Latest news with #MagdaleneLaundry
Forbes
30-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
Fiona Shaw Talks ‘Hot Milk': ‘It's About The Nature Of Being'
Fiona Shaw and Emma Mackey in 'Hot Milk' In Hot Milk, directed by Rebecca Lenkiewicz, Fiona Shaw portrays Rose, a woman with a strange illness, who just moved to a seaside town in Spain with her daughter, Sofia, portrayed by Emma Mackey. Rose is in a wheelchair and suffers from chronic pain. During their stay in Spain, the two women meet with a new doctor to try and find the cause of Rose's inability to walk. This article contains important spoilers past this point Rose needs Sofia's help throughout the day, whether it is to bring her a glass of water or just to leave the house. When speaking with Shaw over Zoom, she told me that the physicality and Rose's state of mind 'were so profoundly connected to her syndrome.' She added: 'I took some classes with a choreographer and we spoke to a lot of people who suffered from this syndrome, not being able to move, you know, it's logical rather than physiological. There was this tick that I had to perfect and it also comes with pain, which is actually much harder to act, because when you don't feel pain, you don't feel pain.' She added: 'You know, people who are in pain often look like they're in pain, and I worked on that, because some of her irritability is connected to being in pain.' Rose's past is very mysterious and she hardly talks about it, even to her daughter. As Shaw explained, when her new doctor tries to find a link between her physical pain and her state of mind, Rose shuts him down immediately. At the end of the movie, we learn that Rose's sister, Mary, who had supposedly died before Rose could even remember her, was actually Rose's mother. Seing that Rose is Irish, I asked the actress if she thought that Mary had been taken away to a Magdalene Laundry. The Magdalene Laundries were religious institutes open in Ireland from the 1920s to 1996. Held by the Catholic Church, these institutes were a place where young women who got pregnant outside of marriage, were sent to perform unpaid work in terrible conditions. Once they had given birth, most of the babies were taken away from their mothers, and the babies would either die of neglect, or be sold to foreign families. 'Hot Milk' Even if Hot Milk doesn't explicitly mentions the institutes, we might think that this is what happened to Rose's mother. Shaw said, 'Rebecca was keen to keeping Rose Irish, and keep the past a classic Irish story of repressed abandonment.' Shaw also declared that this is a 'well-known story of that period.' She added: 'We bury things, you know they say that 96% or something of our brain is buried, and I sometimes think about that. We cannot access the subconscious except through tricks. I mean that's what Jung says.' Shaw also explained that what we do, even our gestures when we talk, might all come from our subconscious and that it is what is probably going on with Rose. She said, 'You really don't know what's pulling the strings way down deep in ourselves. But Rose doesn't willfully hide it, it's a shame.' While the mother and daughter relationship is a major arc in the film, Hot Milk is also a story about self-discovery and breaking-free from our daily lives, obligations, past and even our mental load. Shaw said, 'I think like all good films, and I do think it's a good film, it's about something more, I mean of course the mother and daughter relationship is there, but it's about the nature of being, and I'm really glad that you said that it stayed with you, because it stayed with me when I saw it. I think there's a desolation in the middle of it and a bravery. I mean characters are characters, you're a character, I'm a charater, but actually what it does is when you put characters together, the truth is being revealed or released.' Sofia doesn't really know her father, she saw him a couple of times in her life. One night, she has an argument with her mother and decides to go and visit her father, who lives with his new wife and child. While talking with her father, Sofia learns things about her parents that Rose had never shared with her. Is there an unreliable narrator in the film? Or is truth just a matter of perspective with these characters? Shaw said, 'You know when Sofia says 'My father said you used to play chess' and Rose says 'We didn't.' Who is right? In a couple, one person says 'We used to do that' the other says, 'No we didn't!' Which is true? We just don't know, people remember things differently.' Sofia took a break from her studies to take care of her mother. In the way Mackey portrays Sofia, we can see how tormented she feels. On the one hand, she wants to be with her mother and make sure she is okay, and on the other hand, the two women often argue and Sofia feels like she is suffocating. When the daughter tries to take some time for herself, the mother is constantly calling out for her, which is why Sofia is so conflicted about the idea of going back to school, knowing her mother needs help all the time. 