Corn Mill Theatre Company: ‘On Broken Wings’

The play opens with an old masked figure, Timothy Lavell, seated by the hearth of a cottage on the Mullet Peninsula. The fireplace opens and in stride his parents and his younger self. This unorthodox and highly innovative visual imagery sets the scene for the rest of the play as we follow Timothy on his journey through life picking spuds in Scotland, building walls with his father and working as an elevator man in America where he falls in love with Rosie. He encounters many races and creeds. His experiences, hallucinations and fears are explored with the use of masks, puppets, screens, music and dance. The play ends as it begins with Timothy sitting by the hearth in the cottage where he was born. ‘On Broken Wings’, like all of Healys’ plays, is highly stylized and demonstrates his unique and singular voice and distinctive way of seeing and saying in language that ranges from the profound and poetic to the abstract and obscure. The story is a simple one told with humour, pathos and an element of fatalism but the themes are universal and again as with all of Dermot’s work, possesses a strong sense of social conscience and are as relevant today as they have ever been.