Drama

• “This isn’t a prison,” a nun in the new BBC drama The Woman in the Wall says.
• Established in the 18th century, the laundries catered for so-called “fallen women” who had engaged in sex work or had a child outside of wedlock.
• Laundries were just one of many mechanisms by which the Catholic Church and the Irish state regulated behaviour that was perceived as deviant.
• The Magdalene Oral History Project and Waterford Memories Project address not only what it meant to experience these institutions, but also “what it meant to survive the laundries”.

Dramatising the laundries

• The state’s initial response to the laundries was to claim that they were private institutions and the state was not involved.
• An interdepartmental committee was established and its 2013 report found “evidence of direct state involvement” in the laundries.
• A formal state apology was offered in February 2013 by taoiseach Enda Kenny, who described the laundries as the “nation’s shame”.
• A redress scheme was established with women given ex gratia payments based on how long they were in the laundries.

Other depictions of the laundries

• Films such as The Magdalene Sisters (2002) and Philomena (2013) have also explored this powerful subject matter.
• References are made to a banshee (a female spirit in Irish folklore whose wailing foretold impending death).
• The Woman in the Wall exposes the horrors of the Magdalene Laundries and in doing so seeks to ensure that such horrors will not be repeated in the future.

• In February, a video of Thai taxi drivers watching Chinese TV series The Knockout went viral on social media, another vivid display of the rising popularity of Chinese TV series in the Southeast Asia market.
• Zhang Liang, general manager of Artop International Co, told the Global Times that people in China and Southeast Asian countries share same or similar culture, tradition and custom, which is a precondition for Chinese TV series to be easily accepted and promoted in Southeast Asian countries.
• The transmission of TV dramas is an essential way for Chinese and Southeast Asian people to understand each other, Komin said.
• Artop is making tentative attempts in localizing Chinese TV series in Thai market, which involves purchasing popular Chinese TV series' intellectual property rights and remaking them with Thai actors and directors.

• The 94 awardees represent 47% of the 200 most popular scripted series, which is equivalent to the 2021-22 season results.
• For the second consecutive year, the majority of Emmy Nominees for Outstanding Comedy Series received the Stamp.
• IMDbPro rankings are based on the actual page views of the more than 200 million monthly visitors to IMDb worldwide.
• ReFrame encourages all scripted productions to implement equitable hiring practices and apply to earn the ReFrame Stamp year-round.

• To implement the IBM watsonx powered AI Commentary, experts from IBM iX, the experience design partner within IBM Consulting, worked with the USTA to leverage foundation models within watsonx to build and train AI models in the unique language of tennis.
• Each player will receive an IBM AI Draw Analysis at the start of the tournament, which will be updated daily as the tournament progresses and players are eliminated.
• The watsonx powered AI Commentary and AI Draw Analysis join an already expansive suite of digital fan features including the IBM Power Index, Match Insights, and Likelihood to Win.
• To see IBMs technology in action, including generative AI Commentary and the daily updated IBM Draw Analysis, visit USOpen.org or on your mobile device via the US Open app, available in the Apple and Android app stores.