Awards season is nearly over but one of the films emerging as a favourite in the lead-up to the Oscars is Spotlight.

From director and co-writer Tom McCarthy (who previously made the acclaimed likes of The Station Agent and The Visitor), Spotlight is based on the true story of a group of Boston Globe reporters who exposed a global cover-up by the Catholic Church of child abuse perpetrated by more than 70 local priests.

This evening, director Tom McCarthy, who has been nominated in the director category for the film, will speak to Phillip Molloy on the Picture Show about how he ended up working on the film and how he difficult it was to finance it.

However, McCarthy admits that he nearly couldn’t complete the project due to funding issues: “It’s getting more and more difficult with each passing year to make movies like this. When they don’t fit in a specific genre or type, studios are really becoming in many ways less and less risk adverse.

“We had a really committed cast who none of them were making the money they should.”

In terms of the Catholic Church, they didn’t really have a lot of involvement: “These are matters they really don’t like to talk about, they’re pretty unapproachable when it comes to things like this.

“Keep in mind, we were focusing on the investigation and at that time specifically, there was no side of their story.”

He also discussed the fact that he specifically wanted to bring this film to Ireland: “Knowing the pretty seismic change that’s occurred here between the Irish people and the relationship to the Catholic Church, I was really, as a storyteller, excited to bring this here and see how audiences connect with it.

“It’s certainly not lost on any of us the parallels and the connection between Boston and Ireland.”

You can listen to his full interview here: