The Good Night Bird Analysis

All it takes to bring a couple together is a homeless man leaping from a condo. At least, that’s all it takes to partially mend Lilly’s and Morgan’s marriage in Colleen Murphy’s The Goodnight Bird; a play that she likes to consider to be a “serious comedy about old love and new courage”. The heart of the story comes from the couple’s reaction when a homeless man, Parker, bursts into their lives and throws their peaceful routine into chaos. While it stirs them from the norm, it also enlightens Lilly as to what she’s missing in her life, and what she desires most in her relationship with Morgan. A connection of family and care can be easily sensed between Lilly and Morgan given how they converse about Morgan’s recent heart attack and Lilly’s nightly sleeping pills. The concern, however, comes off as cold and mandatory rather than genuine affection, highlighting the key issue in their relationship; the exhaustion of the normal. The dysfunction of their marriage comes to light even further as Parker, bleeding from the head, stumbles into their bedroom one night. Parker acts as their relationship’s bandage, holding them together while the duo heal. Parker is a crude, sexual, childish man who states his opinions and

It was a life of dull, downwards spirals. While they endured the fall, Parker embraced the tumble and throws himself willing into a nosedive. His handling of his own woes -- the death of his family -- pushes Lilly to return to her husband and beg for change. She wishes to travel, adopt pets to fill their home’s emptiness, and to experience the nature that they only knew from a potted plant in their bedroom. The role of this broken family was to highlight that it’s never too late to heal, all you need is try, and Parker was the push that allowed them to realize