CRUISE on Wikipedia for the striking life story and achievements of Lady Mary Heath. Better still, stalk this Irish aviator/ Olympian / Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society on www.herstory.ie, the platform profiling Irish women who should be acclaimed by the world – and are not.
Bear in mind that Lady Heath was the first female commercial pilot, and a supreme stunt woman. So, what’s the fuss over her about, coming on a century later?
‘I See You’ is a new play written by Amy de Bhrún of LadyBud Productions that is inspired by this buried life. de Bhrún’s prompt to action was mindful that the 20th and 21st centuries each have bearing, this play’s theatricality is the aristocratic Lady Mary instilling courage through attic walls into Mary. This Mary is an unhappy woman living in contemporary times.
Cast as the good Lady in the show, de Bhrún makes her point. “Look at what this woman of 100 years ago was doing, all these things and we don’t seem to have moved on at all. Lady Mary is stuck in the walls of history.”
Thus she embeds the character “in her attic, her space, her time. She is trying to communicate to Mary [21st century] through a chink of light in the wall, writing poetry and sending it through the crack in the wall.”
The sepia-toned stage is flittered by paper aeroplanes on which her encouraging wishes are written.
“[Contemporary] Mary is stuck in an abusive relationship. She’s a woman in her late 20s, early 30s who has got pregnant by an older man. Her experience is that she has been quite controlled by him.”
The playwright describes the vigilant Lady Mary as quirky and funny. “There’s a lightness to her communication through spoken word poetry…. there are moments of humour and lightness and these are fully formed characters.” Their bookended lives opened out before us, silently begging questions as to the status quo of women 100 years on.
‘I See You’ comes to Belltable this Friday 26 for 8pm.
