A Day in May: the marriage equality referendum 10 years on

[Dominique Farrell]

By Harry Guerin

Multimedia Journalist

 

Presented by Colin Murphy, A Day in May is a new RTÉ One documentary that "revisits the people and stories behind Ireland's historic marriage equality referendum, exploring how a landmark vote transformed individual lives and the country".

 

For the documentary, journalist and writer Colin Murphy re-interviews the people who were interviewed by the late journalist Charlie Bird in 2015, at the time of the referendum.

Ten years on, members of Ireland's LGBTQ+ community and their families once again discuss their hopes and fears.

 

"In 2015, Charlie brought me an extraordinary series of interviews he had done around the referendum, and I turned them into a play," Colin Murphy recounts.

"He hoped the play would be done again on the 10th anniversary and, when it was, I decided I should go back to the people he had interviewed and see how their lives had changed.

"I did this to celebrate the referendum, to remember Charlie, and to take the pulse of Ireland today."

 

Harry Guerin: What is your own abiding memory of that day in May 2015?

 

Colin Murphy: On the morning of the referendum, we took our three children into town, to Dublin Castle. The eldest was seven, so they were too young to be there amongst the crowds. But before the crowds had started to gather, we just walked through Dublin Castle and Temple Bar to be a part of the celebration, to soak up the atmosphere, and to hopefully plant a memory in their heads of being a part of it.

One of the things that has inspired me as I went on the journey from writing the play with Charlie to making this documentary, 10 years on, was the thought that my children were growing up in a country that was utterly different, and the hope that the homophobia that was deeply embedded in the society that I grew up in would be a thing of the past.

 

Did you and Charlie Bird talk about making a 10-year documentary after working on the play?

 

Charlie's hope with the play was very much that it would become a part of the remembering of the referendum; that it would be a way to help ensure that the joys and also the lessons of the referendum were never lost. He really hoped the play would travel, and that it would be returned to. He explicitly mentioned the 10th anniversary. So, had Charlie still been with us, I think returning to his interviewees would have been a no-brainer of a story for him - particularly with a new production of the play happening. For me, doing that in his wake was just a joy.

 

How did you decide what people to go back to talk to?

 

Going back to Charlie's interviewees was complicated by the fact that I had never had any direct contact with them - Charlie had given me the transcripts and I worked from that, so I didn't have any contact details. Luckily, Claire, Charlie's wife, went through his papers and found a notebook that had some, though not all, of the contact details. We chose a selection that we thought would give us a diverse range of stories for the doc, and I just sent them cold emails, introducing myself, saying what a privilege it had been for me to work with their stories in writing the play, and inviting them to participate in the doc.

I was thrilled to be given Brendan's email. Brendan's story, which we had had to anonymise at the time, anchored the play. He was in his 70s then; 10 years on, I didn't know if he would still have the same email, if he would be answering it, if he would be well, if he would be alive. But I got back an email from him in short order, saying meeting Charlie had been a high point of his life, that he had already regretted that he had pulled out of the A Day in May book that Charlie made of the interviews (for fear), and that getting my email had put him on a huge high. From that moment, working with him was just a joy.

 

You and Charlie Bird made a great team in the feature-length documentary Ransom '79. Did you have a sense that he was still there with you while making A Day in May?

 

We'd worked so closely with Charlie on Ransom '79, and this was the same team. So, we absolutely felt that Charlie was with us. But particularly when I sat down with the subjects to interview them, I was literally stepping into Charlie's shoes. The secret to Charlie's interviews was the relationships he had formed in that moment with these people, and the onus was on me to pick up where he had left off and establish the same trust and openness. The fact that I was coming with his blessing made it so much easier.

 

What did you get out of making the documentary? Was meeting Brendan the memory you will cherish?

 

For me, the documentary is two things. It revisits a play I wrote 10 years on, and captures the making of that play by a whole new and much younger company, and that's simply thrilling. And as a piece of journalism, it's a series of encounters with an inspiring group of individuals. And though it may be invidious to single one out, bringing Brendan to Dublin to see himself being played on stage by a terrific young actor was absolutely a career high. It was a thrilling and very moving moment.

 

My sense watching was ultimately more hope than fear about the future. Is that your read?

 

When we made the play, the story was absolutely about hope, and joy, and triumph over adversity. There was fear in it, but it was fear that had been vanquished.

Returning to the story 10 years on, I find that hope less unmitigated, perhaps tarnished, but still very much there. The play and the documentary, in its wake, are in part about the practicalities of kindling hope and of delivering on hope - that was what the campaign did, and the documentary retells that story. So, I think fundamentally it is hopeful. But there was an edge to the personal stories told - particularly, of course, that of Caroline - and so that hope is not unambiguous. There's still work to be done.

 

What do you hope viewers take away?

 

Like traditional theatre, I hope they laugh and they cry. I hope they are inspired by the people involved, and, as all storytelling should do, that they gain insights into lives that might otherwise be alien to them.

 

Have you thought about going back to talk to people again in 10 years' time?

 

I hadn't thought yet about going back in 10 years, but I have now! Yes, it's a lovely idea. With the rate of change in society these days, who knows what Ireland and the world will look like then? Maybe I should just ask ChatGPT.

 

A Day in May, Wednesday, 12 August, 9:35pm, RTÉ One and RTÉ Player.

 

RTÉ Entertainment.