From the moment he took off the black shades and gave a wide smile the crowds went wild. He signed autographs and posed for photographs as cameras flashed indoors and outdoors.
The actor whose latest Bond movie, The World is Not Enough, is being premiered worldwide returned to his home town to a hero's welcome. The excitement was tangible as the crowd waited and Pierce Brosnan admitted he was tongue-tied at the reception he got in Navan, Co Meath, yesterday. To the instrumental James Bond theme, the Irishman rated as the best Bond since Sean Connery entered a packed function room to receive the freedom of Navan. "I left a Navan boy and came back a Navan man," he said and the room erupted into applause.
Two hundred tickets were given out on a first-come basis by the local urban district council and some schools gave students the morning off to mark the visit. Lisa McClean (15) and her friends from Loreto secondary school got the last ticket just minutes before the 46-year-old celebrity arrived. The smile on her face said it all.
Accompanying the star were his mother, May Carmichael, and his son Christopher who was celebrating his 25th birthday yesterday. When the audience heard this they burst into Happy Birthday.
Brosnan left Navan when he was just 11 but said he carried the memories of his childhood there in his heart. "I am deeply proud to be standing here with my mother. She was very courageous to leave and find a new life for herself and myself; it took courage to leave in the '50s. That's what Navan people have, courage." The applause was deafening.
He is the first person to be given the freedom of the town; it is a power the local authorities were given in the reform of legislation five years ago. A vellum scroll with his name on it and images of the house in St Finian's Terrace where the family lived was presented to him and the council also presented a painting to both him and his mother.
He appeared to be genuinely emotional and moved by the welcome and promised "I will be back!"
So an idea for such a reception for 007, which began life last year as a proposal from Mr Christy Gorman, a town councillor, reached fruition yesterday.
It was a fantastic success and the feel-good factor stayed long after the star had left for the next big event, the MTV Europe awards in Dublin last night.