Interview with Barry Devlin, Writer
Set in Northern Ireland during World War Two, My Mother and Other Strangers follows the fortunes of the Coyne family and their neighbours as they struggle to maintain a normal life after a huge United States Army Air Force (USAAF) airfield, with 4,000 service men and women, lands in the middle of their rural parish.
Published: 2 November 2016
If you are a ten year old kid who is fascinated by aeroplanes and there is this place just in your peripheral vision that’s lit up at night, with aeroplanes going in and out of it, exotic servicemen and women driving around in Jeeps and so on, it would be odd if it didn’t stick in your mind.
What inspired you to write the series?
The story is inspired by my parish, which had a big American airbase – Station 328 – slap dab in the middle of it. If you are a ten year old kid who is fascinated by aeroplanes and there is this place just in your peripheral vision that’s lit up at night, with aeroplanes going in and out of it, exotic servicemen and women driving around in Jeeps and so on, it would be odd if it didn’t stick in your mind. Every detail is unique - and hopefully fascinating to somebody - so that emboldened me to write the piece.
I was born after the Second World War so the base I actually remember was the one the Americans handed over to the RAF and which they kept operational till the middle fifties. It was still, though, a thriving, humming forbidden city: the story came from the awareness of this big base so close to me.
How did you make the move from music into writing?
I wrote many of the lyrics for the Horslips albums and I think if you have a talent for writing, that transfers. Plus, I was always interested in writing dramas about people. How I got to actually do that is rather circuitous, although there is a musical connection. I produced U2’s first demos back in 1978 and then in ‘82 or ’83 - after Horslips went off the road - I started doing their videos, things like I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For and All I Want Is You. Through that, I started to direct documentaries and then I started to write material for feature films. The first thing I wrote was a film called Lapsed Catholics, then All Things Bright And Beautiful for the BBC. And then a lot of stuff….
Are the characters based on any real individuals?
There is one character in this who is absolutely based on a real individual: the boy, Francis. He’s the geeky child that I was, the anorak who loves aeroplanes, is slightly timid, wants to be loved by adults and is willing to get into mischief but not actually suffer any of the consequences. His bad alter ego, Seamie, is also uncomfortably close to a real character with whom I grew up and whom I absolutely loved, even though he was a wild kid.
The one character who is absolutely fictional is Rose. My mum was a school teacher and she played the harmonium in the church. The idea of an affair would have been absolutely foreign to her: she once described marriage as a condition in which one routinely contemplated murder but never divorce.
Michael Coyne is quite like my father. His own father had been a justice of the peace, he was well liked in the parish, a great footballer and athlete and I hugely admired him. A lot of the other people are amalgams of people I knew.
Who is Rose?
Rose is this curious contradiction: a woman who is a really good homemaker and a terrific teacher but inside, is this wild, romantic, free spirit. Wuthering Heights is her book and she’s always had an inner Cathy who she’s managed to keep bottled up, until one day the waters of the lake part and out steps Heathcliff, in the form of this handsome and charming American Captain. And suddenly a different life - the inner life of her imagination - opens up for her. But she knows well that to live that life will risk destroying everything she holds dear.
And that dilemma is what drives the series.
What is it about Hattie Morahan which made you want to write the role of Rose for her?
Hattie Morahan is an extraordinary person who has this luminous presence on screen when she’s acting – the face of a pre Raphaelite saint - and then if she corpses, she suddenly becomes this funny, sharp, giggly, worldly person. You can’t believe her two personae inhabit the same body. If I hadn’t been able to get Hattie I don’t know how Rose would exist. Rose has the highest moral principles and she’s as mad as a brush at the same time which is a very ... let’s say, interesting… combination. There is nobody better to handle it than Hattie.
What are the weekly stories based on?
The stories of the week all really happened, even if in slightly modified form. The first episode features an American serviceman who gives a good account of himself in a brawl: it turns out that he is the Ohio golden gloves champion. That story really happened. The scarlet fever incident was true, as was the fact that all the fishermen were deemed to be poachers and their rights to fish on the lough had been taken away in the sixteenth century.
How has it been filming in Northern Ireland?
Terrific. I hope that if people take the series to their hearts, they’ll start coming over and having a look on the strength of this. I remember when I used to write for Ballykissangel that on any given day you’d find the church car park full of these enormous throbbing buses, chock full of day trippers. I don’t yearn for the buses but I love how film and TV lets people see the beauty of a place like Ulster.
Cast
- Rose Coyne - Hattie Morahan
- Michael Coyne - Owen McDonnell
- Captain Ron Dreyfuss - Aaron Staton
- Emma Coyne - Eileen O’Higgins
- Francis Coyne - Michael Nevin
- Voice of older Francis Coyne - Ciaran Hinds
- Ned Hanlon - Des McAleer
- Davey Hanlon - Seamus O’Hara
- Mickey Joe Hanlon - Ryan McParland
- Failey - Kerr Logan
- Barney Quinn - Gavin Drea
- Sally Quinn - Fiona O’Shaugnessy
- Ellen Quinn - Maggie Cronin
- Kettie Brady - Antonia Campbell-Hughes
- Seamie Brady - Isaac Heslip
- Doctor Black - Charles Lawson
- Andrew Black - Ruairi O’Connor
- Jemmy Fox - Frank McCafferty
- Nellie Fox - Christina Nelson
- Tillie Ziegler - Kate Phillips
