Father Dougal McGuire The writers have said that the only other actor they feel might have worked in the role is Don Wycherley, who plays Dougal's Rugged Island counterpart, Father Cyril McDuff, in the show. There have been several attempts to remake the show for American audiences. In 2004, it was reported that Graham Norton (who played Father Noel Furlong in "Father Ted") had signed on to play Dougal alongside Steve Martin as Ted. No remake has yet entered production. References to Dougal's family are rare. In "Grant Unto Him Eternal Rest", he mentions that his parents are dead, and also refers to
Father Ted Crilly Hackett; and their neurotic housekeeper, Mrs Doyle (whom Linehan states Ted first met when she won the local Lovely Girls competition). He has a bitter rivalry with Father Dick Byrne, a priest living on the nearby Rugged Island. Ted's experiences throughout the show range from the mundane (having to protest against a blasphemous film in "The Passion of Saint Tibulus", rigging a raffle to repair the roof in "Think Fast, Father Ted") to the surreal (becoming Ireland's entry for Eurosong 1996 in "A Song for Europe", climbing out of a flying plane to fix the fuel line in "Flight Into