BrokenCrow is a creative think-tank and production company, founded in 2011 by Ronan FitzGibbon. It is a company powered by an ensemble of skilled practitioners. We collaborate to create work that challenges, engages and entertains audiences. As an ensemble we assist and support one another in the realisation of theatrical projects, so that at any given time we can have between two and four projects in various phases of development. Creative collaboration is at the core of our process. We believe it is enriching to engage with different artistic perspectives and regularly assist artists and projects from outside the group.
Our six members span three cities, Cork, Waterford and Limerick. We enjoy regular contact via online discussions and meet in the different cities throughout the year to develop ideas, plan projects, and create. Several venues have been very generous in accommodating our practice sessions. BrokenCrow are very grateful to The Theatre Development Centre, Garter Lane, The Belltable, Spraoi, A Little Room, FringeLab, Graffiti Theatre and the Everyman for their continued support.
Our first production, Mantle, enjoyed a sell out run in the Granary Theatre in April 2011. Our second production, Madame Chavelle, was staged in October 2012 in Ballyvolane House, Co. Cork. In 2013 we staged Hang Up in Cork’s first Home Festival. This is an original work written by a Cork poet (Adam Wyeth) and developed with the aid of BrokenCrow. We also staged the Irish Premiere of Bug by Tracey Letts in the Half Moon Theatre, followed by Adam Wyeth’s Lifedeath at the SHOW Festival @ TDC. In 2014 we staged Enter Juliet in the Everyman (with the help of the Arts Council) and Prospect House at SHOW. In 2015 we enjoyed a very successful run of The Secret Garden at the Everyman Theatre which went on to be our first national tour. In 2016 we presented a stage adaptation of two short stories by Kevin Barry: Dark Kingdom in the Cork Midsummer Festival. The following year we premiered Levin & Levin by Aideen Wylde at the Everyman before bringing it up to the Project for the Dublin Fringe Festival. Ronan FitzGibbon’s latest play (Blackwater Babble) sold-out a run in the 2018 Cork Midsummer Festival and toured the country in January of 2020.
Since then, we returned to the Cork Midsummer Festival with our second play for young audiences. Miss Happiness and Miss Flower, an adaptation by Deirdre Dwyer of Rumer Goden’s novel along with so many more exciting projects.
BrokenCrow are also the Everyman Theatre’s Artists in Residence, which has given us the opportunity to begin development on SIX new shows!
We love to play, so if you have a project you’d like to discuss with a multidisciplinary group, just drop us a line. We don’t seek any ownership. We just want to help good work.
We are ambitious, hard-working, open to experimentation and game for a laugh.
we are...
George Hanover
George is an award winning actor and has been with BrokenCrow since its inception. She is currently Director of BEAG Early Years Arts Programme and is an early years artist in her own right. She continues to train & work with Tom Kibbe: Techniques on Modern Realist Acting and is developing a collective to harness this work and bring productions to fruition.
Ronan FitzGibbon
Ronan is a stage designer and writer, based in Waterford. Ronan originally trained as a sculptor before moving in to set design. He founded BrokenCrow Theatre Company in 2011. His second play, Mantle was the company’s first full production and sold out its April 2012 run in the Granary Theatre. His third and fourth scripts, Enter Juliet and Prospect House were performed in the Everyman and Theatre Development Centre respectively in 2014. His first script, Madame Chavelle was produced by Theatre Makers in 2010.
Rosie O’Regan
Rosie is an awarded actor with a background in dance and art. She has a passion for poetry and loves to explore cross disciplinary ways of creating and collaborating. She is coached by Tom Kibbe in Techniques of Modern Realist Acting and attends classes at Dance Cork Firkin. Rosie is on the board of ÓBhéal and is a member of Outlaw Studio. Essentially, Rosie likes to make it up as she goes.
Deirdre Dwyer
Deirdre writes, directs and produces theatre, with a special focus on work for children. She also designs sets and costumes for theatre, opera, dance and film. She lives in Waterford, where she was first introduced to theatre and the arts as a teenager, and she went on to study Drama at UCC and Theatre Design in RWCMD, Cardiff. When not working can be often found in the kitchen, the garden or by the sea.
Gavin McEntee
Gavin McEntee is a director, writer, performer, production manager and a graduate of Drama and Theatre studies at UCC. He trained in Physical theatre and Circus Circomedia, Bristol. Gavin’s next gig is as Assistant Director on Ronan Fitzgibbons ”Our Tethered Kin”. Followed by the premiere of his play “Old Man/Little Girl” at Cork Midsummer ‘23. The play examines grief, guilt ,madness and the aftermath of the Mother and Baby Homes.
Aideen Wylde
Aideen is an actor, writer and researcher with a PhD specialism in ethnodrama. Her next play, FOUND, is commissioned by the Arts Council of Ireland. The play is inspired by her personal connection to the province of Newfoundland and her late father Donal Wylde’s documentary work there. Her first solo work, Levin & Levin, premiered in Cork and Dublin in 2017.
Aideen has trained with The Corn Exchange, at The Actor’s Space in Barcelona, and at the Grotowski Institute in Wrocław.
From 2011 to 2015, BrokenCrow consisted of an annually changing Ensemble. The things that we learned and achieved during that time would not have been possible without the commitment and talent of past members. Thanks for playing; Paula McGlinchey, Frank Prendergast, Julie Kelleher, Mary Lou McCarthy, Mark D’Aughton, Damian Punch, Ciaran Ruby, Maria Moynihan, Tadhg Hickey, Chris Schmidt-Martin and Jon Whitty.