RTÉ One
Tom Vaughan-Lawlor to play Hugh Lane in new RTÉ feature drama documentary Citizen Lane
RTÉ announced today that actor Tom Vaughan-Lawlor (Love/Hate, Charlie, Maze) will play Hugh Lane in an upcoming RTÉ One feature drama documentary called Citizen Lane about the life and times of the art dealer and philanthropist.
Also starring Derbhle Crotty playing Lady Gregory and Marty Rea playing William Orpen, the film will include interviews with contemporary contributors in a narrative richly illustrated by the paintings collected and given to Ireland by Lane.
Hugh Lane’s story is an Irish odyssey set amid the cultural and political ferment of artistic and cultural experience in the early 20th century and follows Lane’s hard fought project to establish the world’s first public modern art gallery, his untimely death on the Lusitania, and his contested will. That story continues to the present day in the long-running campaign to recover for Ireland Lane’s bequest of 39 paintings, including works by Monet, Renoir and Manet.
For many Irish people, particularly Dubliners, Hugh Lane is a well-known name – but relatively few know the story behind the man, a citizen who was arguably Ireland’s greatest ever benefactor of the arts.
Citizen Lane is directed by Thaddeus O’ Sullivan, produced by James Mitchell, Jane Doolan and Sheila Ahern and written by Mark O’Halloran. It is funded by RTÉ and The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland with the participation of Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane, where filming will take place this October.
Citizen Lane will offer Irish audiences an opportunity to explore aspects of Irish artistic and cultural experience which, until now, have been undocumented. The feature length documentary is due to air on RTÉ One next year.
Date: Saturday September 16th 2017
For more information please contact: Rayna Connery, RTÉ Television Senior Press and Publicity Officer, T: 01 208 3169; M: 087 9862902, rayna.connery@rte.ie