To the consternation of movie fans of a certain age, Matthew Broderick’s most famous film, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, turned 40 this year. Life moves pretty fast, to quote the eminently quotable Ferris, who thrilled audiences by bunking off high school for the day in the cult-classic John Hughes movie. Talking on a video call from the Hamptons beach cottage that is a holiday home for the actor and his wife, Sarah Jessica Parker, Broderick, in spectacles and a grey T-shirt, says fans of the film are sometimes disappointed when they meet him that he’s not “more Ferris”. Then he flashes a grin that I’m happy to report is Ferris enough to satisfy even the most ardent superfan.Conscious there are pillows in my video background, I tell Broderick that I’m escaping my noisy family by doing the interview in my bedroom. In turn he confides that he’s also “hiding” in the bedroom of one of his twin 17-year-old daughters, Marion and Tabitha. (The couple have a son as well, the actor James Wilkie, who is 23.)We’re speaking as Broderick prepares to make his Irish stage debut, at the Abbey Theatre later this summer, in Ulster American, a farce by the Belfast playwright David Ireland. Broderick first performed the play in New York, with the Irish Repertory Theatre, which is also producing this show. It’s no small event for Broderick to be making his debut on the Abbey stage. “If you’re an actor and you’ve done Broadway, the one you want to do is the West End, and I did my first play there a few years ago. The Abbey is one of those, too, one of the definite markers to show you’re legit,” he says. “It’s very exciting, and I am honoured.”Directed by Ciaran O’Reilly, Ulster American explores power, identity and artistic ego through the tense relationship between an Oscar-winning actor, Jay Conway (Broderick), a sycophantic director, Lee Carver (Max Baker), and a spirited Belfast playwright, Ruth Davenport (Geraldine Hughes). The premise is that the three of them have gathered in London on the eve of rehearsals for a new play set in Belfast.It is, in essence, a riotous send-up of show business. Nobody escapes ridicule or censure. Actors are described as “gifted, precious, special children”. The play skewers the privilege, sexism, racism and misogyny that are rife in Hollywood. It’s an industry Broderick has been involved with for five decades. How does the play’s unbridled mockery sit with him?Ferris Bueller’s Day Off: Alan Ruck, Mia Sara and Matthew Broderick. Photograph: Paramount “I enjoy it,” he says. “I think it’s a very good satire of the entertainment world and probably of other businesses, too. It covers everything. I mean, it’s got these two men basically overpowering a female writer. So you’ve got the sexism, and then you’ve got this other thing in show business, which is people just pummelling writers until there is a bloody mess. So I like that about it.“Then they have this creepy thing of being very aware and very sensitive about sexism, and bullying, and everything ... These two guys endlessly whine about how much they know about it and how much they object to it, but then they do it ... So it’s very fun, hopefully, to watch that.”Broderick’s character is “particularly awful and probably not too bright, which is also fun to do. It means I don’t have to use my whole enormous brain to play him,” he says.Ulster American also goes to town on critics. At one point Broderick’s character says, “The only thing I want to see a critic write is a suicide note.”Having received both raves and stinkers in his time, how does Broderick feel about reviewers? “I can get very angry about it. I get hurt ... but I also am aware that it’s an important role. Anything that increases interest in theatre is good, from my point of view ... But, yeah, I hate critics – but I also sometimes respect them, particularly when they like me.”Ulster American: Matthew Broderick with Geraldine Hughes and Max Baker in David Ireland's play. Photograph: Rachel Papo/The New York Times Broderick’s character is under the misapprehension that he is playing an Irish Catholic when in fact he’s portraying a British Protestant. As a regular visitor to Ireland – he and Parker have a holiday home in Kilcar, in Co Donegal – does Broderick have a greater understanding of the nuances of Irish identity than perhaps many Americans do?“Doing this play in New York, I lost count of how many people said, ‘I didn’t understand any of it.’ As soon as the characters start talking about Northern Ireland and Protestants they are totally lost,” he says.