'Hot Milk' 'I just got that actually, but it's very hard to concentrate for Sofia. My mother used to play the piano and it was very hard to study when my mother played the piano,' Shaw said. She added: 'We can say the mother is very selfish, but people in pain are selfish.' At the end of the film, Sofia has a mental breakdown and is extremely worried for her mother. Indeed, Sofia saw her mother walking alone in the afternoon, which weirdly happens every now and then. When Sofia comes home and finds her mother in the wheelchair, Rose explains that it is because she doesn't want to raise Sofia's hopes up. Sofia forces her mother to get in the car with her, and the two women have one of the most honest conversations they ever had. In a shocking final move, Sofia takes Rose out of the car, puts her on the wheelchair, and leaves her in the middle of the road, at night, as a truck is dangerously approaching. Sofia begs her mother to stand up, and fight for her life. We don't know if Rose ever finds the strength to stand up, as the movie cuts to credits with Sofia walking away from her mother. Shaw said, 'I saw the film twice and I thought the opposite on each occasion. It depends on the way you watch the film on a certain night. Once I thought 'That's it, she's dead.' The second time, I thought she got up. I don't know. I think Rebecca likes it like that, I think she has done that really well because I literally had two different experiences.'' Shaw's impressive career in theatre, on television and on the big screen ranges from Harry Potter to Killing Eve, Fleabag and more recently Bad Sisters, Echo Valley and Andor. She said, 'I was very proud and pleased to play in Hot Milk, it's very nice for me, in my age group, to be playing a leading part in a film. I really embraced it, I'm grateful to Rebecca for inviting me. I played so many leading parts in the theatre, that it's fantastic when you're asked again to carry the main bulk of the evening. So here's to more of these big parts, even though I enjoy playing the visitors too.'
Irish Examiner
25-06-2025
- Business
- Irish Examiner
Permission granted for student apartments at Cork's former Good Shepherd Convent
Planners have cleared the way for a major student accommodation complex at the former Good Shepherd Convent in Sunday's Well, once the site of a Magdalene Laundry and mother-and-baby home. Permission was granted to brothers Séamus and Pádraig Kelleher who were also cleared for the redevelopment of a building on lower Shandon Street where they intend to re-open the infamous Left Bank pub. It's the only basement bar left in Cork city and was previously an early morning house. As well as re-opening the basement bar, the brothers have permission to convert the remainder of 60/61 Shandon St into apartments. Permission has also been granted for the redevelopment of parts of 60/61 Shandon Street for residential apartments and to reopen the Left Bank pub. Picture Chani Anderson The Sunday's Well student accommodation, earmarked for the site of the former Good Shepherd Convent, is owned by Moneda Developments Ltd, who applied for permission in 2017 to build more than 200 apartments, but did not go ahead, despite being cleared by planners. The derelict ruins of Good Shepherd Convent, Sundays Well, Cork. Picture: Denis Scannell What's now proposed by the Kelleher brothers will deliver 274 apartments and a total of 957 bed spaces. The development will involve the partial demolition, conservation, redevelopment and extension of the existing former convent buildings for student accommodation use, as well as the provision of retail and a cafe – in the Gate Lodge - for the wider community. The student accommodation will be spread across eight blocks, ranging from three to five storeys. The has been some resistance in the community, with more than 30 objections received by Cork City Council. The historical significance of the site as a former mother-and-baby home and Magdalene Laundry and the fact that Little Nellie of Holy God – dubbed Cork's unofficial patron saint – is buried there prompted some of those objections. Padraig Kelleher said they are very cognisant of the site's special significance and that they would retain access to Little Nellie's grave as well as incorporating the historical facade of the main building into their development. Artist impression of 950-bed student accommodation development at the long-derelict Good Shepherd Convent in Cork City 'It's not going to be pastiche; there's some beautiful workmanship and we will incorporate the historical facade into a modern building and give it a new lease of life. It will be at the heart of the campus,' Mr Kelleher said. He added that the grounds extend to about nine acres. 'You can literally have a new campus up there, looking down over the entire city, close to the Tyndall research centre at the bottom of Sunday's Well, and with good access to UCC and the Mardyke.' Mr Kelleher said they 'intended to put a lot into the landscaping piece' to protect kestrals and barn owls and other wildlife as the area is in a Landscape Preservation Zone and that the architectural design would be guided by the expertise of Butler Cammoranesi Architects. The site has been the subject of ongoing anti-social behaviour, with damage caused by fires, but security is now in place. The entire convent site was added to the city's derelict site register in February 2019. 'It's a place of such huge potential, if someone is willing to grab it by the horns,' Mr Kelleher said, adding that they intend to develop the site themselves and not sell it on. 