WATCH New documentary to tell the story and journey of Natasha O’Brien and the ‘person behind the headline’

New documentary to tell the story and journey of Natasha O’Brien and the ‘person behind the headline’. Picture: Olena Oleksienko/ilovelimerick

‘Natasha’, a new documentary airing on RTÉ, shares the story of Natasha O’Brien and her journey through trauma, injustice, and resilience

The highly anticipated documentary, ‘Natasha’, will tell the story of Natasha O’Brien and her journey following being thrust into the national spotlight following her courageous act, standing in the face of bigotry, which led to her being savagely beaten in Limerick.

The documentary is set to be more than a film, it will be a portrait of Natasha and offer a glimpse into the events that changed her life following her court case with her attacker, Cathal Crotty, who was given a suspended sentence which led to a public movement demanding justice for Natasha and highlighting changes that people wanted made to Ireland’s prosecuting system.

“ I put myself out there. I spoke up, I stood up to talk about all these issues and to stand up,” Natasha told I Love Limerick, adding, “There’s just so much violence and there are so many injustices in court. And about six weeks after all the media and the headlines, my producers of this documentary got in touch to talk about it and talk about a film project.”

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Explaining her view for the documentary, she said she didn’t want a “true crime, dramatic” story, saying, “ If you want that kind of thing. I’m not your girl. I don’t want to keep going back over the same story and the same trauma. I’ve told my story so many times. There’s only so many times I can tell it, and there’s only so many times people are gonna wanna hear it.

“This documentary is new stuff, there’s a little intro about what happened, and then it is my journey through the appeal, my relationship with my mom – you know that the mother is trying to help their child, and the child goes, ‘no, mom, leave me alone’. And it’s all that and it follows my intimate personal life.”

Natasha believes the documentary is important as it gives an insight to the people who are often forgotten about when a headline is written and read, she said, “I just thought that was so important, because I was out in this public platform and people just saw this, just thrown into the spotlight and people saw this one kind of dimensional,this surface level. We see that all the time. Like when we see victims in headlines, we don’t actually think about the whole person behind that headline.

“So this documentary was me showing the person behind the headline, and it’s about me and my journey and my struggle and the good and the bad, and the ups and the downs, and the days I’m rotting in bed and the days I’m out dancing in the George and all the in between because that’s what a human is.”

In May 2022, Natasha was violently assaulted after intervening to defend a young gay man being harassed, which changed the course of her life. Natasha said, “ I was walking home from work that night and this young gay guy was being harassed and verbally assaulted. I just said, ‘Leave him alone. Please leave him alone.’ Because I’ve been the person who has been bullied my whole life, so now, I never ever want to see anyone be bullied or picked on or harassed because it’s so important, and especially when you go through it and you experience what it’s like when nobody stands up for you. Now I’m the first to stand up for someone else because nobody was there to stand up for me. So that’s why that happened.”

Speaking about some of the negative reactions from people and towards her, Natasha had a simple message: what she is doing is to help people in the future, she said, “ It made me so angry, I am literally trying to help other people. I’m trying to do the right thing. I don’t ever hope to have to go back into that system again, but I know there are people who are going back into that system.

“Standing up for the people that don’t even know what’s ahead of them, and it just reminded me of being that powerless teenager, where people just told me that I wasn’t important, and I was annoying and too opinionated. And so now, being an adult and having gone through all that, I’m like, ‘you’re embarrassing. You’re acting like my 12-year-old bully. I really don’t care about your opinion.’

“I know what I’m doing is right, and I’m proud to be me, and I’m proud to be this outspoken. I’m proud to be this authentic, outspoken girl, yeah, I’m a difficult woman, and I love that. I claim that!

“Yeah, I’m difficult. I get told all the time, ‘you’re so attention seeking. Oh, look at her. She’s looking for attention.’ Yeah, I am looking for attention for a very important reason.”

Natasha’s voice, which was once silenced by her bullies, is now a rallying cry for justice reform. The documentary will be a raw look at her life, including counselling sessions and the courtroom, to moments of joy and vulnerability.

“I thought it was important to invite the  cameras to document my whole journey, to show the reality that we’re up and down and we’re everything in between. And that’s the human experience.

“Even if you’re not a victim in going through something in the justice system, you might have something traumatic happening in your life and be dealing with something, we can’t just expect people to act one way. And all the hate I’ve received, it’s been like, ‘Oh, she’s not a real victim. Look at her.’ Or like, ‘She’s all these things.

“So I’m like. ‘No, I am a real victim.’ A real victim does not look like anything. We’re not what happened to us, we’re not what happens to us.”

The documentary is not just Natasha telling her story; it shows a fight for change as it gives an insight into how Natasha has been working with politicians and legal experts to push for sentencing reforms and judicial training. She said, “ It’s not a political issue. It’s a human issue. Honing in on proposing new sentencing guidelines, and there have been talks about more judicial training. I also open up in the documentary, and I speak with a couple of other victims who have put themselves out there in the media. They share what they would like to see, too.”

In doing so, she’s also redefining feminism and social justice. “Feminism is about giving everyone equal support,” she says. “If you support women but not men with the same energy, you’re not a feminist. Men are affected by gender-based violence too. Trans people are under attack. This fight is for everyone.”

Speaking about the support which others can give, Natasha spoke about feminism, saying, “ I think we have an idea of feminism, but gender-based violence is an epidemic. What we do forget is that 80 percent of homicide victims are male. But they’re affected by gender-based violence because most of their perpetrators are also male.

“So we’re only looking at half the picture because men are affected by gender-based violence too, so that’s the bigger picture. We need more advances in women’s rights, but we also need to remember that there are other people in this story who deserve to be a part of this discussion and conversation.

“Feminism is about giving everyone equal support. If you are a feminist and you are supporting the women who are speaking out. And you are not supporting the men with that same energy. You’re not a feminist. Because that’s not equality. You need to support everyone, women, men, the LGBTQIA community.”

Natasha will be available to watch from Wednesday, June 25 at 9.35 pm on RTÉ One and is available on the RTÉ Player.