{"id":480630,"date":"2026-06-03T08:31:16","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T08:31:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/480630\/"},"modified":"2026-06-03T08:31:16","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T08:31:16","slug":"irish-director-wins-us-film-award-for-tipperary-murder-drama-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/480630\/","title":{"rendered":"Irish director wins US film award for Tipperary murder drama \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jessie Buckley<\/a> may have won an Oscar<\/a>, but she isn\u2019t the only Irish woman returning from Los Angeles<\/a> with a film award this year after Tipperary woman Anne Williamson won best first-time female director at the Indie X Film Fest for her drama Bridget.<\/p>\n

Williamson, from Mullinahone, Co Tipperary<\/a>, directed and co-wrote the 40-minute film that tells the story of the murder of Bridget Cleary, who was burned to death by her husband in Tipperary in 1895. He was later jailed for 15 years for murder.<\/p>\n

\u201cBridget Boland was just 26 years old when was murdered by her husband Michael Cleary, who later claimed that she had been taken by fairies and replaced with a changeling,\u201d Williamson told the audience at a recent showing of the film at the Abymill Theatre in Fethard. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt was always a story that fascinated me from listening to stories my grandfather told me when I was a child. It was always a tale that tore at my heart strings the fact that she was burned and buried in the middle of the night with no mourners. It always got to me that she was wronged.\u201d<\/p>\n

Williamson co-wrote the film with Brian Clancy from Clooneen. <\/p>\n

Filmed by cinematographer Louis Buggy of Diceman Films, Bridget alternates between a modern-day introduction to the story shot in colour and a black-and-white historical retelling, with all parts played by members of the Fionn MacCumhaill Players from south Tipperary.<\/p>\n

Williamson travelled to Los Angeles with cast members Vicky Maher, who plays Bridget; John Peter Morris, who plays her husband, Michael; and Deirdre De B\u00farca, who plays a local gossip. All three were present as she collected her award at the Regal Theatre in the city. <\/p>\n

The film also stars young actor Cathal Fahey as Danny, Mark Fitzgerald as his father, and Eugene O\u2019Meara as his grandfather, who introduces the story. The drama features an original ballad entitled The Maid of Old Clooneen, written and sung by Dublin folk singer Chris Kavanagh.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Horror films Backrooms and Obsession are doing something astonishingOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Fethard undertaker and publican, Jasper Murphy, who plays a priest in the drama, said locals involved in the film have been inundated with messages of congratulations since Williamson\u2019s win. \u201cWe\u2019re getting messages from all over the place and it\u2019s just fantastic for everyone involved in the project.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jessie Buckley may have won an Oscar, but she isn\u2019t the only Irish woman returning from Los Angeles…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":480631,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[61,60,116,80,9123],"class_list":["post-480630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-los-angeles","tag-technology","tag-tipperary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=480630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480630\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/480631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=480630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=480630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=480630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}