Irish celebrities are following in the footsteps of their US counterparts by offering to record personal birthday messages and well wishes for their fans.
Well-known faces such as Boyzone singer Ronan Keating, former world snooker champion Ken Doherty and several of the actors from Mrs Brown’s Boys are just a few of the Irish celebs that you can have wishing you a happy birthday.
The have joined the website cameo.com which offers unique shout-outs from the stars in the form of custom video messages.
Throughout 2020 and into 2021 most countries have found themselves in some form lockdown at some point.
This as led to a boom in digital communications, with meetings between families, friends, and business associates all taking place on screens.
Cameo is an extension of that idea and offers people the chance to surprise their loved ones with a special message from the stars.
The concept was already proving successful in America but Irish stars were initially a little sceptical about selling their services in this way.
Former Miss Ireland winner Amanda Brunker has been the driving force behind getting the Irish celebs onboard.
She partnered with Cameo to represent the Irish talent on the site and is delighted the way it is gathering momentum.
She told the Irish Mirror: “Cameo is an American site, and it’s huge Stateside, it started to do well in the UK last year.
“It allows people to buy personalised messages like, happy birthday or for any occasion really.
“You can get everyone from Caitlyn Jenner to Boy George.
“I came on board to get Irish people onto the site. It was a bit of a hard sell.
“It’s a really nice idea and it’s exploded because of Covid.
“Actors and musicians just aren’t working and they’ve all this extra time on their hands and out of boredom they said, let’s give it a go.
“Celebs are constantly asked to send fans messages and now it can be done easily, you’re paying for people’s time.
“Samantha Mumba is a sweetheart, she joined along with Jedward who are having their 15 minutes of fame again.
“They’re brilliant in the messages, they sing and if you like Jedward they throw themselves into it completely and give it socks.
“Ian Mcelhinney who plays Tommy Tiernan’s father in law in Derry Girls is gas, he’s the life and soul.”
“We’d love to get Brendan [O’Carroll] of course, but my superstar of the site is Eilish O’Carroll from Mrs Brown’s Boys.
“She is flying it, everyone’s booking her, she does a few messages everyday.
“Danny O’Carroll who plays Buster, he’s only up a day and he’s done five messages.
“Because Mrs Brown’s Boys is so popular Eilish does messages all over the world.”
“We’ve got John and James Kavanagh too and drag queen Davina Devine and we have the snooker star Ken Doherty, so there’s something for everyone.”
“At the end of the day it’s lovely, if you read through Eilish O’Carroll’s reviews, people are thanking her telling her they laughed and cried.
“If you look at some of the American stars from Sarah Jessica Parker to Snoop Dogg, Your Ice Tea your Ice Cube.
“You can get everyone from David Hasselhoff to Don Johnson and Stormy Daniels, you’ve got Eastenders and Corrie stars.
“A mad one is Nigel Farage, he joined recently and Sarah Palin, so the Irish are just getting started.
“It’s a nice idea and something personal, what do you buy people now, there are no shops open.
“There’s huge money to be made too: “The most successful guy in the UK is a character from the Inbetweeners, Jay Cartwright played by James Buckley who made 300,000 last year.
“I mean you can get Samantha Mumba for less than 50 quid or Caitlyn Jenner will set you back a couple of grand, but you can get Paula Abdul for the same price as Ronan Keating.
“Danny and Eilish are very cheap and they’re just doing it to connect with people.
“They’re not trying to get rich quick, it’s more about performers missing the stage.
“This is such a big American trend, big stars like John Cleese made a lot of money last year, one of the guys from the American Office, David Koechner who plays Todd is a millionaire off the back of this.
“You can even get a video from your favourite Dallas Stars too, it’s like a trip down memory lane.
Here are the some of the Irish personalities available to record personal messages on Cameo.
Ronan Keating €328
Patrick Bergin €82
Samantha Mumba €49.20
Andrew Maxwell €45
Celia Holman Lee €41
Jason Byrne €41
Paul Harrington €34.44
Eilish O’Carroll €32.80
Danny O’Carroll €24.60
Mary Byrne €20.50
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