Ronnie Drew tells the story of Colleen Bawn whose murder and trial inspired a novel, a play, and an opera.
The programme opens with Ronnie Drew singing 'Limerick is Beautiful'. He explains the connection between a number of different Irish people that the programme could have been about from the liberator Daniel O'Connell to the novelist Gerald Griffin and playwright Dion Boucicault.
We're telling the story of a young girl called Ellen Hanley, a girl whom nobody would remember at all had not all those famous people been involved in one way or another in her tragic fate.
This programme features a dramatisation featuring Marian Richardson as Ellen Hanley, Conor Evans as Daniel O'Connell and Jim Mooney as John Scanlon. The scriptwriter was Bernard Share and the producer was Joe O'Donnell. The programme is presented by Ronnie Drew.
'Irish Men and Irish Women: Ellen Hanley' was broadcast on 10 October 1977.
