'Weird couple of years' for Stranger Things star

Irish actress Amybeth McNulty has said it has been a "weird couple of years" since joining the cast of sci-fi horror series Stranger Things.

McNulty, who is from County Donegal, said: "It's insane, I feel like a little cog in this very massive machine."

The 24-year-old joined Stranger Things in its fourth series and played the role of Vickie, a student at Hawkins High School.

She also played the lead role of Anne Shirley in the TV show Anne with an E.

McNulty joined Patrick Kielty on Irish broadcaster RTÉ's The Late Late Show on Friday night.

On the programme she said being a fan of Stranger Things helped her in her audition.

"I know what the show likes, I know the pacing, I think I have an idea of how I can do this. But I didn't think that I would get cast in any sort of world."

When she got the call to say she got the role, McNulty said she was "screaming, crying down the phone".

She said it was the last audition her parents knew that she did and she got the role after they had both died.

"They said they had a good feeling about it and they were right."

McNulty was raised in Letterkenny by her Irish father and her Canadian mother.

She had to move to Canada at the age 14 to star in Anne with an E and she credits her parents "who did everything" for her.

"They moved with me to Canada... I was very, very lucky they were retired and they were able to that for me.

"They said they would do anything for me and they did.

"I will always appreciate it."

She was trained in ballet as a child, and also appeared in local plays and musicals at An Grianán Theatre.

Looking back at her time in Letterkenny, she said that everything is down to the community.

"There is a real sense of family there.

"It was everything."

In 2014, she got her first TV role when she co-starred in the RTÉ One series Clean Break as a child called Jenny Rane.

The character McNulty plays in Stranger Things is Robin Buckley's girlfriend.

McNulty added that she grew up as "a queer kid in Donegal" who came out online at 16/17 as bisexual.

"We had people in my hometown going up to my parents going 'oh I'm so sorry to hear about your daughter' and I'm going 'right okay, nothing to apologise for', so it gives me more of an invigoration when I do roles like this and when I'm able to do things like this."

McNulty said she wanted to "do it justice and do it right for kids like me growing up".

"I think it is important, especially when the queer story line is a part of their chapter, whilst their dealing with monsters, in the 80s and there is all these other things going on, it doesn't have to be about that. It is just a part of it.

"I think that is ideal."