‘Maddest night of my life’: Walsh

LITTLE DORRIT director Dearbhla Walsh was very glad that her parents got cable when she picked up her Emmy for her direction of the drama series.

The 14-part adaptation of the Charles Dickens novel took home seven trophies, including that of outstanding mini series.

Little Dorrit, regarded as a neglected Charles Dickens work, was aired in Britain last year.

It tells the story of the changing fortunes of the Dorrit family, who emerge from the Marshelsea prison for debtors to discover they are heirs to a fortune.

Dearbhla, who has been directing the final series of The Tudors, tottered up to the stage at Hollywood’s Nokia Theatre, not thinking of her speech at all.

“I’m having the maddest night of my life in Hollywood,” she told RTÉ’s Ryan Tubridy yesterday.

When they called out her name as winner of the title of Outstanding Director, she was sure they had got it wrong. She had not even prepared a speech.

“I was walking very slowly, because I am in the highest heels of my life,” said Dearbhla, who recalled actor Gabriel Byrne catching her hand and saying “well done”.

As she walked to the stage, she had a flashback to when she was a little girl growing up in Tubbercurry, Co Sligo, because the event that was unfolding before seemed so surreal.

And her speech was all about her parents buying cable TV so they could watch the live screening.

“Guys, I am here. I can’t believe it,” she told her parents as she waved her trophy at the camera.

Dearbhla described herself as someone who was always catching up on herself and trying to be better at what she did.

She was overawed when offered the job of directing Little Dorrit and was disappointed when it got “a bit overlooked” at the BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Awards).

“By the time it came out in America the Lehman Brothers crash had happened and Little Dorrit is all about money and finance. That is the background but there is a very engaging love story at the front of it,” she said.