'We want to see this delivered,' he said. He added that a student population would have a good effect on the local economy, just as it did in other parts of the city. The Kelleher brothers were also cleared to redevelop 60/61 Shandon Street on Farrens Quay - the shortest quay in the city - from commercial use to residential use. The building was once a solicitor's office but has been empty for some time. Mr Kelleher said even though the initial plan was for nine apartments, they have scaled it back to five. 60/61 Shandon Street, located at the gateway to Cork's historic quarter, has been cleared for redevelopment. Picture Chani Anderson 'They'll be well over the standard size and will have nice features such as high ceilings and a terrific vista over the river.' He said they had received sterling advice from the city's conservation architects and that it would guide their work on the building. 'We want to do something decent with the building, it's very unique. We want to follow best practice, I don't know yet when we will be starting, but the first thing we intend to do is clean it up on the outside,' Mr Kelleher said. The brothers' desire to reopen the basement bar underneath the apartments is borne of nostalgia. 60/61 Shandon Street. 'Our father used to drink there and it's probably the only basement bar left in the city. It's closed for a long, long time, but credit to the owner, he hung on to the licence. We won't make anything out of it, but it's the last of its kind in Cork and we'll probably rent it out to a decent operator,' said Mr Kelleher, adding that it would continue to be known as the Left Bank. Read More Cork publican Benny McCabe hails city revival with opening of The Fountain bar
Metro
15-05-2025
- Metro
Being imprisoned in a cruel Magdalene laundry left me with 'no soul'
It is hard to imagine how Maureen Sullivan rebuilt her life after enduring devastating trauma as a child. Following the death of her father, she was raped repeatedly by her stepdad, and when she spoke out about what happened after four years of abuse, she was incarcerated. Maureen, now 73, was one of the youngest girls to enter the Magdalene Laundries – institutions run primarily by Catholic religious orders where so-called 'fallen women' were sent. Inmates, often young and vulnerable, were forced to work in harsh conditions, usually doing laundry for local businesses, the church, or the state. Maureen was sent to the Magdalene Laundry at St Mary's Convent, New Ross, County Wexford, where she was forced to work long hours scrubbing floors and washing clothes, and denied an education. She was ostensibly put there for her own safety, but the experience proved to be the final nail in the coffin of her childhood, which had already been devastated. Speaking from her home in Carlow, Ireland, about the abuse she suffered at the hands of her stepfather Marty, she tells Metro: 'I was so full of fear, it felt like my body was burning. It's a very horrible way to feel. And I couldn't understand what was happening to me, couldn't put a name to it. He was pure evil.' He warned Maureen that if she told anyone what was happening, nobody would believe her. 'It's what paedophiles do. They will groom a child and call them a liar. If you say that you are hurting, or something has happened, they will say: 'Sure, don't mind her. She's a liar.'' So the little girl kept it inside, all the while enduring pains in her hips and abdomen and cramping so bad she would vomit. It went on for years until one day, at the age of 12, a teacher approached Maureen and took her into her office for a private chat. 'She said: 'Maureen, you really look pale and unwell, and I'm concerned about you. I know something is wrong.' She had a lovely box of Black Magic chocolates and gave me a few. I'd never seen lovely sweets like them before, and I started talking,' Maureen remembers. The Priest was called and a letter given to her mother. It was decided that she was to go immediately to live at the convent at New Ross. Relieved to have escaped Marty, she thought she was going to get an education and come home at weekends, but when she arrived, Maureen realised life was to be very different. As a survivor of sexual abuse, she was kept away from other children. 'Because I could 'corrupt' their little minds', she remembers. 'How cruel is that? I wasn't able to talk to them or play with them. I was stripped of everything a child should have and was left with nothing.' Instead, there was hard labour and long days. Maureen was woken at 6am and began the day by washing, polishing and shining corridors, windows and doors. She would then attend mass, have breakfast and go on to spend the day working in the Laundry. At 5pm she would have tea and then attend 'recreation'. 'Recreation was making rosary beads and sweaters for Lourdes, Rome and holy places across the world,' she remembers. 'There was no such thing as recreation. We would do that until bed at 8 o'clock. We'd be exhausted. They didn't need to worry about us talking or whispering to one another, we didn't have the energy. 'You'd then go to sleep and have nightmares about whether you'd got it right. It was horrible; no play time, no sitting and having a chat… It just didn't happen,' she adds. Maureen would work five days a week, and the weekends would be spent cleaning the church or the nuns' apartments. Her hands were left sore and burnt from the soul-destroying work and she was given a new name; Frances. 'You were left with no soul. You had nothing. It was very cruel,' she remembers. 