Frank Deasy
Encyclopedia
Frank Deasy was an Irish
screenwriter. He won an Emmy Award
for the television series Prime Suspect and was also nominated for his works, Looking After Jo Jo
and The Grass Arena. His other works included the BBC
/HBO mini-series
, The Passion
.
Preceding his death from liver cancer
on 17 September 2009, Deasy spoke in public about his condition. An appearance on RTÉ Radio 1
's Liveline
led to a record increase in organ donor
card requests in Ireland.
. He initially worked as a child carer with Ireland's Eastern Health Board. He relocated to Glasgow, Scotland, where he died in 2009, having "liked it so much he never came home".
His career credits include Prime Suspect and The Passion
. James Walton of The Daily Telegraph
described The Passion as "exactly the kind of intelligent and engaging drama you'd expect from a series written by Frank Deasy". For RTÉ he wrote Father & Son
, which achieved 26% and 27% audience shares for its first two episodes broadcast on RTÉ One
in 2009 and was consistently within Ireland's Top Ten television programmes throughout its run. Father & Son features a character, Barrington Smith, who suffers from kidney malfunction and must escape from prison to find a cure. In spite of this success, John Spain in the Irish Independent
commented that Deasy was still not very well known in Ireland at this time. He also wrote films and had a co-credit on Miramax's Prozac Nation
, featuring Christina Ricci
, Jessica Lange
and Lou Reed
. Deasy was working on Gaza, a BBC Films
drama due to begin filming in October 2009, at the time of his death. One year before his death, Gaza featured on the "Brit List", which features the most deserving unproduced screenplays in Ireland and the United Kingdom. He was also supposed to be writing an eight-part BBC drama series about the House of Medici. He was also due to follow a family over a century for RTÉ.
four years before his death. He underwent surgery to remove the tumour but it was found to have returned in January 2009.
Days before his death from the disease, Deasy began discussing his condition in public forums. On his final Sunday, The Observer
featured an article detailing his suffering and using it to request more organ donors. Deasy said: "I am only one of thousands of patients on organ transplant
lists in Britain
, living on our own, invisible, death row". Actor Dougray Scott
, who starred in Deasy's drama Father & Son, supported him in The Observer. Deasy's words were echoed in The Observers editorial which called for an enforcement of presumed consent.
The following day, Deasy's story was carried by The Scotsman
newspaper. Later that day, he appeared on Joe Duffy
's Liveline
programme on RTÉ Radio 1
appealing for more organ donors and insisting that it was a "very urgent matter". On the day his death was reported it was confirmed that a record of at least 5,500 people had applied to become holders of organ donor cards since the interview, 2,000 immediately afterwards and a further 3,500 the following day. By comparison, a similar request on The Late Late Show
in 2007 yielded only 1,000 more donor applicants. The Evening Herald
carried Deasy's story on 16 September, one day before his death in The Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. The figures had risen to 10,000 one day after Deasy's death, three times the amount usually received during an annual appeal.
His blood group
(B) is that which makes up 10% of people, meaning he could only have received a transplant from such a group. Deasy resided in Scotland
at the time of his death in hospital. He was survived by his wife, Marie and their three children. A seminar on organ donation inspired by Deasy took place in Dublin seven weeks to the day after his death.
, said he was a "wonderful, funny, tough and clever man". RTÉ Television's Commissioning Editor for Drama, Jane Gogan, said Deasy "brought a tremendous honesty and passionate intensity to his work" who "will be a big loss as a friend and inspiration to those he worked with but, more importantly, as a husband and father his loss will be incalculable". Actor Dougray Scott called Deasy "quite simply the most extraordinary and brilliant writer I have ever worked with and one of the most extraordinary and beautiful men I was blessed to have met" and said: "Today a great, great man was taken away from us. Very few times in life is one fortunate and blessed enough to meet a person like Frank Deasy. [...] Whenever I spent time or talked with Frank I always felt the warmth, wisdom and sheer joy of life that I remember getting from my own father. That's how special he was to me. He had everything I admire in a human being. Protective, caring and loving to his very special wife and children. And brave. So brave. Frank Deasy will be with me always". In its editorial on 18 September 2009, the Evening Herald said Deasy "gave hope to thousands".
