Irish actress Saoirse Ronan has revealed that she has found it tough to secure good movie roles as she has aged.

The Carlow native has been steadily working since she was a child but feels there are not enough interesting roles for women in their 20s at the moment.

“I haven’t found the right thing and I’m almost 21 now, which is a tricky age to find the right role,’ she told the Herald.

“You’re sort of somewhere in between that coming-of-age girl and a young woman and especially if you’ve started out quite young it’s kind of hard to prove to everyone, ‘Look, I’m not 13 anymore’.

“There’s been a bit of a process doing all that stuff and there are a lot of roles out there which are not really interesting.

“I’m waiting for the right one,” she continued.

“It’s hard, because you want the balance between steady work, if you’re lucky enough to have it, and the right job to come along.

“You need that one project on enough of a high pedestal to showcase that you’re no longer a kid,” she added.

Ronan (20) launched the inaugural National Performing Arts School and Cinemagic Industry Film Academy for 12 to 18 year olds as part of Cinemagic Dublin 2015 yesterday.

“I’ve been involved in it since I was 15 and grown up with the programme and it’s about nurturing enthusiasm and skills or talent for kids who are interested in acting,” she said.

Cinemagic Dublin takes place from July 27 to August 1.

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The pair collaborated on Ryan’s directorial debut Lost River and relished the opportunity to finally work together.

The actors were originally meant to co-star in The Lovely Bones with the Hollywood actor slated to play Saoirse’s father before being axed from the flick.

“We have wanted to work together since we were meant to have starred in The Lovely Bones and I sort of wrote Lost River with her in mind,” Ryan said.

The Grand Budapest Hotel actress also revealed that Ryan was a very supportive director on set.

“I think we were all encouraged by Ryan to find our own meaning for the story an for the characters we played as well,” she said.

“A big part of the prep for us was to incorporate our own sort of personality and character into the role.”

“Then that sort of influenced the relationships we had within the story and determined what path we all took.”

“That could change from day to day so we really had to be on our toes,” she added.

The Carlow native also admitted she developed a close bond with her character’s pet rat Nick during filming.

“I really fell in love with Nick. It got to the stage where we would kiss each other on the lips when nobody was watching or when they were watching, we didn’t really care,” she admitted.

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“I wanted to have my North American debut in Austin at South by Southwest because I hear you like to keep it weird,” he announced to a packed house. “Well, let’s see just how weird you like to keep it!”

Featuring an eclectic cast of talented performers, including Iain De Caestecker, Saoirse Ronan, Christina Hendricks, Matt Smith, Eva Mendes and Ben Mendelsohn, Lost River follows a single mother and her oldest son who, having hit some economic hardship, are forced to come face to face with all sorts of allegorical monsters.

ComingSoon.net sat down with Gosling, Ronan and De Caestecker the following day and was treated to an in-depth, behind-the-scenes look at what went into bringing Lost River to life. With topics ranging from rats to fairy tales to dreams about vampires, this is one video interview you’re not going to want to miss. Check it out in the player below and then catch Lost River on April 10 when it simultaneously hits theaters and VOD.

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One of the youngest actresses to be nominated for an Oscar, it was clear from the outset that Saoirse Ronan was destined for big things, and that’s before you throw her actor father Paul Ronan into the mix. Earning the election at just 13 for her role in 2007’s Atonement, she went on to star alongside the likes of Susan Sarandon (in 2009’s The Lovely Bones) and Cate Blanchett (2011’s Hanna). Now, at just 20 years old, Ronan already has a reputation for role picking done right.

When we catch her jetlagged and cocooned in blankets on a sofa in her home in Ireland, Ronan is doing what any sensible girl would do: indulging in a 24-hour marathon of Homeland, her latest obsession. We talk through upcoming films Stockholm, Pennsylvania and Brooklyn, dream director collaborations and why integrity is paramount.

Wonderland: Talk us through the films you have coming out.
Saoirse Ronan: At the start of the year I did Stockholm, Pennsylvania. It’s a tiny film written and directed by Nikole Beckwith. It was her first time directing and we did it in 19 days, on a million dollar budget. I’d never done anything like that before. It was interesting to see how somebody, especially a new filmmaker, could handle that kind of pressure. After that I had about a week off, before moving onto Brooklyn.

