'The thought that I was writing a new performance connected me to a vision of a future the other side of crisis. I understood more deeply than ever how creative expression is a source of sensemaking and of solace'. The Tightrope Walker is a new play from writer and performer Jenny Macdonald, navigating a personal journey through the chaotic and profound territory of illness and recovery.
Ahead of performances at this year's First Fortnight mental health, arts and culture festival, Jenny introduces The Tightrope Walker below.
My first solo performance, Enthroned, premiered in First Fortnight Festival in 2016. Soon after, it was programmed in the New York International Fringe. I returned from New York with good reviews, high confidence and a conviction to tour the world. Six weeks later, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Rather than a global tour, I was given a new journey. I likened it to the precarious step by step balancing act of moving along a tightrope.
This year, I am an older and (I hope!) wiser writer/performer. I am presenting another solo show, The Tightrope Walker, about that experience. Life puts us where we are and one of the gifts of being an artist is that wherever we are, our job is the same. We create from there. Sometimes our most difficult experiences take us to the deepest places and we may emerge with more to share.
In a life suddenly overwhelmed by hospital appointments, performing wasn’t possible for a time. But writing was. I chronicled all the insights, characters, deep connections and intense emotions. I hoped my writings would be a play one day and the thought inspired and sustained me. Writing brought me back to myself; a rehumanising process after long days in hospital. The thought that I was writing a new performance connected me to a vision of a future the other side of crisis. I understood more deeply than ever how creative expression is a source of sensemaking and of solace.
Creativity can help stich the pieces back together.'
A few years later, I started to add to my writings and to give them a theatrical form. I shared them with trusted colleagues to test their value beyond my own process. I searched for a form that didn’t simplify the experience of cancer to reductive images of bold warriors or zen survivors. I wanted to embrace the complexities and the chaos.
Sometimes our most difficult experiences take us to the deepest places and we may emerge with more to share.
I set the play in an imagined hospital waiting room. Various memories from my experience are written on numbered pages scattered across the stage. The show changes each night according to which numbers are called. It is nonlinear and we never hear the whole story. This form mirrors the creative process and the process of illness for me. Time and time again, life tears things apart. Creativity can help stich the pieces back together. On any given night, we will hear about half of the papers on the stage floor. I didn’t want to try to say it all nor was that possible. Creating art allowed me to find meaning, but also to accept the mystery and randomness of illness.
Eight years after diagnosis, I am back in First Fortnight with a piece I couldn’t have written without my earlier plans being interrupted. Sometimes an interruption turns out to be more like a rerouting. An unexpected gift of the new route is my deepened understanding of the value of creativity in mental health, physical health and integrating crisis. Writing was my way of connecting to my humanity in the midst of crisis and disruption. I hope that performing the piece gives the same gift to my audiences as they make sense of journeys of their own.
The Tightrope Walker is at Smock Alley Theatre, Dublin, on Thursday, January 9th, Friday January 10th and Saturday January 11th 2025, as part of this year's First Fortnight Festival - find out more here, and explore the First Fortnight programme here.
