TV producer nominated for a Bafta Cymru award
A TELEVISION producer from Llansteffan has been nominated for a Bafta Cymru award.
Tim Lyn has been nominated in the factual category of the awards which will announce the winners next month.
His documentary was screened earlier this year on S4C and follows care worker Eirlys Smith, who has Alzheimer’s Disease, tracking down her old school pal Tim Lyn - now a TV director - to make a touching documentary programme to prove there is life after dementia.
Mother-of-three and grandmother-of-five Eirlys Smith, from Menai Bridge, on Anglesey, lost touch with Tim who now lives in Llansteffan, nearly 50 years ago - but she found him again on Facebook.
The result was a “hugely emotional and often hilarious rollercoaster of a programme”, Eirlys, Dementia a Tim (Eirlys, Dementia and Tim), made by Caernarfon-based
production
Cwmni Da.
Eirlys was diagnosed with early onset dementia just before Christmas in 2018 and she made contact with Tim in January last year. He had gone on to become an actor and an award-winning director who has made some of the most popular and acclaimed dramas on S4C.
The message she wrote to Tim via Facebook in January last year was blunt and to the point.
Tongue in cheek, television company she asked him whether he wanted to follow her journey with dementia until she became “doolally”.
At first, according to Tim, he struggled to remember Eirlys, but the request particularly resonated with him because his own father, David Lyn, one of Wales’s most eminent actors and directors who passed away aged 85 in 2012, had also been diagnosed with early onset dementia.
The documentary highlights the challenges Eirlys faces day-to-day and how she is overcoming them.
Making the programme was an emotional experience for Tim because it brought back memories of his father whose career meant the family lived a nomadic life based wherever he was working.
Tim said: “My father was in a similar situation, and we buried him, and it broke up our family totally because he was the one person who kept us all together. I think Eirlys is the rock in her family.
“I was very close to my dad growing up and I went on to work with him so it was very tough when he got diagnosed with early onset dementia because he changed and became very difficult. My family is still suffering because of my father’s illness.
“When Eirlys got touch on Facebook in we hadn’t spoken for around 50 years.
“She was very anxious before filming, but she became a different person during it.
“I think filming the documentary was an empowering experience for her.”
Tim is also nominated for a Bafta in the children’s category for his work on S4C Deian a Loli, a series about mischievous twins who have secret magical powers.