“Of course, it’s this hugely complicated subject, but the basics of it aren’t that hard. Maybe it’s because the play has a Protestant point of view in it and we don’t hear much of that in America.” He imagines it will go over differently with Irish audiences. “It’ll probably have a whole different resonance. I’m sure it will anger people. It’s a subject that is delicate, to say the least.”Broderick is contractually obliged to have a woeful northern Irish accent in Ulster American. In one of the best lines, the playwright tells the insufferable actor that he sounds like a Belfast Dick Van Dyke – “like you’re Dick Van Morrison”. “The great thing is in this play I don’t have to have a good accent, which is a relief,” Broderick says.His character also tries to pretend that he doesn’t care about his Oscar. Does Broderick hanker after an Academy Award? “I would be very happy to receive an Oscar. So far, no luck. But, yeah, I would love that. I recently saw James Cagney’s Oscar acceptance speech. He said, ‘I guess I must have had a pretty good part.’ I liked how humble he was.”The Producers: Matthew Broderick with Nathan Lane in the Mel Brooks musical in 2002. Photograph: Sara Krulwich/The New York Times Broderick was in his early 20s when he emerged as one of the defining actors of the 1980s, combining boyish charm with laidback comic timing not only in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off but also in films such as War Games and Glory.He was an award-winning stage actor on Broadway before he became a Hollywood star: his role in the first production of Brighton Beach Memoirs, the Neil Simon play, when he had just turned 21 in 1983, earned him a Tony award. He picked up a second 12 years later, for his role in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, and was nominated for a third for playing Leo Bloom in the Mel Brooks musical The Producers, in 2001.Broderick has managed to maintain a career that moves easily between stage, film and television. Standout movies include Biloxi Blues, Election and Torch Song Trilogy. More recently, on TV, he played Richard Sackler in the Netflix drama Painkiller, about the OxyContin scandal in the United States.[ Painkiller: Matthew Broderick goes for broke in queasy take on Purdue Pharma horror showOpens in new window ]When we speak he’s getting ready for the Fourth of July celebrations. How does he feel about his country as it celebrates 250 years? “It’s limping along. It’s so divisive that I try to stay out of it. I don’t love talking to strangers about politics. I mean, I am an entertainer,” he says. “But I love America. I was saying the other day to somebody that I get a little unhappy when people start badmouthing it too much when I am travelling, you know? I have home-team loyalty. But some of it is very scary. Things are eroding that I took for granted. So it’s a frightening time.”Brighton Beach Memoirs: Matthew Broderick in his dressing room in 1983. Photograph: Barton Silverman/The New York Times As a native New Yorker who has lived in and around the same few blocks in Greenwich Village his whole life, he’s on safer ground talking about Zohran Mamdani’s election as the city’s mayor. “Well, yes, I mean it’s nice to see a new generation coming up. Very exciting. We’ll see how some socialism goes down.” Another boost for his home city was the New York Knicks winning the National Basketball Association championship for the first time in more than 50 years.“That was a really big deal in New York,” he says. “It got everybody in such a good mood – which is unusual in New York City.”Broderick grew up with two sisters in a culturally rich household. His mother, Patricia, was a playwright and painter, his father, James, an actor. He has fond memories of acting with him as a child and a young adult, but his dad died of cancer when Broderick was filming War Games, his first movie.“He got sick right when all my professional stuff started, so, you know, it coloured everything.”Painkiller: Matthew Broderick as Richard Sackler in the OxyContin drama. Photograph: Keri Anderson/Netflix Broderick is, like his Ulster American character, proudly Irish American. He says he doesn’t have much information about his Irish background, despite taking part in a television programme that dug through his past. His father didn’t talk much about the family’s lineage, but Broderick’s relationship with Ireland is an enduring and fond one. He turns up “when I can” to give prizes at a Kilcar GAA tournament named for his parents, who bought a holiday home there when he was a child.He has memories of happy, carefree summers in the northwest of the country. He bought his own home near his parents’ property and says his children love their summers and occasional Christmases there too.The bond with the country of his ancestors is mired only by the painful memory of a crash in Co Fermanagh on August 5th, 1987, in which two women died. On that sunny afternoon, Broderick’s rented BMW veered into the wrong lane and collided with another car. Its occupants, Margaret Doherty, who was 63, and her daughter Anna Gallagher, who was 28, died instantly.The