The FX Adaptation of ‘Say Nothing’ Is Tremendous—but Just How Accurate Is It?

Each episode of Say Nothing ends with a disclaimer noting that Adams has always denied being a member of the IRA or knowing anything about the 1972 disappearance of Jean McConville, a mother of 10 whom the IRA suspected of being a British informant. As Adams told a Belfast court in 2019: “I categorically deny any involvement in the abduction, killing, and burial of Jean McConville, or indeed any others.” The accusations against Adams came primarily from The Belfast Project, a Boston College oral history project for which Dolours Price, Brendan Hughes, and other former IRA members were interviewed and which was not released until their deaths. However, a judge ruled that the Belfast Project tapes were unreliable and could not be used as evidence against Adams.

Did the Price sisters really rob a bank dressed as nuns?

Improbably enough, this story (which gets translated onscreen into one of the most nail-biting moments of the season) is real, according to Keefe’s book: “One day in the summer of 1972, three fresh-faced nuns walked into the Allied Irish Bank in Belfast. Just as the branch was about to close, the nuns reached under their habits and came out with guns—then proceeded to stick up the place. It was the Price sisters, along with another female volunteer.”