The Hanging Gale (BBC Drama, Joe McGann, Paul McGann)

Period drama serial The Hanging Gale was about a group of families struggle for their lives in 1840’s Ireland after a potato famine blights the country.

Notable at the time for bringing together the four McGann brothers. They were all big names in their own right but had never appeared on TV together before.

The title of the series comes from the term ‘hanging gale’, the name for a widespread practice in Ireland at the time, where a landlord would allow new tenants a six-month grace period on payment of their rent, with the expectation that the rent owed would be paid when the land’s crops were harvested and sold.

Cast: Joe McGann as Sean Phelan; Mark McGann as Conor Phelan; Paul McGann as Liam Phelan; Stephen McGann as Daniel Phelan; Michael Kitchen as Townsend; Fiona Victory as Maeve Phelan; Tina Kellegher as Mary Dolan; Sean McGinley as Perry; Gerard McSorley as Coulter; Joe Pilkington as James Phelan; Ciaran Fitzgerald as Joseph Phelan; Ciara Marley as Molly Phelan; Dylan O’Connell as Baby Hannah; Barry Barnes as Michael Dolan; Birdy Sweeney as Patrick Dolan; Máire Ní Ghráinne as Sarah Dolan; Mal Whyte as McBride; Dave Duffy as McCafferty; Peter Caffrey as Doctor Davis; Joe Savino as Meagher; B. J. Hogg as Harkin; Gerry Walsh as Brady

Writer: Alan Cubitt / Music: Shaun Davey / Executive Producers: David Blake Knox, Robert Cooper, James Mitchell, Rod Stoneman / Producer: Jonathan Cavendish / Director: Diarmuid Lawrence

UK / BBC One – Little Bird – BBC Northern Ireland / 4×60 minute episodes / Broadcast 14 May – 4 June 1995