A previously unreleased Sinead O’Connor song was featured in the BBC One drama The Woman in the Wall.
The late Irish singer-songwriter gave the psychological drama permission to use the song The Magdalene and it aired at the end of Sunday’s final episode.
The six-part series looks at a mysterious death after the Magdalene Laundry scandal, which saw women held against their will and forced to give up their children.
O’Connor – who died in July aged 56 – spoke openly about the abuse she faced as a teenager when she spent more than a year at the Magdalene Laundromat.
According to Chrysalis Records, the song’s use was proposed by her producer, Belfast DJ and composer David Holmes, and „approved by Sinead before her death”.
Holmes told the Observer: “The first half of the route is absolutely heartbreaking and the second half is absolutely defiant.
„I stripped the song down to Sinead’s voice and then let the second half come full force.
„It’s incredible how the meaning of the song meshed with this story. It was meant to be. There’s a certain magic when you bring music to an emotional story.
In the BBC series, Tipperary actor Daryl McCormack plays Detective Coleman Agande opposite British actress Ruth Wilson – who plays Lorna Brady.
[ Sinéad O’Connor’s warning about online pile-ons was prophetic in more ways than one ]
The show follows Lorna, who suffers from sleepwalking after being admitted to a Catholic institution while pregnant, as Coleman investigates the death of a priest.
Holmes said: „In the lyrics, Sinead was trying to say, I think, that even though she’s been through a lot of turmoil, it doesn’t stop her from being who she wants to be.
„She never talked about the meaning of her songs. She joked that she would often tell people that her songs were about something completely different than what they were about.
He also said that his „biggest regret” was that O’Connor tore up a picture of Pope John Paul II on Saturday Night Live in 1992 to speak out against sexual and physical abuse in the Catholic Church. Check out the series.
In August, as the late singer’s funeral procession passed her former home in Bray, Co Wicklow, tributes were paid by survivors of Magdalene Laundries and Mother and Child Homes.
Organizers estimated around 100 victims of the Catholic Church traveled to honor the Dublin-born singer – who was found unresponsive by police at her south-east London home on July 26.
His private funeral was attended by political figures including President Michael D Higgins and Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, as well as musicians such as Bono and Bob Geldof.
She was buried in South Dublin Gardens. – B.A