We are becoming accustomed to having historic incidents served in the form of motion picture stories. "The Life of Henry VIII." was a good example of it. I hear now that an American woman is engaged in research in this country, with a view to supplying a motion picture corporation with a scenario based on the life of Theobald Wolfe Tone.
There is of course, an American "link up" with Tone, and between his experiences in Ireland, in the United States and France there is plenty of material for a splendid film. I cannot think what Hollywood would do about the love interest, but there would be scope for the spectacular in the expedition under Hoche, which the weather broke up in Bantry Bay, and in the actual fighting when Tone at last reached Ireland in 1798.
Of course, the greatest scope for love scenes in a '98 film lies in the tale of Henry Joy McCracken. So little is known of his courtship of Mary Bodel that Hollywood could let itself go.
The Irish Times, June 23rd, 1939.