Irish people
The Irish people are an ethnic group who originate in Ireland, an island in northwestern Europe. Ireland has been populated for around 9,000 years , with the Irish people's earliest ancestors recorded having legends of being descended from groups such as the Nemedians, Fomorians, Fir Bolg, Tuatha...
screenwriter. He won an Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
for the television series Prime Suspect and was also nominated for his works, Looking After Jo Jo
Looking After Jo Jo
Looking After Jo Jo is a 1998 BBC Scotland television drama starring Robert Carlyle as a petty thief turned drug dealer in Edinburgh in the 1980s. It is set in and around the North Sighthill housing estate....
and The Grass Arena. His other works included the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
/HBO mini-series
Miniseries
A miniseries , in a serial storytelling medium, is a television show production which tells a story in a limited number of episodes. The exact number is open to interpretation; however, they are usually limited to fewer than a whole season. The term "miniseries" is generally a North American term...
, The Passion
The Passion (TV serial)
The Passion is a television drama serial produced by the BBC and HBO Films in association with Deep Indigo Productions. It tells the story of the last week in the life of Jesus. The serial was first proposed by Peter Fincham in 2006, on the success of the contemporary-set Manchester Passion...
.
Preceding his death from liver cancer
Liver cancer
Liver tumors or hepatic tumors are tumors or growths on or in the liver . Several distinct types of tumors can develop in the liver because the liver is made up of various cell types. These growths can be benign or malignant...
on 17 September 2009, Deasy spoke in public about his condition. An appearance on RTÉ Radio 1
RTÉ Radio 1
RTÉ Radio 1 is the principal radio channel of Irish public-service broadcaster Raidió Teilifís Éireann and is the direct descendant of Dublin radio station 2RN, which began broadcasting on a regular basis on 1 January 1926...
's Liveline
LiveLine
Liveline is an Irish radio interview and phone-in chat show broadcast on RTÉ Radio 1 each weekday afternoon between 13.45 and 15.00. The programme, which is currently presented by Joe Duffy and known for its slogan "Talk to Joe", seeks the public's opinion on various questions, normally one or more...
led to a record increase in organ donor
Organ donation
Organ donation is the donation of biological tissue or an organ of the human body, from a living or dead person to a living recipient in need of a transplantation. Transplantable organs and tissues are removed in a surgical procedure following a determination, based on the donor's medical and...
card requests in Ireland.
Life and career
Deasy was a native of Artane, DublinArtane, Dublin
Artane, sometimes spelled Artaine , historically Tartaine is a Northside suburb of Dublin, Ireland. Neighbouring districts include Coolock, Beaumont, Killester, Raheny and Clontarf; to the south is a small locality, Harmonstown, straddling the Raheny-Artane border.-History:Artaine, now usually...
. He initially worked as a child carer with Ireland's Eastern Health Board. He relocated to Glasgow, Scotland, where he died in 2009, having "liked it so much he never came home".
His career credits include Prime Suspect and The Passion
The Passion (TV serial)
The Passion is a television drama serial produced by the BBC and HBO Films in association with Deep Indigo Productions. It tells the story of the last week in the life of Jesus. The serial was first proposed by Peter Fincham in 2006, on the success of the contemporary-set Manchester Passion...
. James Walton of The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
described The Passion as "exactly the kind of intelligent and engaging drama you'd expect from a series written by Frank Deasy". For RTÉ he wrote Father & Son
Father & Son (TV serial)
Father & Son is a four-part television crime thriller produced by Left Bank Pictures and Octagon Films for the British ITV network and the Irish broadcaster RTÉ. Written by Frank Deasy, the serial depicts the return of Michael O'Connor to his native Ireland, after spending several years imprisoned...
, which achieved 26% and 27% audience shares for its first two episodes broadcast on RTÉ One
RTÉ One
RTÉ One is the flagship television channel of Raidió Teilifís Éireann , and it is the most popular and most watched television channel in Ireland. It was launched as Telefís Éireann on 31 December 1961, it was renamed RTÉ Television in 1966, and it was renamed as RTÉ One upon the launch of RTÉ...
in 2009 and was consistently within Ireland's Top Ten television programmes throughout its run. Father & Son features a character, Barrington Smith, who suffers from kidney malfunction and must escape from prison to find a cure. In spite of this success, John Spain in the Irish Independent
Irish Independent
The Irish Independent is Ireland's largest-selling daily newspaper that is published in both compact and broadsheet formats. It is the flagship publication of Independent News & Media.-History:...
commented that Deasy was still not very well known in Ireland at this time. He also wrote films and had a co-credit on Miramax's Prozac Nation
Prozac Nation (film)
Prozac Nation is a 2001 American drama film directed by Erik Skjoldbjærg, starring Christina Ricci, Jason Biggs and Anne Heche. . It is based on an autobiography of the same name by Elizabeth Wurtzel, which describes Wurtzel's experiences with major depression...
