Matt Damon first heard about Small Things Like These, the latest effort from his and Ben Affleck’s Artists Equity, while filming Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, working opposite Cillian Murphy. Murphy, who is also a producer on the project, leads the period drama, which is adapted from the novel of the same name, set out in a small Irish town in 1985 in the weeks before Christmas. He plays Bill Furlong, a coal merchant and family man who becomes aware of abuse happening at the local convent, abuse that forces him to confront the trauma of his own childhood and make a moral choice. The backdrop is the real history of the Magdalene Laundries, asylums and workhouses run by the Catholic Church in Ireland purportedly for the purpose of employing and educating “fallen women.” Small Things Like These also stars Emily Watson, who plays the head of the Laundry, Sister Mary. The film will be directed by Tim Mielants who also worked with Murphy on popular series Peaky Blinders.