Originally produced and broadcast by RTÉ as part of the 1966 commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Easter Rebellion 1916, Insurrection was set in the style of a special TV News report depicting the events of the Rising as they unfolded day-by-day. With a stellar Irish cast including Ray McAnally as the studio presenter and such luminaries of stage and screen as Anna Manahan, Jim Norton, Ronnie Walsh and Kathleen Watkins with legendary Abbey actor Eoin O’Suilleabhain as Padraig Pearse,Insurrection was written by Hugh Leonard and produced and directed by Louis Lentin and Michael Garvey. Insurrection was a hugely ambitious project and was the biggest drama ever undertaken by Telefís Éireann at a time when the television station was still in its infancy having launched only four years previously.