W: It’s certainly intriguing. What’s the role like?
S: Stockholm is about a girl called Leia who’s in her early twenties. At the start she’s rescued, after seven years, from her kidnapper, who raised her in a basement. She has never seen the light of day until she is handed back to her biological parents in the second scene, but she doesn’t know these people. It’s mainly about the relationship between Leia and her mother, and how she doesn’t see why it’s wrong to be completely in love (in a childlike way) with her kidnapper, despite what he did. Her mother, played by Cynthia Nixon, spirals out of control, imprisoning Leia in a different way. Both films are centred on women. Brooklyn is based on a book by Colm Tóibín. It’s set in the 1950s and follows Eilis Lacey’s journey to New York to start a new life. It follows immigrants and Irish people in general, who made that trip, showing its difficulties, wonders and heart-breaks. I’ve never been so affected by a film before. The screenplay was written by Nick Hornby; it’s a gorgeous and very simple take on life.

W: He does it so well, doesn’t he?
S: He really does. It spans two years of Eilis’s life within the first half hour – going over to New York, getting a job and meeting a boy, before a family tragedy brings her home after a few months. It’s about how her relationship with home has changed, which I really got. Once you move away from home, it’s never quite the same again. You expect everything to be just as you left it, and it never is. It’s almost the first step into adulthood, realising you’ve got to make your own way.

W: You’ve picked two quite independent films to star in. How do go about choosing roles?
S: The story always comes first – it’s paramount. A lot of actresses who I’ve worked with have said that this is a tricky age – you can’t quite do the coming of age roles anymore, or maybe you don’t want to, and nobody has seen you as a young woman yet. Brooklyn was perfect for me. I’ve done a couple of biggish movies, but it was never down to exposure or money. I remember there was a toss-up between a big action film and Atonement, but I knew what I wanted to do. People make different decisions regarding their work, for different reasons. I keep it as simple as I can.

W: How did you stay rational about being nominated for an Oscar so young?
S: I was 13, so I didn’t think about it. It would be different now as I’m more aware of how the industry works. It’s amazing to look back on. I think Atonement was a very important film for all involved. It was really exciting to be on a film set with people who have won like 12 Oscars, but I knew I wasn’t going to win.

W: Do nominees know that kind of thing?
S: Yeah, I had an insider! No, I just I knew. I was in a category with Tilda [Swinton], Cate [Blanchett] and Amy Ryan, so I knew one of them would win. But it was amazing to be in the front row at the Academy Awards with my parents.

W: How did your dad prep you for the Oscars? Obviously he knows the game, so to speak.
S: He hadn’t really been to any award shows apart from the Iscars, which is the Irish Oscars. It’s just as good, obviously. It’s like a huge wedding that everyone in the Irish film industry is invited to…

W: Like The Godfather or something?
S: Yeah, basically. It’s like the Irish Godfather awards! So the three of us went [to the Oscars] not knowing what to expect. It’s definitely on a bigger scale than any other award show, another realm altogether. At one point John Travolta and his wife were in front of us. If I met him now, I’d be more excited because I love Saturday Night Fever and Grease so much. My mum went to see Saturday Night Fever at the cinema 27 times when it first came out – she’s obsessed. When they said hello to us, it absolutely made her night.

W: You were a front-runner for the role of Katniss in The Hunger Games. How do you feel about that in retrospect?
S: I love Jennifer Lawrence – she’s done an incredible job with the film. A lot of girls auditioned for it, it wasn’t like I was offered it and turned it down or anything. I only auditioned. It was years ago, so I’m fine about it.

