RTÉ AND the makers of the controversial documentary Fairytale of Kathmandudisagreed sharply over aspects of the project in the year leading up to its transmission last month, newly released documents reveal.
At one stage in the development of the project, the director Neasa Ní Chianáin claimed she felt under pressure from RTÉ to include the central allegations about the poet Cathal Ó Searcaigh's relationships with young Nepalese men. RTÉ strongly denied this.
According to correspondence between the film-makers, RTÉ and the Irish Film Board, obtained by the Irish-language newspaper Foinseunder the Freedom of Information Act, Ms Ní Chianáin made the claim at a meeting in the RTÉ canteen on August 2nd, 2007.
Recalling the exchange, Eddie Doyle, RTÉ's assistant commissioning editor for factual programmes, said "she suggested that I had somehow compelled her to 'defame' the subject of the documentary".
In a letter to Vinegar Hill Productions, the company run by Ms Ní Chianáin and producer David Rane, Mr Doyle continued: "Elsewhere, during a conversation with our legal representative, you suggested that the central allegations were only being included at the behest of RTÉ. This is not my recollection of events."
Vinegar Hill had pointed out that it was RTÉ that had insisted on a third trip to Nepal to seek further evidence, including interviews with young men, to support the film's allegations. However Mr Doyle reminded the film-makers that it was they who had approached RTÉ with the allegations and said the broadcaster was only seeking to ensure that journalistic rigour be applied.
From its reading of the documents, Foinsesuggests both RTÉ and Vinegar Hill had concerns about proceeding with the documentary about Ó Searcaigh and his relationships with young men in Nepal.
When, in August 2007, Mr Doyle told Vinegar Hill that their recent statements seemed to suggest they lacked confidence in the allegations made in the film, however, David Rane insisted that the film-makers stood firmly behind the allegations.
"We are not investigative journalists and we do not even know the first thing about this kind of television programme-making. We said at the time that it would be better if RTÉ were to take this particular investigation on, especially with your Prime Time Investigatesexperience, and you accepted this and even said in an early communication that RTÉ would probably do something yourselves on this issue," he wrote to Mr Doyle, who had been brought in to work on the project because of his experience of investigative journalism.
There was also some dispute over editing. After viewing a version of the film, RTÉ raised concerns that some scenes were shown out of sequence and warned against the viewer being misled.
In response, Mr Rane said that it would be almost impossible to ensure that every scene would be shown in the sequence in which they were filmed. "Just to remind you that this is a documentary film, not a piece of journalism . . ." he wrote.
RTÉ would not accept this.
"The rules regarding journalistic accuracy, fairness and transparency apply to this production, given the nature of the allegations that you are making in it. Indeed, all programmes broadcast in Ireland are subject to Irish law, regarding libel, defamation, fairness, etc, and a statement that a programme is a documentary film, not a piece of journalism, will not hold up as a defence in any action which might follow the broadcast," Mr Doyle wrote on September 14th, 2007.
The documents also show that Clare Duignan, RTÉ's director of programming, suggested that the title Fairytale of Kathmanducould be offensive to homosexuals, but the title was retained.
According to Foinse, there is no evidence in the 600 pages of correspondence that the film-maker had set out to deceive Ó Searcaigh as to the nature of the documentary, or that she knew more at the outset than she revealed.
Ó Searcaigh has strongly criticised his portrayal in the documentary, saying that it gave a distorted and unfair impression of his relationships with young Nepalese men.
