Much new, some old and some well-worn programmes make up RTÉ's autumn television schedule, announced yesterday.
It includes The Clinic, Ireland's answer to ER, the mega-hit US medical drama. Set in a "multi-discipline" Dublin clinic, the series aims to "set pulses racing".
It is the only new drama series in the autumn line-up but Bachelors Walk returns, while Fair City keeps up its four episodes a week output. The Holy Cross school controversy in north Belfast forms the basis of a docu-drama in a co-production with the BBC.
Reruns include the late James Plunkett's epic drama Strumpet City, based on the 1913 lock-out and first broadcast in 1980. It returns in a digitalised and re-mastered version.
ER itself returns for its 10th series, while the international drama contribution to programming include favourites such as The West Wing, Eastenders, Law and Order and Boomtown (about LA life).
Film highlights include cinema blockbusters from 2000 and 2001, such as Gladiator, Cast Away, Remember The Titans, Meet the Parents and Chocolat, while the Ireland on Screen series includes network premieres and reruns of Irish films like Accelerator, How to Cheat in the Leaving Cert, Ordinary Decent Criminal, The Butcher Boy and Michael Collins.
RTÉ is putting a particular emphasis on young people's programmes, including a new Saturday morning show with presenters in Cork and Dublin and a style that will be "unpredictable, cheeky and fast-paced".
In home entertainment, the hugely popular You're a Star series, with its emphasis on the singer not the song, returns to the screens in the search for Ireland's next Eurovision representative.
Devoted couples can test their love and fancy their chances to win a house in an elimination contest House of Love, whose entry rules include that the couple must be engaged.
RTÉ will do battle for Friday night audiences with its 42nd series of the Late Late Show, presented as usual by Pat Kenny. Seachtain, a new weekly bilingual regional news programme, will be aired on Sundays at 5.30 p.m.
The bicentenary of Robert Emmet's execution is marked with a biographical documentary, while Guns & Chiffon is the title of a documentary on women rebel prisoners in Kilmainham Gaol.
RTÉ's managing director, Mr Cathal Goan, said viewers would see "proof of determination to carry through on our commitments to expand and enhance our programme output in every area".