W: If you had the choice, which directors would you like to work with next?
S: I would love to work with Lenny Abrahamson, he’s an Irish director. He just did Frank and he’s made some of the best Irish films, including my favourite, Adam & Paul. I like it when Irish filmmakers’ work is unrelated to Ireland. Jonathan Glazer is really brilliant as well and obviously I want to work with the legends: Tarantino, Spielberg and Alexander Payne…

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Saoirse Ronan, Hollywood’s Leading Lady in Waiting
Poised on the edge of adulthood, the Irish actress Saoirse Ronan still lives at home with her parents, but is coming into her own with an Oscar nomination, films with Wes Anderson and Ryan Gosling, and a budding friendship with Patti Smith.

Through the windows of stained and frosted glass, light from the city streets streams in, dusty and mellow. Conversation swells across the paisley carpet and the worn velveteen booths. Watching over it all, as he has done for the past 40 years, is the wry, white-bearded barman, Tommy Smith, a collector of rare books. On the wood-paneled walls, a ramshackle gallery of local artists; on the stools, a mixture of old-timers and Dublin hipsters (much like the Brooklyn variety, except they get their bikes stolen more often). There’s nowhere in the world quite like Grogans, this much-loved pub. If you’re looking for out-of-work Dublin actors, people say, this is where you’ll more than likely find them.

And here, it seems, is another of their number, strolling in from the street in the middle of the afternoon, her Dublin drawl ringing out proud and lively and her vivid blue eyes lighting up as she scores us a corner booth. In her plaid shirt and skinny jeans, she could easily be one of the local hipsters, but — don’t tell the other actors — that’s actually an Oscar nominee in the corner. And don’t blame me for introducing Saoirse Ronan, Ireland’s first honest-to-goodness Hollywood ingénue, just 19 years old, and with the most flawless skin I’ve ever seen, to Dublin’s most notorious bohemian bar. This was her father’s idea.

But Ronan fits right in. She is indeed between jobs, if only technically: she recently wrapped movies by Wes Anderson (“The Grand Budapest Hotel“) and Ryan Gosling (“How to Catch a Monster”), and she’s about to fly to Toronto for the premiere of Kevin Macdonald’s “How I Live Now,” an adaptation of Meg Rosoff’s postapocalyptic Y.A. novel. Her character, Daisy, a surly New York teenager sent to visit English cousins at the onset of World War III, represents a coming of age for the actress who began her Hollywood career portraying another girl rattling around the English countryside in the shadow of war: the interfering little sister in Joe Wright’s “Atonement,” the performance that earned Ronan her Best Supporting Actress nomination in 2008. On Oscar night, she was the 13-year-old in emerald green Alberta Ferretti who brought her parents as her date. Five years and 13 films later, the Ronans are still quite happily “pals,” as Saoirse puts it. These days, her parents are no longer her constant chaperones, but her father, himself an actor, continues to act as her manager — a job that today involves dropping her off at the pub.

“I said you’d think we were pure dipsos, bringing you to Grogans,” his daughter says as we settle in with our drinks. Hers is a half pint of stout — which seems about right, given that she combines a ballerina’s willowy frame with a Dublin accent that’s as broad as it is brawny: she’s all ragin’ and goin’ and mad abourih’ (“mad about it”), all rolled vowels and lobbed consonants, like a young one from the pages of a Roddy Doyle novel. “Ah, he’s dead right, isn’t he,” she says, when I tell her that Tommy Smith has said there’ll never be a TV in here as long as he’s alive. “That’s the great thing about coming home — you’ve got the old Dub characters.”

Not that Ronan actually is a Dubliner: the accent is an inheritance from her parents. By the time she was born, in 1994, they had left Dublin and were living in Riverdale, in the Bronx; Ronan has dual citizenship. In New York, her mother, Monica, worked as a nanny and her father, Paul, picked up bar shifts between acting jobs.

The four of us are having dinner at the Trocadero as Ronan’s parents reminisce; it’s a long-established theater restaurant, where diners sit in red velvet banquettes and the walls are lined with black-and-white photographs of generations of Irish actors. This restaurant was also the choice of Ronan’s father: once a Dublin actor, always a Dublin actor. His daughter says that she has been feeling the urge to try theater herself. “I think it’s in the blood,” she says. “And even though I’m terrified about doing it, if something goes all right on stage, it must be the most amazing feeling.”

