Sean Walsh

Veil. A press review.

Mary Lappin. Her radio column in the Irish Press, May 8, 1982:

(The home station: RTE One.)

I had the foresight to ensure that I wouldn’t let slip what I adjudged would be the major broadcasting event of the period: the first airing of Veil, a play written and produced by Sean Walsh. (You’ll remember that his Assault on a Citadel was the most memorable dramatic offering scripted for the home station during the ‘seventies.)

Thanks to a cassette recording, I’ve just been listening to his ingenious and totally gripping reconstruction of the events that prompted a legendary maiden to use her veil to wipe the sweat from the brow of Jesus during the agonising Via Crucis.

According to the legend, the veil, when returned, was found to bear a perfect likeness of our Lord’s face, and it subsequently became known as the Vera Icon; the maiden consequently became Veronica.

In addition to explaining the politics that dictated the Jewish attitude towards Jesus, the dialogue of Veil clearly and naturally showed that Sean Walsh had assimilated the relevant historical and topographical background.

As the plot unfolded we learned that Veronica – played with considerable charm, simplicity and sincerity by Catherine Brennan – had parents: Kevin Flood’s interpretation of Azarias, a Sanhedrin official, was a tremendous tour de force… a boyfriend and a brother who was possessed of at least one devil – not an unusual phenomenon in biblical times.

And even if the awesome and harrowing exorcism scene smacked a little of the melodramatic, the production had an atmosphere of tense reality that I, for one, found enormously stimulating.