actor, who was convicted of careless driving, and fined, rarely speaks about the incident. He is visibly stricken when I bring it up. “It was an absolute tragedy,” he says. “I don’t know how to put it into words for everybody. I’m not comfortable talking about it, to tell you the truth,” he says.We move on.Having, in twin 17-year-old daughters, something in common with Broderick, I steer the conversation to this less fraught topic. He’s enjoying being a father of teenage girls. “I hear horror stories. But I feel quite lucky. They sometimes get a little moody, but who doesn’t?”Teenagers like to point out how wrong we are about a lot of things. “They do, and they sneer at me sometimes, tell me how stupid I am,” he says, grinning. “It’s fun, though. We’re very close.”Broderick is extremely private about his personal life. He has talked proudly about acting with his son, James, in an episode of the TV series Elsbeth. He also has one of Hollywood’s most successful marriages: in 2027 he and Parker, the Sex and the City star, will celebrate their 30th anniversary. He points out that the marriage is long not only by Hollywood standards but “by any standards”.What’s their secret? “I wish I had a good answer for that. Laughing helps. My friend always makes fun of this idea that it’s backbreaking, incredibly hard work to be married, like the hardest job you’ll ever have. “It does take some effort, but it’s not the worst job ever. You have to weather bad periods – but if you do, you have all that history together.”He says he’s extremely proud of Parker’s success. A few years ago they appeared together in Plaza Suite – like Brighton Beach Memoirs, a Neil Simon play – first on Broadway and then in the West End of London. “She was great. It was fun to do, to see how good she is – which I knew anyway – but it was nice to be reminded of what a sharp comedian she is.”Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker on the red carpet for the opening of Plaza Suite, in which they starred, in 2022. Photograph: OK McCausland/The New York Times Broderick says he’s looking forward to spending more time in Dublin during Ulster American’s run at the Abbey. He’s in Ireland a lot, but it’s mostly in Donegal, where the Rev Janet Broderick, one of his two sisters, oversees the Church of Ireland parishes of Ardara, Glencolumbkille, Glenties, Inniskeel and Lettermacaward. She performed the marriage ceremony for Broderick and Parker back in May 1997. “She can marry you. She can do your funeral. She does everything,” he says, smiling.A few years before he got married, in 1994, Broderick made a film with his fellow teen heart-throb Andrew McCarthy called Mrs Parker and the Vicious Circle, about the American writer Dorothy Parker. I mention that McCarthy performed in The Crucible at the Gaiety Theatre in Dublin earlier this year. “I know Andrew, but I did not know that. Well, that sort of steals my thunder, doesn’t it?” he says.Are there any roles he’d still like to play? “There are a lot of classics I haven’t done – Chekhov and Shakespeare. I did play the wall in A Midsummer Night’s Dream in high school. I was very good,” he says with a smile. “I love doing new plays, but I think I’m probably missing some of the stuff you are supposed to do if you are going to be a serious actor. It’s too late for me.”I tell him I think he’s done okay, all things considered. He flashes another Ferris-adjacent grin.Matthew Broderick. Photograph: Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post via Getty Broderick recently said that he thought his acting legacy would be Ferris Bueller. He says now, “I don’t really know what my legacy will be. I only say things like that because I get asked about my legacy, but it certainly seems to be the one everybody knows about.” A third generation are now enjoying it, with very young people regularly approaching Broderick to let him know how much they love the film.He has tried hard over the years not to be pigeonholed “as this geek teen”, but he has learned to embrace the movie’s popularity. His costar Alan Ruck, who played Ferris’s best friend, Cameron, recently suggested a sequel in which the friends are in their 70s and Cameron is in a nursing home.[ ‘I used to drink a lot’: Succession’s Alan Ruck on Ferris Bueller, booze and bouncing backOpens in new window ]The action would centre around Ferris springing his friend from the institution for a day. Instead of zipping about in a red Ferrari, the old friends would get around Chicago on mobility scooters and Zimmer frames. I tell him I think it’s a great idea. “That would be fun to watch?” he asks, dubiously. Yes, I tell him confidently. Us Ferris fans can only hope.Ulster American is at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, from Thursday, August 13th, until Saturday, August 22nd, with a preview on Wednesday, August 12th