vanity Fair in 2022. “Any problems I had on set, him and Colin [Farrell] and Brendan [Gleeson] and Kerry [Condon], they were right beside me.”

Since recovering, the actor has certainly kept busy. His role opposite Jacob Elordi in Emerald Fennell’s Saltburn has been a huge conversation topic going into awards season. In EW’s review of the film, Maureen Lee Lenker wrote, “Keoghan turns in a towering performance, sinister and irresistible in equal measure,” adding that he “approaches every scene here with a remarkable level of abandon, propelling the film to its divinely gonzo conclusion.”

Keoghan will next star in the Chris Andrews thriller Bring Them Down and Apple TV+’s Masters of the Air, the Steven Spielberg produced miniseries about the World War II–era bomber pilots known as the Bloody Hundredth. And as for where he’d like to go from there, the actor had a list of dream directors ready.

“Barry Jenkins. Paul Thomas Anderson. Christopher Nolan, again. Yorgos again, obviously. Lynne Ramsay. Chloé Zhao again. Martin McDonagh, obviously, again,” he said. “Greta Gerwig, as well—I’d love to work with Greta. I think she’s f---ing incredible.”

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