| Eureka Street | |
|---|---|
| Based on | Eureka Street by Robert McLiam Wilson |
| Written by | Donna Franceschild |
| Directed by | Adrian Shergold |
| Starring | Vincent Regan Mark Benton Dervla Kirwan Elisabeth Rohm |
| Composer | Martin Phipps |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| Original language | English |
| No. of series | 1 |
| No. of episodes | 4 |
| Production | |
| Executive producers | Robert Cooper Debra Hauer Claire Duignan |
| Producer | Sophie Gardiner |
| Production locations | Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK |
| Running time | 4 x 60 minutes |
| Production company | BBC Northern Ireland |
| Original release | |
| Network | BBC2 |
| Release | 13 September – 4 October 1999 |
Eureka Street is a BBC Northern Ireland 1999 adaptation to mini-series of Robert McLiam Wilson's 1996 novel of the same name. Set in Belfast in the six months before and after the 1994 ceasefire, it commences with an anonymous hand typing the words, "All stories are love stories." The novel opens with the same text.
Set in the Northern Irish city of Belfast, the series follows the lives of two young men, Chuckie Lurgan (played by Mark Benton) and Jake Jackson (played by Vincent Regan), as they navigate the turbulent social and political landscape of the late 1990s. Chuckie is a lovable rogue who dreams of making it big, while Jake is a former soldier trying to come to terms with the violence he has experienced.
The series explores a range of themes including sectarianism, politics, and the complexities of modern Northern Irish society. As Chuckie and Jake navigate their way through the city's underworld, they encounter a diverse cast of characters, including loyalist paramilitaries, former IRA members, and corrupt politicians.
Despite the often grim subject matter, the series also has moments of humor and tenderness, as Chuckie and Jake's friendship provides a counterpoint to the violence and division around them.
Belfast is the capital city and principal port of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan and connected to the open sea through Belfast Lough and the North Channel. It is second to Dublin as the largest city on the island of Ireland with a population in 2021 of 345,418 and a metro area population of 634,600.
The Troubles were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted for about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it is sometimes described as an "irregular war" or "low-level war". The conflict began in the late 1960s and is usually deemed to have ended with the Good Friday Agreement of 1998. Although the Troubles mostly took place in Northern Ireland, at times violence spilled over into parts of the Republic of Ireland, England, and mainland Europe.
The Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) is an Ulster loyalist paramilitary group based in Northern Ireland. Formed in 1965, it first emerged in 1966. Its first leader was Gusty Spence, a former British Army soldier from Northern Ireland. The group undertook an armed campaign of almost thirty years during The Troubles. It declared a ceasefire in 1994 and officially ended its campaign in 2007, although some of its members have continued to engage in violence and criminal activities. The group is a proscribed organisation and is on the terrorist organisation list of the United Kingdom.
The Official Irish Republican Army or Official IRA was an Irish republican paramilitary group whose goal was to remove Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom and create a "workers' republic" encompassing all of Ireland. It emerged in December 1969, shortly after the beginning of the Troubles, when the Irish Republican Army (IRA) split into two factions. The other was the Provisional IRA. Each continued to call itself simply "the IRA" and rejected the other's legitimacy.
Stiff Little Fingers are an Ulster punk rock band from Belfast, Northern Ireland (UK). They formed in 1977 at the height of the Troubles, which informed much of their songwriting. They started out as a schoolboy band called Highway Star, doing rock covers, until they discovered punk. They were the first punk band in Belfast to release a record – the "Suspect Device" single came out on their own independent label, Rigid Digits. Their album Inflammable Material, released in partnership with Rough Trade, became the first independent LP to enter the UK top 20.
The Workers' Party is an Irish republican, Marxist–Leninist communist party active in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
The New Lodge is an urban, working class Catholic community in Belfast, Northern Ireland, immediately to the north of the city centre. The landscape is dominated by several large tower blocks. The area has a number of murals, mostly sited along the New Lodge Road. The locality is demarcated by Duncairn Gardens, Antrim Road, Clifton Street, and dependent on opinion, York Street or North Queen Street. North Queen Street and Duncairn Gardens have often seen rioting between republicans and loyalists. The New Lodge is also an electoral ward of Belfast City Council.
Bernard MacLaverty is an Irish fiction writer and novelist. His novels include Cal and Grace Notes. He has written five books of short stories.
