Catholic speaker John O’Leary gets the Hollywood treatment of his life story

St. Louis, Mo., Dec 28, 2023 / 08:00 am

In the late 1980s, John O’Leary was 9 years old and, by his own admission, a pretty ordinary suburban kid. On a day that would change his life forever, he was playing in his parents’ garage in St. Louis, experimenting with matches and gasoline. In the blink of an eye, the gas can exploded, engulfing O’Leary’s body in flames. 

With serious burns covering his entire body, O’Leary should never have survived. He ultimately lost most of his fingers, and much of his body was left disfigured with scars. 

O’Leary’s road to recovery was long and arduous, and for much of his life following the fire, he said he just wanted to survive, to blend in, to be ordinary.

Today, though, O’Leary — a Catholic — is a bestselling author and sought-after motivational speaker. And on Dec. 8, he had the surreal privilege of watching as a film crew trained their lenses on a young man in prosthetic makeup, acting the part of John O’Leary in a Hollywood adaptation of his life story. 

That same afternoon, director Sean McNamara yelled “cut” for the last time, marking the completion of filming. The final location for the movie shoot was the Shrine of St. Joseph in downtown St. Louis. 

The movie’s title? “On Fire.”

“I’m overwhelmed and utterly in awe of how great our God is and to bring forward stories like this…John O’Leary is so ordinary, which is why this extraordinary story of survival and endurance and faithfulness and community and God’s grace is so awesome,” O’Leary told CNA. 

“I’m grateful that we get to share that story now in a movie … I recognize my story is not about me. It is about community, it’s about prayer, it’s about God, it’s about hope. It’s about recognizing that our life is about something bigger than ourselves. And I love celebrating that work every day,” he said. 

‘Say yes to good’

The way O’Leary tells it, a significant portion of St. Louis — at least, that’s how it felt — rallied around him after the accident, helping him along the difficult road to getting back his mobility and his zest for life. 

Among the many people who went out of their way to assist O’Leary was Jack Buck, a legendary sports announcer for the St. Louis Cardinals who first visited the young burn victim in his hospital room and mentored him for years afterward. Buck, played by actor William H. Macy of “Fargo” fame in the new film, features prominently in the movie. Buck died in 2002. 

Despite a remarkable recovery given the severity of the accident, O’Leary said he spent many years never talking about what happened. He graduated elementary and high school, and then college at the Jesuit-run St. Louis University, and went into the construction business. Most people he encountered were too polite to ask him why his body and hands look the way they do, and O’Leary was perfectly happy not to tell them. 

“After getting burned on 100% of my body and spending five and a half months in the hospital and going through dozens and dozens of surgeries, and then amputations, the goal of my life was not to be extraordinary but to be ordinary,” O’Leary explained. 

“It wasn’t to stand out but to kind of fade in and disappear … The whole goal in life was to never, ever to be defined by that experience.”

O’Leary said he grew up in a strong Catholic family and credits the Catholic friends he made in college with helping him to retain his faith after leaving home. But he said it wasn’t until later in adulthood, especially after getting married, that he began to take real ownership of his Catholic faith. By reigniting his faith in Christ, “I realized my life no longer could be about me. It had to be about something bigger than me,” he explained. 

He said he has also experienced a strengthening of his faith amid the enormous difficulties he has had to overcome since getting burned. 

“If your faith is real, you’ve got to praise [God] in the miracles, but you also have to praise him in the defeats and the agony. And the cross points the way forward toward both. It’s not just that we’re an Easter people — the way we get there is through Good Friday. And so you’ve got to praise him in both,” he said.

O’Leary’s life was to take another decisive turn one morning in Mass, when the priest preached on the parable of the talents in Matthew’s Gospel. In this story, Jesus teaches his followers about the importance of using the talents God has given them for his glory. 

O’Leary said he still remembers the priest’s words during the homily: “Listen to me clearly. Your life is a precious, priceless gift. Say yes to being used for good.”

Those words stuck with O’Leary, and he said he began from that moment on to say “yes” in earnest to new opportunities that God seemed to be placing in front of him. He became a hospital chaplain in an effort to bring comfort to the many people suffering, as he had, with serious injuries or ailments. 

Despite rarely even speaking with friends about what happened to him, O’Leary was invited one day to give a speech to young students at a local school. After that first speaking experience broke the ice, the speaking requests kept coming. More than 2,600 speeches later, John said he is “overwhelmed and utterly in awe” that God could take a life seemingly broken, as his was following the accident, and use it to bless countless others. 

“The best part of my story… it’s not surviving the fire, actually. It’s recognizing the grandeur of life. Not just mine, but all of our lives,” he said.

‘We want to get more people engaged in their faith’

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The film has been a work in progress for several years. O’Leary said numerous people had suggested the possibility of a movie after his book, also titled “On Fire,” was released in 2016. O’Leary said he had been open to the idea of a movie but only if it was God’s will — he liked the idea but hadn’t pushed for it. Finally, he met a producer who asked if she could get the ball rolling. 

McNamara, a director best known for the inspirational 2011 film “Soul Surfer,” joined the project as director. O’Leary said McNamara, who has a passion for creating “positive, life-affirming movies,” has taken care to give O’Leary a prominent role in the production, seeking his input throughout the process.

“He has insisted I have a seat next to him at the table, which is remarkable because he doesn’t have to,” O’Leary commented. “He wanted my voice heard clearly throughout it all.”

The film is the first major Hollywood production to be shot in St. Louis in years — the first major production to make use of a brand-new movie tax credit signed into law by Missouri Gov. Mike Parson in July. The production completed the filming process on Dec. 8, but the movie won’t be released for approximately another year, O’Leary said. 

In the movie, O’Leary is played by Joel Courtney, star of the 2023 film “Jesus Revolution.” The cast also includes John Corbett of “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” fame as O’Leary’s father, and the aforementioned Macy as Jack Buck.

“We wanted people who had a heart for this project and a heart for reminding a broken world that there was still reason for hope. And we built an entire cast and an entire crew around that mission,” O’Leary said of the film’s production. 

When asked about whether the film would highlight the importance of his Catholic faith, O’Leary said he has sought to be “intentional in making sure this movie was an invitation for others to join us in the faith walk.”

“We want to get more people engaged in their faith. We want to see people live that out in their life…And I hope this movie does a wonderful job of reminding people that God is still God, that prayer still matters, and the best is yet to come.”

When asked about his hopes for the movie’s success, O’Leary said he hopes the message of the film will touch people — not necessarily on a mass scale but on the individual level.

“I’m not after the big numbers … when you look at the work Jesus did, there were some miracles he did in fields with 5,000, and those are grandiose and those are awesome. But the way I read the Scriptures, where Jesus’ best work was frequently done was one by one,” O’Leary said.

“And so I hope this movie deeply, eternally moves the life of one individual that watches it … one by one, indeed, we can change the world for good going forward. That is my prayer for this movie.”