, featuring Christina Ricci
Christina Ricci
Christina Ricci is an American actress. Ricci received initial recognition and praise as a child star for her performance as Wednesday Addams in The Addams Family and Addams Family Values , and her role as Kat Harvey in Casper...
, Jessica Lange
Jessica Lange
Jessica Phyllis Lange is an American actress who has worked in film, theatre and television. The recipient of several awards, including two Academy Awards, four Golden Globes and one Emmy, Lange is regarded as one of the première female actors of her generation.Lange was discovered by producer...
and Lou Reed
Lou Reed
Lewis Allan "Lou" Reed is an American rock musician, songwriter, and photographer. He is best known as guitarist, vocalist, and principal songwriter of The Velvet Underground, and for his successful solo career, which has spanned several decades...
. Deasy was working on Gaza, a BBC Films
BBC Films
BBC Films is the feature film-making arm of the BBC. It has produced or co-produced some of the most successful British films of recent years, including An Education, StreetDance 3D, Fish Tank, Stage Beauty, A Cock and Bull Story, Nativity! and Match Point.It aims to make strong British films with...
drama due to begin filming in October 2009, at the time of his death. One year before his death, Gaza featured on the "Brit List", which features the most deserving unproduced screenplays in Ireland and the United Kingdom. He was also supposed to be writing an eight-part BBC drama series about the House of Medici. He was also due to follow a family over a century for RTÉ.
Health
Deasy was first diagnosed with liver cancerLiver cancer
Liver tumors or hepatic tumors are tumors or growths on or in the liver . Several distinct types of tumors can develop in the liver because the liver is made up of various cell types. These growths can be benign or malignant...
four years before his death. He underwent surgery to remove the tumour but it was found to have returned in January 2009.
Days before his death from the disease, Deasy began discussing his condition in public forums. On his final Sunday, The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
featured an article detailing his suffering and using it to request more organ donors. Deasy said: "I am only one of thousands of patients on organ transplant
Organ transplant
Organ transplantation is the moving of an organ from one body to another or from a donor site on the patient's own body, for the purpose of replacing the recipient's damaged or absent organ. The emerging field of regenerative medicine is allowing scientists and engineers to create organs to be...
lists in Britain
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, living on our own, invisible, death row". Actor Dougray Scott
Dougray Scott
-Early life:The son of Elma, a nurse, and Alan Scott, an actor and salesperson, Stephen Dougray Scott was born in Glenrothes, Fife and attended Auchmuty High School...
, who starred in Deasy's drama Father & Son, supported him in The Observer. Deasy's words were echoed in The Observers editorial which called for an enforcement of presumed consent.
The following day, Deasy's story was carried by The Scotsman
The Scotsman
The Scotsman is a British newspaper, published in Edinburgh.As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 38,423, down from about 100,000 in the 1980s....
newspaper. Later that day, he appeared on Joe Duffy
Joe Duffy
Joseph "Joe" Duffy is an Irish broadcaster employed by Raidió Teilifís Éireann . A Jacob's Award winner, he is the current presenter of Liveline, which is broadcast on RTÉ Radio 1, Monday - Fridays between 13:45 and 15:00.Duffy has a history as a student activist; he was President of the Union of...
's Liveline
LiveLine
Liveline is an Irish radio interview and phone-in chat show broadcast on RTÉ Radio 1 each weekday afternoon between 13.45 and 15.00. The programme, which is currently presented by Joe Duffy and known for its slogan "Talk to Joe", seeks the public's opinion on various questions, normally one or more...
programme on RTÉ Radio 1
RTÉ Radio 1
RTÉ Radio 1 is the principal radio channel of Irish public-service broadcaster Raidió Teilifís Éireann and is the direct descendant of Dublin radio station 2RN, which began broadcasting on a regular basis on 1 January 1926...
appealing for more organ donors and insisting that it was a "very urgent matter". On the day his death was reported it was confirmed that a record of at least 5,500 people had applied to become holders of organ donor cards since the interview, 2,000 immediately afterwards and a further 3,500 the following day. By comparison, a similar request on The Late Late Show
The Late Late Show
The Late Late Show, sometimes referred to as The Late Late, or in some cases by the acronym LLS, is the world's longest-running chat show by the same broadcaster and the official flagship television programme of Irish broadcasting company RTÉ...
in 2007 yielded only 1,000 more donor applicants. The Evening Herald
Evening Herald
The Evening Herald is a mid-market tabloid evening newspaper published in Dublin, Ireland by Independent News & Media. It is published Monday-Saturday, and has three editions — City Edition, City Final Edition and National Edition...
carried Deasy's story on 16 September, one day before his death in The Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. The figures had risen to 10,000 one day after Deasy's death, three times the amount usually received during an annual appeal.
