‘For years, I couldn’t talk about her’: filmmaker David Merriman on his mother’s death by suicide

Co-director of Jim Sheridan’s forthcoming film about Ian Bailey on what he describes as a bomb going off in his teenage years

David Merriman. Photo: Gerry Mooney

David Merriman can still remember the last time he saw his mother Elizabeth alive. He was 19, and it was a sunny Tuesday morning in July 1995.

“The day that my mom took her life, I was ironing, and she came in and she said, ‘Will you iron my shirt?’. I said yes, and then she hugged me and told me she loved me and kissed me.