Sitting loudly in a quiet corner of the Central Hotel’s Library Bar, Patrick Bergin is considering his relationship with the younger generation of Irish movie stars. “I used to hang out with Colin in his, and my, wilder days,” the veteran actor recalls. He speaks in a deep, rich baritone that’s still very recognisably a Dublin accent, albeit a well-travelled and experienced one.

“I’ve worked on something with Jonathan; we had good craic together and would be friendly if we met. I’ve just recently finished a movie with Cillian Murphy. What’s the other guy? Jack Reynor? All those guys are great. We get on great.”

Now aged 66, Bergin’s own contemporaries would include the likes of Liam Neeson, Pierce Brosnan, Stephen Rea and Gabriel Byrne. Are the younger Irish stars very different from that generation?

“I don’t think so,” Bergin muses, stroking his graying beard. “I think they’re obviously younger by definition, but they’re just as passionate and determined as we were.” He smiles slyly and shrugs. “Of course, they’re not quite as good looking, but…” He laughs loudly, something he does quite a lot throughout our hour together.

Excellent company, Bergin still has the look of a deeply cool motherfucker. With his dark shades, battered hat and long black leather coat, he comes across more like a veteran bluesman than a famous movie star. As it happens, the roguish-looking Irishman is a musician as well as an actor, but he’s wearing the latter hat for this encounter with Hot Press.

He seems to be in great form, full of laughter, jokes and stories. Now three years off the booze (Shane MacGowan himself advised him to stop), he’s drinking coffee and mineral water this afternoon. When I ask how sobriety is going, he shakes his head and waves a dismissive don’t-wanna-talk-about-it hand. I get the same reaction when I enquire about his current relationship status (he’s been separated from his wife Paula Frazier for a few years). All he’ll say is, “I guess I went through my change of life…or change of attitude. But I’m fine now.”

Which is absolutely fair enough. He’s not here to talk about his personal problems. We’re actually meeting to discuss his latest acting gig in Red Rock. He’s currently appearing on Irish small screens in the role of Jim Tierney, grandfather of Detective Rory Walsh, in the successful TV3 soap opera.

“It’s been great doing it, actually,” enthuses Bergin. “One of the reasons I did it was because it was shot up in the old John Players factory on the South Circular Road and I used to pass it quite regularly on the way back and forth from my family home Drimnagh. I was always intrigued by the place.”

Did he return to Ireland specifically for the gig?

“Nah, I’m here a lot anyway,” he says. “I live in what I call the Bergin Triangle… as in the Bermuda Triangle. There are three places where I disappear. I live in the UK, LA and here.”

Of his Red Rock role, he explains, “I’m playing a cop. Well technically I’m playing the grandfather of one of the cops, but I’m far too young for that really (laughs). Without giving too much away or I’ll have to kill you… I have a past and I’m being blackmailed because of my past, and if my past is revealed it could have serious detrimental effects on my grandson. He might lose his job, in other words, so the plot involves trying to eliminate the threat.”

Bergin first shot to international fame for his role as Julia Robert’s psychopathic husband in 1991 psychological thriller Sleeping with the Enemy, and then went on to appear in such big movies as Robin Hood and Patriot Games. Washing up in an Irish soap opera more than a quarter of a century later might appear to be something of a fall from grace for a former Hollywood star, but he doesn’t see it that way. It might seem to outside eyes that Bergin took a wrong turn on his career path at some stage, but throughout his life he’s always ploughed his own furrow.

“Sleeping with the Enemy was huge for me, for sure,” he concedes. “It was a turning point in many, many ways, you know, because it was Hollywood and I think it was the first film ever to make $100million in January. Normally the big blockbusters were in summer. But I genuinely think it remains a classic. It’s actually a really good film. I saw it recently at a Q&A thing I did in Cork. I hadn’t seen it in a long time, but it actually stands the test of time. It’s really cleverly and brilliantly done. Joseph Ruben was a great director.”

Despite that film’s box office success, and a few others after that, Bergin somehow didn’t sustain his Hollywood money-making momentum. “Well, what happens 99% of the time is that you’re not chosen because you’re a great actor, you’re chosen because the last film you did made money,” he explains. “And then you’re on the list. Because when the producers see the list their first question is, ‘How much did his last movie make?’ ‘$100million’. ‘OK, we want him, get him!’ It’s as simple as that. I mean, the director might want you, but if your last movie didn’t make money then you’re not hot.”

‘Hot’ didn’t necessarily interest him. Rather than go for more big Hollywood roles, Bergin started making movies for cable TV instead. “Cable was just getting going then,” he recalls. “Stations like Showtime and HBO were really beginning at that time. It was part of their package that there was a brand new film every week, so that meant there were four or five companies that didn’t exist before making fifty movies a year. So that’s another 200 or 300 movies being made every year… and I did half of them.”

Most of these movies were fairly forgettable, but he says he has no regrets. “In a sense I was happy to do whatever came my way. My agent did say, ‘Patrick, you’re working too much, you should be more choosy, you should do this or that’, but if someone offers you a few hundred grand to go to Canada and to shoot a film with some wonderful actress, and it’s a good plot line and you’re going to be shooting guns and zooming around in a fast car, then my attitude was I’d like to have some fun. And it was great fun.

“I think it’s important that everyone should do what they feel like doing,” he continues. “Trust yourself. If you feel like doing something then there’s a reason that you feel that way. Trust your feeling, trust your guts. The main teaching of an actor is: turn up on time, know your lines, and don’t bump into the furniture! In all walks of life: turn up on time, know your lines, and don’t bump into the furniture! It’s simple!”

Making low budget movies for cable TV mightn’t have allowed him to remain a bankable Tinseltown star, but it was still lucrative work. One of his Irish homes is an old 15th century castle in Tipperary so he presumably isn’t too strapped for cash. Is money an important factor in him deciding to take on a role or not?

“An old phrase I used to hear in Dublin a lot is, ‘Money’s not the be-all and end-all of everything… but a little bit is very good for the nerves’,” he observes, smiling. “It’s never been a factor in my career. Red Rock is not that well paid. It has to be said, you have to pay for your own lunch – it’s that bad. I believe they talked to the BBC, and the BBC are doing that now, you pay for your own lunch. I mean, if you do a film for a student they’ll give you a sandwich, you know? No catering. (Plummy BBC accent) ‘They don’t cater for you anymore, dear boy!’

“But money is not the root of all evil,” he continues. “Love of money is the root of all evil. It is scary. A little bit is still good for the nerves. Funnily enough, etymologically the word for money and the word for shit are exactly the same. Initially it’s a fertiliser. Money is there to make things grow and if you horde it… What happens to shit when you horde it? It fuckin’ stinks.

“What’s happened is the rich have got the money and they’re not spending it. No problem with you being rich, mate, but spend it, spread it out a bit, fertilise things. That’s what one would be encouraging. All that money that was owed in taxes by Apple, could you imagine if that was spent in Ireland? Just that amount alone? Like, how much fertiliser could you take?”

Of course, the wonderful Irish government fought hard to not have to take those billions off Apple…

Patrick Bergin shakes his head and sighs wearily: “Well, those people should be taken out, given a chance to apologise… and if they refuse they should be put naked into a room full of wasps.”

Red Rock is on TV3 Mondays at 9pm.