His blood group
Blood type
A blood type is a classification of blood based on the presence or absence of inherited antigenic substances on the surface of red blood cells . These antigens may be proteins, carbohydrates, glycoproteins, or glycolipids, depending on the blood group system...
(B) is that which makes up 10% of people, meaning he could only have received a transplant from such a group. Deasy resided in Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
at the time of his death in hospital. He was survived by his wife, Marie and their three children. A seminar on organ donation inspired by Deasy took place in Dublin seven weeks to the day after his death.
Tributes
Mark Murphy, CEO of the Irish Kidney Association, praised Deasy's "selflessness" during his final days alive. Anthony Jones, Deasy's literary agentLiterary agent
A literary agent is an agent who represents writers and their written works to publishers, theatrical producers and film producers and assists in the sale and deal negotiation of the same. Literary agents most often represent novelists, screenwriters and major non-fiction writers...
, said he was a "wonderful, funny, tough and clever man". RTÉ Television's Commissioning Editor for Drama, Jane Gogan, said Deasy "brought a tremendous honesty and passionate intensity to his work" who "will be a big loss as a friend and inspiration to those he worked with but, more importantly, as a husband and father his loss will be incalculable". Actor Dougray Scott called Deasy "quite simply the most extraordinary and brilliant writer I have ever worked with and one of the most extraordinary and beautiful men I was blessed to have met" and said: "Today a great, great man was taken away from us. Very few times in life is one fortunate and blessed enough to meet a person like Frank Deasy. [...] Whenever I spent time or talked with Frank I always felt the warmth, wisdom and sheer joy of life that I remember getting from my own father. That's how special he was to me. He had everything I admire in a human being. Protective, caring and loving to his very special wife and children. And brave. So brave. Frank Deasy will be with me always". In its editorial on 18 September 2009, the Evening Herald said Deasy "gave hope to thousands".
Awards and nominations
| Year | Award | Category | Work | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1993 | British Academy Television Award British Academy Television Awards The British Academy Television Awards are presented in an annual award show hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts . They have been awarded annually since 1954, and are analogous to the Emmy Awards in the United States.-Background:... |
Best Single Drama | The Grass Arena | |
| 1999 | RTS Programme Award Royal Television Society The Royal Television Society is a British-based educational charity for the discussion, and analysis of television in all its forms, past, present and future. It is the oldest television society in the world... |
Best Writer | Looking After Jo Jo | |
| 2007 | British Academy Television Award | Best Drama Serial | Prime Suspect: The Final Act | |
| Best Writer | Prime Suspect: The Final Act | |||
| Primetime Emmy Award Primetime Emmy Award The Primetime Emmy Awards are awards presented by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in recognition of excellence in American primetime television programming... |
Outstanding Writing for a Miniseries, Movie or a Dramatic Special Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Miniseries, Movie or a Dramatic Special This is a list of the winners of the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Miniseries, Movie or Dramatic Special.- Award winners:1970s*1979: The Jericho Mile – Michael Mann, Patrick Nolan1980s... |
Prime Suspect: The Final Act | ||
| 2009 | ZeBBie Award | Best Television Script | Father & Son Father & Son (TV serial) Father & Son is a four-part television crime thriller produced by Left Bank Pictures and Octagon Films for the British ITV network and the Irish broadcaster RTÉ. Written by Frank Deasy, the serial depicts the return of Michael O'Connor to his native Ireland, after spending several years imprisoned... (Episode 1) |
|
| 2010 | Irish Film & Television Award | Script (Television) | Father & Son Father & Son (TV serial) Father & Son is a four-part television crime thriller produced by Left Bank Pictures and Octagon Films for the British ITV network and the Irish broadcaster RTÉ. Written by Frank Deasy, the serial depicts the return of Michael O'Connor to his native Ireland, after spending several years imprisoned... |
External links
- Deasy's article in The ObserverThe ObserverThe Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
—13 September 2009 - Deasy podcasts on LivelineLiveLineLiveline is an Irish radio interview and phone-in chat show broadcast on RTÉ Radio 1 each weekday afternoon between 13.45 and 15.00. The programme, which is currently presented by Joe Duffy and known for its slogan "Talk to Joe", seeks the public's opinion on various questions, normally one or more...