FOUR MOTHERS in theatres Apr 4

Darren Thornton, a filmmaker from Drogheda, is returning to the big screen this April with FOUR MOTHERS, a new Irish comedy opening in cinemas on April 4. Co-written with his brother Colin, the film has already garnered awards at major international film festivals and will screen locally at Omniplex Drogheda and other cinemas nationwide.

The film follows Thornton’s critically acclaimed A DATE FOR MAD MARY, which won Best Film at the IFTA Awards. FOUR MOTHERS tells the story of Edward, a novelist on the brink of fame in the literary world who simultaneously finds himself living at home full time with his elderly mother as she recovers from a stroke that has left her wheelchair bound and unable to speak.

Edward is surrounded by a group of gay friends in similar circumstances, whose closest social outlet is commiserating about their unfulfilled lives with each other in the back pew of the church where they routinely take their mothers to mass.

Edward’s cohort of friends, played by Gearóid Farrelly, Gordon Hickey, and Rory O’Neill (aka Panti Bliss, Ireland’s premiere drag superstar and one of the faces of the country’s successful 2015 marriage equality campaign), upend his weekend by leaving their mothers on his doorstep so they can attend Maspalomas Pride, knowing he will feel obligated to help.

The middle-aged writer is left to care for both his mother (played by LOST alum Fionnula Flanagan) and his friends’ mothers, a group of thoroughly uncompromising matriarchs. The film was directed by Darren Thornton, who also co-wrote it with his brother Colin, who is gay himself.

Speaking about the unique relationship between mothers and their gay sons, Colin noted that the experience of coming out and the healing that follows often creates a bond that differs from the relationship between mothers and their straight sons.

FOUR MOTHERS will be in cinemas across the UK and Ireland starting April 4.