'It felt as bad as the original abuse I'd suffered. I was thinking – 'why did I tell my teacher? Why did I open my mouth?' Isn't that sad?' Maureen's presence in the laundry was kept secret from the outside world; if inspectors or other visitors arrived, she was put in a tunnel to hide. Once, aged 14, she was locked in for hours and forgotten about. She became hysterical and it took her days to get over the traumatic incident. After two years, the young girl was transferred to another laundry in Athy, County Kildare and then to a school for blind people in Dublin. 'My education was taken from me, my hair was cut, I was used as a child slave. I was trafficked from laundry to laundry and my name was changed,' she remembers starkly. 'It really damaged me for years. I should have been enjoying life in my early years, but I didn't. It was worse than prison, because we had no rights. 'After that, I didn't cope very well. I never thought anything of myself, it destroyed all the enjoyment I should have had. I never celebrated a birthday or anything about my life. I couldn't warm to or trust anybody. It was horrendous what was done to me.' Maureen left as soon as she could, aged 16, and took the boat to London with her brother Patrick where the pair decided to build a new life. They slept in Argyll Square, Kings Cross, with no sleeping bag, pillow or money to their name. When, after two months they found the Irish Centre in Camden Town, they were given a room. Without an education, Maureen was limited to jobs in laundries and restaurants. 'I was getting more and more depressed and getting flashbacks. Memories of my stepfather, of what he did. Memories of the laundry and the way I was treated. Of sleeping in a park and how anything could have happened to me,' she explains. She married soon after she arrived in London andhad two children, but Maureen admits she was miserable. Just 19 when she had her daughter, she was so full of 'fear and confusion' she struggled to parent. Her son came 15 years later. By the time she was 34, Maureen made an attempt on her life and ended up in hospital, where, for the first time, she started receiving therapy. She has had counselling every week ever since and has slowly managed to rebuild her life. Her mother, who had ten children by Marty, left him shortly after her daughter was incarcerated, but when Maureen was in her thirties she learned her stepfather was terminally ill and he'd asked for her to come and see him. 'I went into the hospital room in private, because I didn't want to hurt his other children. It wasn't their fault,' remembers Maureen. 'I told him I couldn't forgive him for what he did. He replied: 'Oh, you were a silly little girl. I was only getting you ready for the outside world.' Imagine saying that? It's sick. I told him: 'I hope you rot in hell' and left the room. 'I felt nothing when he died.' In 1995, Maureen moved back to Carlow to be with her mother and determined to help others like her, she started working as an advocate for laundry survivors. More Trending She also joined Justice for Magdalenes, the group that helped bring about an apology from the Irish State, and has been involved in honouring the names of women of the laundries who were buried in unmarked graves. Maureen helped unveil the the Journey Stone at the Little Museum of Dublin in 2022, to honour 'the great courage, integrity and dignity of the women' who had been in the laundries. The following year she published The Girl in the Tunnel about her experiences, in the hope that it would help other survivors of abuse. Despite her initial parenting struggles, she and her children have grown very close. However, even now, people are trying to force Maureen into silence, she says. 'I was invited onto Oprah and somebody emailed to try and stop me going on. People say I make stuff up, that I'm a liar. Really nasty stuff. The latest rumour is that I am a bigamist,' she adds.'I don't know why they do it. I think they begrudge me speaking out, but I don't care. I will never stop talking about what happened to me and other survivors.' 'The Good Shepherd Sisters remain focused on providing whatever support they can to women and children who were in their care and continue to offer help and pastoral support wherever possible. We support victims and survivors in several ways. The Congregation has made financial contributions to the Towards Healing support service since its inception almost 30 years ago. This means that any victim or survivor who requires support has access to a free, confidential, independent counselling service for as long as they need. Many former residents and their family members remain in contact with and have good relations with individual Sisters. This is encouraged and acknowledged as an essential encounter in the healing process. The Good Shepherd Sisters have co-operated fully with several historical inquiries, including detailed testimony from many of its members and by providing extensive files and documentation. We continue to engage with ongoing investigations. We do not comment publicly on individual cases, but we strongly encourage anyone in need to contact us directly.' MORE: 'My life is a ticking time bomb – I worry about running out of days to make change' MORE: Coming seventh in a triathlon taught me more than becoming European champion MORE: A friend asked a question about disability that stopped me in my tracks
