‘Rebellion’ creator celebrates role of women in the Rising

The creator of RTÉ's 1916 Rising drama Rebellion has said that he did not deliberately set out to write a drama with women as the central characters, but did so following his research for the show.

The five-part historical drama features Charlie Murphy as Elizabeth Butler, a medical student from a middle-class background who joins the Irish Citizen Army.

It also features Ruth Bradley as Frances O'Flaherty, a member of Cumann na mBan, and Sarah Greene as May, a receptionist who is having an affair with a married British official at Dublin Castle.

Speaking on The Irish Times Off Topic podcast, Colin Teevan said he had not been aware of just how many women were involved in the Rising.

He said that he was “astonished” by the numbers involved once he had researched the period.

He said many women, who had been radicalised by the suffragette movement, were alienated by the refusal of the Irish Parliamentary Party to support votes for women.

Many middle-class women became involved with the Irish Citizen Army as a result of the party’s position.

Teevan cited Dr Kathleen Lynn as an inspiration for some of the characters in the drama.

Dr Lynn was a middle-class Protestant who became an active suffragette and labour activist. She became the Irish Citizen Army’s medical officer during the Rising.

“There were many educated women pre-1916 until the opportunities started to close down after 1923,” he said.

“It intrigues me how she ended up fighting in the Irish Citizen Army.

"John Redmond was opposed to suffragism. It forced suffragettes away from constitutional nationalism.

“The Irish Citizen Army was a strange alliance of middle-class women and working-class men. That really led me to the stories of the women.

“Some 50 per cent of the population have had their stories airbrushed out of history.”

Two states

Teevan said the drama will explore how the pluralist Ireland of 1914 ended up leading to two monocultural states on the island by 1923.

“The dominant story we have been told of history is that there was a nationalist inevitability. It is really not the case,” he said.

“I wanted to show how events change people. The Rising completely eroded the middle ground and it forces people to take one side or the other.”

Teevan said he had researched the language used in the drama and was satisfied that the “F” word was in common currency at the time.

The first episode of the drama, broadcast Sunday last, has been well-received generally.

Some 619,000 viewers watched it, which was 41 per cent of the total available audience.

“I think the first episode is very difficult in television when you are trying to introduce characters and try to tell that story,” he said.

“We’re delighted all round. My sense of it . . . is that it has been very positive.”