Say Nothing speaks volumes

IN 1972, AT THE BLOODY HEIGHT OF the Troubles, home invaders abducted a widowed mother of 10 named Jean McConville from her Belfast apartment. Her children never saw her alive again.

- JUDY BERMAN

The family spent decades demanding answers from the Irish Republican Army, which was known to have "disappeared" fellow Catholics at the time, as to what had become of McConville and why-a quest that propels Patrick Radden Keefe's acclaimed 2018 book, Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland. Now the best seller has been adapted into an exceptional nine-episode FX miniseries, also titled Say Nothing, that resonates not only as a gripping true-crime drama, but also as an urgently timely work of political art.

While the mystery of McConville's disappearance gives the narrative shape, Keefe (an executive producer) and creator Joshua Zetumer weave several related stories into a profound meditation on radicalism, regret, and the complicated legacy of the Troubles. From a distance, we observe the rise of Gerry Adams, who would become the longtime leader of Irish republican party Sinn Fein. Though an onscreen disclaimer dutifully notes that he has always denied having been an IRA member or participated in its attacks, the show's version of a cutthroat young Gerry (Josh Finan) masterminds bombings and orders the deaths of compromised comrades.