If you've been hopelessly devoted to EastEnders as your humble filmographer has since it's inception in 1985 you just may be tickled to pink to discover that two of its darling denizens in the names of Kat and Alfie Moon (Jessie Wallace and Shane Richie) are currently starring in one of the most inspiring inspired series that made it's way to a living room near you. Keeping the continuum of a story-line in which Kat who birthed the twin-children from an illicit affair to say the least (it was an unctuous uncle that sexually abused a young Kathleen Slater) only Kat wasn't aware she had twins all those years ago, thirty two to be exact. We learned there was a second child when Kat visits the nunnery and has a fateful encounter with Sister Ruth, who was portrayed by the inimitable June Whitfeld, who eventually disclosed to Kathleen that she gave birth to two children, not the one that Kat was led to believe, as she was in her own words 'out cold' during the whole shebang.
There was not much to go on except for a postcard from Christmas of 1983. The clue that led the pair to the land of Erin, to the sleepy town of Redwater. Kat and Alfie have an immediate meeting with two of the essential pieces of the long and winding puzzle.Agnes (the fabulous Fionunula Flanagan and daughter Roisin Kelly (Maria Doyle Kennedy of Black Orphan fame) Agnes is no fan of Kathleen Moon and never intended on letting her son be privy to the news that he was essentially taken from her on a trip to London where the woman he believed was his birth mother gave birth to a still born and returned to Redwater presenting Kathleen's son who was told was named Luke (later named Dermot) as the child she was expecting with husband Peter (Stanley Townsend). Happy families were indeed played until the boating accident would claim the life of mother Iris who confessed as we see in one of Dermot's hazy flashbacks was not his mother. As Iris was waving as she was drowning and asked her 'son' to help give her a lifeline and he was the only one in proximity enough to save her life before she ultimately drowned
Dermot emphatically says 'no.'
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| Fr. Dermot Dolan on call for all your ecumenical matters. (Pictured :The formidable Oisin Stack) |
Kat Moon probably never banked on in her wildest dreams that her prodigal son (impeccably portrayed by Oisin Stack whose previous roles were mawkish by comparison)who now returned would be a man of the cloth, a homicidal priest that took the life of one of the men that was closest to him , Agnes' husband Lance in those very same Redwater waters. Just as Dermot is cozying up with his mama he discovers there were more secrets and lies, lies which are the one true anathema to Dermot and his remit for taking the life of Lance and letting his 'mother' Iris perish before his very eyes. Dermot seems to have little if any remorse for each of the crimes he exacted.
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| Redwater airs Thursdays on RTE One at 8. |
There's one more episode to go in this series which has drawn comparisons to the Wickerman and is now in five shows deep, the penultimate episode aired on June the 15th. It is unclear if there will be a followup series but get in your eyefuls now. The photography is as visually arresting as the town is, this ain't no podunk little place in fact Mr. Richie was so taken by this languorous and lambent land - he decided to search for property there. And if there is any testament to this being worth taking a butcher's, please take it from a staunch purist, this is some serious televisual manna to be had here and you'd be doing yourself a woeful disservice if you didn't partake, just don't hail your Marys with Fr. Dolan anytime soon.