Death and Nightingales
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Death and Nightingales
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A Lot or a Little?
The parents' guide to what's in this TV show.
What Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that Death and Nightingales is a period drama set in Ireland in the 1880s about a young woman and her abusive stepfather. The three-part miniseries is adapted from a 1992 novel by Eugene McCabe. Death and Nightingales includes plot points about incest and abuse, and characters discuss murder and other violence. Characters are seen naked in bed after sex, but no nudity is explicitly shown. One major character is repeatedly seen inebriated and describes blacking out while drunk. The violence, incest, sex, and alcohol use are all used to explore themes of morality.
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What's the Story?
Death and Nightingales takes place within a 24-hour period when Beth Winters (Ann Skelly) will make choices that change her life forever. Beth lives with her abusive stepfather, Billy Winters (Matthew Rhys), and spends most of her days working around the house and tending to the land while Billy goes out and drinks. When she meets the charming Liam Ward (Jamie Dornan), who she's overheard some townspeople describe as "evil," he convinces her to escape from Billy's control forever.
Is It Any Good?
Unlike literary adaptations that struggle to bring the complexities of a novel to the screen, this feels almost staggeringly simple. Things that may have worked in the novel Death and Nightingales feel like melodrama or cliché here. The movie is filmed beautifully, especially in any scene involving the water, but it can't overcome a skeletal plot. When so little happens, every event takes on outsized significance; the thin plot and broad characterizations in Death and Nightingales can't bear that weight.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about where the concepts of "good" and "evil" show up in Death and Nightingales? Who is described as evil? Why? Is it a fair description? Why or why not?
What else is important about the setting of Death and Nightingales? How does religion play into the story? How do Ireland's politics fit in?
Explore the realities of farm life. What is Beth's day-to-day life like? What is her relationship with the animals like? With the land? How do her relationships with the land and with people contrast one another?
TV Details
- Premiere date: May 16, 2021
- Cast: Ann Skelly, Matthew Rhys, Jamie Dornan
- Network: Starz
- Genre: Drama
- TV rating: TV-MA
- Last updated: February 28, 2022
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