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(Seo alt ónár bhfoireann Gaeltachta. Is féidir an bunleagan as Gaeilge a léamh anseo)

WHEN THE FIRST production of a new musical about life in nursing homes in the Muskerry Gaeltacht was staged at the start of the summer, many people came away saying they were going to call their parents who, as it happens, were living as residents in nursing homes.

In the weeks ahead, An tÉalú by Cumann Léirithe Bhéal Átha’n Ghaorthaidh will be staged at the Town Hall Theatre in Galway and the Opera House in Cork.

With believable characters, humour and original songs, and no shortage of emotion, this work from the pen of Seán Óg Ó Duinnín succeeds in delivering a powerful reminder to audiences not to forget their loved ones in these nursing homes.

Ó Duinnín found the inspiration for this work in his own life.

“I started writing because of a strong independent woman inspired by my mother who passed away in March 2025.

“She was at home, living independently – which was what she wanted – she was still driving, for example.

“She had a very brief illness and was always resolute that she did not want to go into a nursing home, that she did not want to be a burden to anyone.”

He had a number of conversations with people and while he had a seed of a story, he had no structure for it. “Then it struck me that there was a story there about nursing homes and people working in them – there was a story on Prime Time Investigates and I said to myself, that’s my story. She wants to break out of the nursing home.

“She feels her independence has been taken from her, that there is no need for her to be in the nursing home.”

He said he had a very strong view that there was mistreatment going on in some nursing homes when he started writing. “I pulled back from that because it is too black and white and I didn’t want to be casting aspersions on nursing homes – because they are very important as well,” he said.

“Another thing is that I have no personal experience of nursing homes and I wanted to make it somewhat grey.”

While doing research for the play, he found that older people escape from nursing homes because they’re suffering from dementia or they’re lonely or they want to regain a sense of independence as well as other reasons.

The result of his work is a musical with a very strong central character, Síle, living in a nursing home called Lios Álainn. Life isn’t too bad for Síle – there is plenty to do, chair yoga, knitting and so on, and she has friends. But she would still like her old independent life back.

She makes a number of escape attempts, and this causes trouble for the nursing home staff who complain to her daughter. “She has a song that she sings, Tá Mo Shaol Lán (My Life is Full), and that is the story for many people – they are working, they have children, they have responsibilities and there is no space in their large houses or in their lives for the parent who is now in a nursing home,” he said.

There is a great deal in this play that will have audiences laughing – they will be singing along with the elderly residents doing chair yoga, they will be rooting for them to manage to escape and they will have some sympathy too for the people caring for them in the nursing homes. They will even have sympathy for the adult children who put their parents into these places.

The writer believes this play will prompt audiences to question the way we should be caring for our elderly. While he is not opposed to nursing homes per se, he raises the question of whether there are ways in which older people could still live independently.

“They have what they call ‘sheltered living’ in England and other countries but it hasn’t arrived here yet,” he said. Sheltered living housing offers a measure of independence for elderly residents, they have their own homes in a community but they also have support for medical conditions and other needs.

Tickets are still available for the production at the Town Hall Theatre in Galway on 29 August. The musical will be staged at the Cork Opera House on Saturday, 26 September.

While the musical is performed in Irish, it is sub-titled throughout and is accompanied by a programme which can be accessed on your phone via a QR code.

The Journal’s Gaeltacht initiative is supported by the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme.

This article was originally written in the reporter’s native Irish and has been translated to English here. AI was used as part of the translation process before final edits. 

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