Having endured the Irish summer, which should be renamed Rain, RTE Autumn schedules have wetted the appetite for those interested in history, genealogy and archives, with three programmes of varying quality over the past ten days.
It has eventually arrived on our shores, with all the fanfare and marketing of its British cousin, the Irish version of ‘Who do you think you are?’. The first episode, which aired on Monday night, dealt with the renowned journo on the spot, Charlie Bird. I was somewhat cynical before the programme aired as I think the British version has become a tad too contrived, the tried and tested formula of Celebrity X…crying on queue…’skeletons in the closet’…’there is a package at reception for you’. The first programme of the Irish series of ‘Who do you think you are?’ sought to bring Charlie Bird closer to his roots. It was a success, more so for the viewer who got to play the voyeur, as Charlie’s great grandmother illegally married her brother in law, while his grandfather turned out to be a bigamist. Charlie must be cursing the high standards of record keeping in Britain.
A week earlier, ‘Where was your family during the famine?’ aired on RTE. Unfortunately, the programme told us more about the status of the celebrities and their lives now, rather than the famine itself. The sepia inspired show made a bit of a mockery of the famine and the music and background transitions made it look and feel like a cheap ghost ride, of the variety where you get slightly man-handled.
On the other hand, on Tuesday night, the excellent two-part series, ‘Hidden History: Cromwell in Ireland’ was presented by Dr. Michael O Siochru, the ear ring toting TCD academic. The obligatory military re-enactment scenes however took away a little from what was a very good programme.