Robert McLiam Wilson is a Northern Irish novelist.
Nicholas Laird is a Northern Irish novelist and poet.
The Blame Game is a Northern Irish comedy panel series that has been broadcast on BBC Radio Ulster and later jointly on BBC One Northern Ireland. Starting in 2005, it is hosted by Tim McGarry. Regular panellists include comedians Colin Murphy, Neil Delamere, and, until 2020, Jake O'Kane. Former guest panellist local comedian Diona Doherty, became a regular panellist since series 19. As well as the regular three panellists, they also have a regular guest panellist. The guest panellist is usually a comedian from outside Northern Ireland who is not always as familiar with the complexities of Northern Irish politics which leads to some hilarity.
Paul Marquess is a television producer from Belfast, Northern Ireland. His credits include Brookside, The Bill, Family Affairs, Hollyoaks, Crime Stories, Suspects and Hope Street. He also originated the idea for the series Footballers' Wives. He currently holds the post of managing director of Newman Street, a label of Fremantlemedia.
Sam(uel) Thompson was a Northern Irish playwright best known for his controversial plays Over the Bridge, which exposes sectarianism, and Cemented with Love, which focuses on political corruption. His works fall into the social realist genre but are distinct in their dramatisation of Northern Irish issues; they were ground-breaking in documenting sectarian violence before the eruption of the Troubles.
Maurice Henry Leitch MBE was a Northern Irish author. Leitch's work included novels, short stories, dramas, screenplays and radio and television documentaries. His first novel was The Liberty Lad, published in 1965. His second novel, Poor Lazarus was awarded the Guardian Fiction Prize in 1969, and Silver's City won the Whitbread Prize in 1981.
Events during the year 1996 in Northern Ireland.
Banbridge is a town in County Down, Northern Ireland. It lies on the River Bann and the A1 road and is named after a bridge built over the River Bann in 1712. It is situated in the civil parish of Seapatrick and the historic barony of Iveagh Upper, Upper Half. The town began as a coaching stop on the road from Belfast to Dublin and thrived from Irish linen manufacturing. The town was home to the headquarters of the former Banbridge District Council. Following a reform of local government in Northern Ireland in 2015, Banbridge became part of Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council. It had a population of 17,400 in the 2021 Census.
Bloody Sunday or Belfast's Bloody Sunday was a day of violence in Belfast, Northern Ireland on 10 July 1921, during the Irish War of Independence. The violence erupted one day before a truce began, which ended the war in most of Ireland. With the truce nearing, police launched a raid against republicans, but were ambushed by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and an officer was killed. In retaliation, Protestant loyalists attacked Catholic enclaves in west Belfast, burning homes and businesses. This sparked rioting and gun battles between Protestants and Catholics, including paramilitaries. There were also gun battles between republicans/nationalists and the police, and some police patrols fired indiscriminately at Catholic civilians. Seventeen people were killed or fatally wounded on 10 July, and a further three were killed or fatally wounded before the truce began at noon on 11 July. At least 100 people were wounded. About 200 houses were destroyed or badly damaged, most of them Catholic homes, leaving 1,000 people homeless. See: The Troubles in Northern Ireland (1920–1922).
That part of the United Kingdom called Northern Ireland was created in 1922, with the partition of the island of Ireland. The majority of the population of Northern Ireland wanted to remain within the United Kingdom. Most of these were the Protestant descendants of settlers from Great Britain.
Eureka Street is a novel by Northern Irish author Robert McLiam Wilson, published in 1996 in the UK, it focuses on the lives of two Belfast friends, one Catholic and one Protestant, shortly before and after the IRA ceasefire in 1994. A BBC TV adaptation of Eureka Street was broadcast in 1999.
A series of riots in loyalist areas of Northern Ireland began in Waterside, Derry, on 30 March 2021. After four nights of rioting in Derry, disturbances spread to south Belfast on 2 April, where a loyalist protest developed into a riot involving iron bars, bricks, masonry and petrol bombs. Following this, civil unrest spread to Newtownabbey on 3 April, where cars were hijacked and burnt, and petrol bombs were also used against police. Carrickfergus in southern County Antrim also saw serious civil unrest on the night of 4 April and morning of 5 April, where loyalists created roadblocks to keep police out of local estates and threw petrol bombs at police vehicles.
