THE CREATOR OF the beloved gritty crime drama Love/Hate is bringing another show to RTÉ, this one billed as a “darkly comedic drama”.

Titled Tall Tales & Murder, screenwriter Stuart Carolan’s latest venture is a six-part series based on the nine-book Dublin Trilogy by Caimh McDonnell.

It will star Aidan Gillen (Love/Hate, Peaky Blinders), Ella Lily Hyland (Fifteen-Love), Casey Walsh, and Phillippa Dunne (Motherland, Derry Girls).

Packy Lee (Peaky Blinders), Brian Doherty and Aisling O’Sullivan (Raw) also star.

Promotional material promises the show will mix a “Bonnie and Clyde-style adventure of bent cops, kidnapping, underworld fixers, libido-enhancing horse medication bootleggers, and the dilemmas of unconventional heroes and villains with an 8th Century tall tale of monks, Vikings, buried treasure, and a priceless holy book”.

Its release date has yet to be confirmed, although it is among a host of titles RTÉ promises is “coming soon” as it released a list of its new series, acquisitions, and even a new app: RTÉ Listen, which will offer users the “best live and on-demand listening experience” across stations and new podcasts.  

What else is coming soon?

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RTÉ

RTÉ

You can probably guess a large portion of the names adorning RTÉ’s much-hyped autumn schedule: Garron Noone has to be in there somewhere (this autumn he’ll be swanning around the US), Miriam O’Callaghan has questions to ask in a two-part series.

Dáithí Ó Sé will take the European gap year he never had. Donnacha O’Callaghan will bring a different celebrity to a different country each week. Dónal Skehan will travel Italy “chasing the places, people, and dishes that have shaped his cooking”.

But among the predictability, there are some welcome additions and reboots.

RTÉ’s spread of drama offerings is its biggest ever: 160 hours of Irish drama is either in production or scheduled to air throughout the year.

  • A third series of KIN scheduled to come out in 2027.
  • Fair City will “set the tone for high-stakes drama” this September, RTÉ promises, while a new series of Marian Keyes’s The Walsh Sisters is in production.
  • There is a brand-new series The Galway Bay Murders set in the west coast of Ireland, following seasoned NYPD detective Nora Savage, who is taking a career break but is unexpectedly pulled into a murder investigation.

Entertainment

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Katie Taylor’s historic Croke Park fight will also be broadcast by RTÉ.

  • The star of the entertainment catalogue is of course series two of the well-received The Traitor’s Ireland, which will premiere on RTÉ One and the player on Sunday 30 August.
  • The Late Late Show is back on 18 September, with host Patrick Kielty ready for the hot seat.
  • Dancing with the Stars is back in January, as is The Tommy Tiernan Show, The 2 Johnnies’ Late Night Lock-In, and First Dates.

Comedy

  • Hardy Bucks is coming back to Irish screens with a new series after the show wrapped in 2018. Expectations are high as the new series is set against Mayo’s All-Ireland win, with the bucks older and no wiser.
  • In December, a new series Kevin and PJ Obsessed will follow the I’m Grand Mam hosts PJ Kirby and Kevin Twomey as they “jump head-first into Ireland’s most passionate and unique communities to learn what makes them tick”.
  • Foul Play, a new comedy series from Ross McCarney and Ryan Carrick of Joe.ie, imagines life at a Dublin-commuter town GAA club.
  • Comedian Joanne McNally’s life onstage and off will be documented in feature documentary What An Absolute Joke.