Fastnet Films' documentary ‘Troid Fhuilteach’ (A Bloody Canvas) is set to premiere on TG4, on Wednesday 16th January, at 9.30pm.
The one hour documentary, written and directed by Andrew Gallimore, tells the tale of three unrelated events - a civil war, a black heavyweight champion without a challenger and a journeyman Irish fighter down on his luck – that conspire to produce the most bizarre world championship fight in boxing history, on St. Patrick's Day 1923, in Dublin City.
While offering the definitive version of events that took place before,
during and after the fight, this documentary also examines the
life and times of a near forgotten Irish sporting hero, "Bold" Michael Francis McTigue. The doco portrays the story of the underdog boxer and shows a panoramic sense of life from late eighteenth-century rural Ireland through to the Civil War to the Jazz Age in New York and the days of the Great Depression.
Produced by Morgan Bushe, ‘A Bloody Canvas’ was made through the support of the BCI Sound and Vision Broadcasting Funding Scheme and TG4, and was shot on location in New York City, Dublin and Co. Clare.
"Fastnet are delighted with the finished piece,” said Bushe. “Andrew Gallimore is a master filmmaker, up there with the Ken Burns of this world. Through painstaking research he has managed to unearth a wealth of previously unseen archive which unquestionably helps to paint a unique picture of the characters involved and the events which occurred.”
“Micheal O Meallaigh at TG4 was an enormous help and can't be thanked enough, likewise with Eoin McDonagh who did a first rate job on the post. Mike McTigue was our country's first ever boxing world champion, a man whose achievements in my opinion demand that he now be re-entered into Ireland's pantheon of sporting greats."
The same creative team will now begin work on the follow-up boxing
Documentary, 'Babyface Goes to Hollywood: The Jimmy McLarnin Story', funded through the BCI and Setanta Sports, in early 2008.