Her “Grand Budapest Hotel” co-star Ralph Fiennes, himself a seasoned stage actor, says he has a feeling that Ronan would be “fantastic” onstage. On the phone from his house in Italy, he says that Ronan has “no affectation,” either on or off camera. “I think she’s completely natural,” he says. “She just seems to have been gifted with something, where she seems to have none of the anxiety the rest of us have. She’s very special.”

The Ronans currently live in a seaside suburb north of the city, where they’ve just bought a home. When they left the Bronx and returned to Ireland in 1997, they settled in rural County Carlow, where Saoirse (whose name, pronounced “sur-sha,” is the Irish word for freedom) could grow up the way country kids do. But not quite the same: at 8, she made her screen debut in an Irish medical drama, in which she played a little girl almost run down by her father. Saoirse’s own father, that is — Paul played the frazzled driver. Which is ironic, because from the start of her career she has been very carefully protected by her parents: until she was 18, they vetted every script and public appearance, accompanied her on every set and oversaw her home schooling. (They continue to look out for her: just today, Monica has been buying Barry’s Tea to pack in Saoirse’s suitcase for Toronto.)

Ronan now chooses her own roles. “I had done three films that were very ethereal, were quite supernatural,” she says. “I became very worried that I was going to be pigeonholed. And even though being an ethereal character is better than the girl next door, to be honest, I wanted to play somebody who was a current teenage girl, who cursed, and was a bit of a bitch, and had bleached blond hair, and worried about sex, and all these things that I hadn’t really dealt with as much.”

You can see this in her, this moment of trying on characters, trying on roles, the act of becoming. Before dinner, Ronan and I stop in at Jenny Vander, Dublin’s legendary vintage store in the heart of the old rag trade district. In the window onto Drury Street, 1950s ball gowns rustle against flapper sheaths, surrounded by rhinestone bracelets and pearl cluster earrings, box frame handbags and velvet cocktail hats. Italian opera plays low on the stereo, and the store manager, Marion Sullivan, waves a greeting from behind the counter. Then, in the next instant, she has recognized the teenager who is already trawling, entranced, through the rails; she declares Ronan a “national treasure,” adding, “we’re so proud of you.” “Oh,” says Ronan, startled, and she smiles as she turns back to the clothes, fixed on treasure of a different kind. She admires, in turn, a brocade coat, an orange silk chiffon gown, a 1980s pyramid clutch, a Bakelite cuff. That white linen petticoat, she says, would be great as a skirt. A red military vest would be perfect for a friend.

As she pulls pieces out, exclaiming over them, I’m put in mind of the scene set in the Bowery thrift stores in Patti Smith’s memoir, “Just Kids,” which Ronan, on the way here, talked about having read and adored. She and Smith have become mutual admirers. Earlier this year, Smith turned up at the New York premiere of “The Host,” having come expressly to see Ronan’s latest performance and in the hope of saying hello. After the film, Smith asked a publicist for an introduction, and the two women chatted. “She took my hands,” Ronan recalls, “and gave me these amazing words of wisdom.” Shortly afterward, Smith sent Ronan a warm e-mail for her 19th birthday. “Out of all the people I’ve met through show business,” Ronan says, “she’s the most incredible, such a generous and kind and intelligent woman.”

Over the phone, Smith describes Ronan as “quite a little light,” and says she has followed her career since “Atonement.” “I’ve just been captivated by watching her. She has a certain inner sincerity that comes out and magnifies her character,” Smith says. “She’s so gifted. I enjoyed meeting her so much. She is very singular. I mean, I don’t think she’s innately fragile. I think she’s very strong.”

Ronan’s eye has fastened on a gem hidden at the back of the store; an extraordinary ivory bolero by the Irish designer Caiomhe Keane. Intricately hand-beaded, it looks delicate on the hanger but is as heavy as armor. “That is amazing,” Ronan says, as she holds it, and in the next breath, she’s slipping it on. “It’s like something from the sea,” she says, moving closer to the mirror. “That’s so cool.” And then she twirls: a teenager in her jeans and Keds, but already a star in her bearing.