Behind the Scenes Archives

Behind the Scenes

RTÉ’S COMPLIANCE CONCERNS

May 16, 2019

FANS OF Irish daytime TV will be familiar with Today with Maura and Daithí, fronted by the dream team of Maura Derrane and... Read more »

SARAH DURCAN’S NOMINATION

May 16, 2019

GOLDHAWK was recently perusing the Memorandum and Articles of Association of the Abbey Theatre and spied a regulation that could be interpreted to... Read more »

Susan Bergin Marlowe Mullingar Film Studio RTÉ Self-Employment

SARAH DILLON’S €2M FUND

May 16, 2019

FANS OF Goldhawk will be aware of the Western Region Audiovisual Producers (WRAP) Fund thanks to the nascent body’s first funding decision –... Read more »

KEVIN RAFTER’S CV

May 2, 2019

NOT TOO late in the day, Blueshirt Minister for Culture Josepha Madigan has appointed Kevin Rafter as Sheila Pratschke’s replacement in the chair... Read more »

BILL SHIPSEY’S AMNESTY

May 2, 2019

GOOD NEWS for top barrister Bill Shipsey, whose Art for Amnesty (AfA) vehicle has been restored to the Companies Register, seven months after... Read more »

NEIL JORDAN’S ‘LUDICROUS THRILLER’

May 2, 2019

NEIL JORDAN’S latest opus, Greta, opened to predictably ‘mixed’ reviews over the Easter weekend. The Financial Times’s opening salvo referred to the “ludicrous... Read more »

ABBEY BOARD’S SCRIPT

April 18, 2019

GOLDHAWK was interested to know how the Abbey board reacted to last year’s decision by the Arts Council to withhold a chunk of... Read more »

ADDING UP IN CORK

April 18, 2019

THE FALLOUT from the Michael Jackson documentary, Leaving Neverland, has affected a number of players here. One of those hit is the Cork... Read more »

JOHN GLEESON’S NEW PLOT

April 18, 2019

THE ACCOUNTANCY profession has expanded significantly since the financial services sector was freed of its old-fashioned, fusty reservations. And with riskier business came... Read more »

BARBARA DAWSON’S PLAN

April 4, 2019

IT’S SLOW ahead at the Hugh Lane Gallery, where director Barbara Dawson and her board are looking to implement a rather ambitious strategy.... Read more »

JOSEPHA’S BURSARIES MK II

April 4, 2019

THIS MONTH, applications close for the ‘Markievicz bursaries’ (mark II) and it promises to be pretty competitive given that the potential field has... Read more »

THE TAXMAN COMETH… EVENTUALLY

April 4, 2019

BACK IN November 2014, Goldhawk put a few queries to Revenue as the country’s film luvvies were wishing farewell to the old ‘investor’... Read more »

NO QUEUE TO SUCCEED PRATSCHKE

March 21, 2019

CULTURE MINISTER Josepha Madigan’s search for the next chair of the Arts Council has begun (albeit a little late in the day), but... Read more »

SLOWLY DOES AT IVEAGH HOUSE

March 21, 2019

DOCUMENTS released to Goldhawk reveal that the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade created the new post of cultural director as it was... Read more »

MORE HAPPY ENDINGS FOR FILM PRODUCERS

March 21, 2019

BY HAPPY coincidence, figures have emerged from three separate film and television funding schemes that dispense public lolly to hard-pressed producers. The Sound... Read more »

MARIAN KEYES’S MAKE-UP

March 7, 2019

THIS MONTH the long list for the first Comedy Women In Print (CWIP) prize is announced, with our own Marian Keyes in situ... Read more »

BISI BLOCKED

March 7, 2019

SPARE A thought for playwright Bisi Adigun. The Supreme Court has found that the long-running litigation against his former legal eagles failed to... Read more »

CONOR BARRY’S ‘HOLE IN THE GROUND’

March 7, 2019

IRISH HORROR films and psychological thrillers have not fared well at the box office. Recent excursions The Lodgers and The Cellar Door hardly... Read more »

