One of the surprise hits of the Christmas video spree this year is to be shown on RTE1 television next Tuesday at 9.30 p.m. A Year 'til Sunday is a documentary about the Galway football team's journey to the All-Ireland this year and has been given an over-12s rating. Made by Galway's substitute goalkeeper, Pat Comer, it is a remarkable, uninhibited fly-on-the-dressing-room wall account of the agony and the ecstasy during Galway's wonderful championship year. Starring team manager John O'Mahony and captain Ray Silke, the cast includes players Ja Fallon, Michael Donnellan, Johnny Divilly, Kevin McNamara and goalkeeper Michael McNamara. It has been hailed by commentators as the first great GAA film.
Other documentaries to be screened on RTE in January include Paradise Ireland, about the work of Irish priest Father John Glynn on New Ireland Island in the South Pacific. It goes out at 8 p.m. on Monday, January 4th. Ceithre Scor Bliain Ag Fas, on the relationship of Cambridge scholar George Thomson with the Blasket Islands and Muiris O Suilleabhan in particular, begins at 9.30 p.m. on January 7th on One.
A new four-hour drama series, co-produced with French television, Flesh and Blood, begins on RTE1 television at 9.20 p.m. this Sunday. The first of eight episodes of Across the Line, about two young people's journey from Alaska to Argentina, begins on RTE1 at 7.30 p.m. on Tuesday, January 12th.
Gerry Ryan hosts a new talent show, Let Me Entertain You, from Sunday, January 10th, at 8 p.m., also on RTE1, while a brand new travel series, No Frontiers, begins at 8.30 p.m. on January 12th. Paddy O'Gorman brings his Queueing for a Living interview style to RTE1 with a six-part series, O'Gorman's People, beginning at 8 p.m. on January 13th.
A new 12-part music series, Celtic Rocks at the Quays, filmed at the Quays pub in Galway, goes out on Network 2 at 11 p.m. from January 11th. Imprint, a new books programme presented by poet Theo Dorgan, will be broadcast on RTE1 at 10.10 p.m. from January 14th.
Solved and Unsolved, a series on recent crimes begins on January 26th on RTE1. The time of broadcast has yet to be decided. D Watch, a six-part documentary series on the day-today activities of fire-fighters at Phibsboro station in Dublin begins on February 23rd at 8 p.m. on RTE1.
Announcing the new schedule, RTE's managing editor, Mr Joe Mulholland, said it reflected the policy of providing Irish audiences with a comprehensive and dynamic Irish television service "by featuring an array of new programme series which should have wide appeal".