NEIL MURRAY’S TACTICS

February 21, 2019

ALMOST A month after the Abbey Theatre found itself the star of yet another offstage drama, courtesy of a critical letter signed by... Read more »

REGIME CHANGE ON MERRION SQUARE

February 21, 2019

WATCH OUT for an advert seeking to fill vacancies in the Arts Council. Given that the most important seat to be filled on... Read more »

TAXMAN STARS IN ARTHOUSE DRAMA

February 21, 2019

JUST WHEN the dust seemed to have settled on Galway’s dalliance with ‘cultural cinema’ – the bijou Pálás art house having been folded... Read more »

JOSEPHA MADIGAN’S BOTCHED BURSARIES

February 7, 2019

FANS OF The Phoenix will not have been surprised to hear about the sudden brake applied to the €20,000-a-pop “Markievicz bursaries” announced last... Read more »

VAL RUTTLEDGE’S CHOCOLATE SURPRISE

February 7, 2019

INTERESTING to see Dublin City Council (DCC) getting exercised about a plan by an arts centre to develop a property near Kilmainham Goal... Read more »

DEIRDRE DONAGHY’S PLOT SPOILER

February 7, 2019

THE OIREACHTAS Budgetary Oversight Committee had a recent session on tax expenditures (wake up down the back! – Ed), which uncovered some of... Read more »

ROBERT BALLAGH’S ART PROBLEM

January 24, 2019

THE OUTBREAK of tut-tutting over Robert Ballagh’s complaint about the lack of Irish players at the top of many cultural institutions here was... Read more »

AFTER JAMES HICKEY AT SCREEN IRELAND

January 24, 2019
ON A rare joint appearance on radio with Screen Ireland (SI) chair Annie Doona, the agency’s outgoing chief executive, James Hickey, told RTÉ that... Read more »

ANN MULROONEY’S SUCCESSOR

January 24, 2019

THE HUNT is under way for a new chief executive/artistic director for the VISUAL contemporary arts centre in Carlow, which continues to struggle... Read more »

PASS THE FERRERO ROCHER

January 10, 2019

THE APPOINTMENT this week of an Irish five-a-side squad of “cultural ambassadors” marks the latest wheeze in the much-hyped objective of “doubling Ireland’s... Read more »

JOSEPHA MADIGAN’S PRESSIE

January 10, 2019

’TWAS BUT a week before Christmas and all were asleep when Josepha Madigan bestowed gifts to the tune of U200m to Annie Doona’s... Read more »

EUGENE DOWNES’S NEXT JOB?

January 10, 2019

GOLDHAWK was interested to see an advert for the new role of cultural director at the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT)... Read more »

BUSY TIMES AT ANNAGH-MAKERRIG

December 13, 2018

EARLIER THIS year, Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Josepha Madigan spent a week at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre (TGC) artists’ retreat... Read more »

CURTIN CALL AT THE ABBEY

December 13, 2018

WHILE THE Abbey Theatre’s imported Christmas show, Come From Away, has attracted lots of pre-opening night publicity, one of the board members has... Read more »

SANTA CLAUS IS COMING TO TOWN

December 13, 2018

THE PERIOD from mid-November through to mid-January is traditionally a nervy time for idle freelance workers in the film and TV business. There’s... Read more »

JOSEPHA MADIGAN’S BIASED BURSARIES

November 29, 2018

NOT SURPRISINGLY, there was little (ie no) outcry after Josepha Madigan unveiled the government’s latest gender-based culture wheeze, which takes the form of... Read more »

THE ABBEY’S NEW NUMBER CRUNCHER

November 29, 2018

CULTURE MINISTER Josepha Madigan has been busy making appointments to the boards of some national cultural institutions. One of these is accountant Peter... Read more »

SELINA CARTMELL VS GRAHAM McLAREN

November 29, 2018

IT’S THE time of year when our two biggest institutions announce winter and spring programmes – ones that will leave audiences and, more... Read more »