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American farce. Michael Parker When Harry Douglas, the new American Ambassador to Great Britain,
tells his family he is going to Scotland to play golf, his wife Lois
and daughter Debbie announce plans of their own. Their newly hired
butler, Perkins, watches stoically as each leaves and secretly returns
for a romantic rendezvous in the empty house. In the wake of a bomb
threat, the Embassy is sealed off - with hilarious results. Billy Roche : Drama 8M 3F Flexible staging Old superstitions survive throughout the world, but nowhere as strongly as among the men who work the fishing boats in the Irish town of Wexford. The shoals of herring have long since left the local waters and the fisherman are now reduced to working in a local mussel packing factory - except one. Eagle remains a true independent, a lone individual clinging to the sea, struggling to keep the old traditions alive in a fast-changing world. Now in his forties, many of the local customs have died out with his generation and the younger men who have followed have become disaffected, having nothing of the spirit which once meant 'belonging'. The last of a dying breed, Eagle proudly holds on to his past despite knowing that he will also soon be forced to have the freedom of the sea for the factory floor. Before he does, however, he decides to revive an old local rite-of-passage ritual for his own son, Issac: a night spent alone on an uninhabited offshore island. It proves to be a gesture which awakens both envy and scorn from the local community, opening up past secrets which have helped to shape the present. "Amphibians leaves no doubt that he [Roche] is one of the finest and most humane dramatists of his generation.' - Daily Telegraph. ISBN: 0 85676 161 3 Amphibious Spangulatos, or Newt on Your Nellie! Farce. Paul Doust Cherry Hellingsworth is fulfilling her Community Service stint by
working at a Village Hall as the Functions Manager. But she's not
terribly good at it. On one evening she manages to to hire out the
hall to the Village Drama Society, the Cricket team, a Singing Telegram
and a Country and Western group called the Southern Fried Chickens.
A frenzied, door-slamming farce, suitable for adults or youth groups.
Comedy Molière; translated into English verse by Richard Wilbur. 9 men, 3 women. Unit Set Jupiter, King of the Gods, has again become enamoured with a mortal
woman, Alcmena, wife of the military general, Amphitryon. During
the general's absence in the field, Jupiter assumes Amphitryon's
form, and is gladly welcomed home and into Àlcmena's bed.
The god Mercury aids in the deception by assuming the role of Amphitryon's
valet, Sosia. The next morning, the real Sosia arrives to tell Alcmena
that her husband will soon return home, but he is thwarted by his
own double (Mercury), who, protecting Jupiter inside the house, berates
and confuses Sosia, beating him up as he forces Sosia to flee. Alcmena
and Jupiter (as Amphitryon) take leave of one another amid eloquent
and passionate speeches befitting young newlyweds. Cleanthis, Alcmena's
maid and Sosia's wife, is envious of such romantic fervour, and reproaches
Mercury (whom she believes to be her husband) for his want of tenderness
toward her. Mercury's mischievous replies contribute to the unhappiness
of Cleanthis' and Sosia's quarrelsome marriage which, in a number
of scenes throughout the play, provides a counterpoint to the behaviour
of their employers. When the real Amphitryon arrives home, his wife
declares she has already welcomed him, and that he has but lately
left her after a night of love. Amphitryon flies into a baffled rage,
denies it all, calls Alcmena a faithless woman and goes off to seek
her brother, a fellow soldier, who can testify that Amphitryon was
with his battalion the night before. Jupiter, perceiving a further
opportunity for human passions, reappears as Amphitryon and convinces
Alcmena he meant no insult in his rash actions. His ornate contrition
and repeated threats of suicide persuade Alcmena to forgive him.
Later the real Amphitryon returns home again, having failed to find
his brother-in-law, and is told by Mercury (as Sosia) that Amphitryon
is at home with his bride. Throughout the remaining action, which
includes a confrontation between the two Amphitryons, the young general
is in a state of vengeful fury. This gives way to stupefaction at
the close, when the impostor gods reveal themselves. Mercury introduces
Jupiter, restores an intact identity, to Sosia, and flies to Heaven.
Jupiter speaks appeasingly to Amphitryon, promises him many future
blessings (among them a son named Hercules), and vanishes in his
turn. Considering the damage that has been done to the marriage of
Amphitryon and Alcmena, the
"happy ending" leaves them with an ironic hope for the future. Comedy Jean Giraudoux, adapted by S.N. Behrman. 6 men, 5 women. Interior; 3 Exteriors (Stylised). The story follows the outlines of the legend of Amphitryon, Alkmena,
and Jupiter, in which Jupiter descends to Earth, impersonates the
General Amphitryon - Alkmena's husband - and makes love to her. Difficulties
arise when the father of the gods is met with stubborn resistance.
For Alkmena is faithful to her husband. Even the greatest god can
win her only after much ungodlike embarrassment and, in desperation,
the unsportsmanlike device of impersonating Amphitryon himself. Amulets Against the Dragon Forces Play Paul Zindel. 9 men, 3 women (of the 9 men several roles can be doubled). Interior The action of the play takes place the in borough of Staten Island
in the mid-50s. Mrs. Boyd, a divorced practical nurse, makes a living
by caring for terminally ill patients, moving from house to house
with her sensitive, lonely, teenage son, Chris. As the play begins
Mrs. Boyd and Chris arrive at the home of Mrs. Dipardi, who is dying
of cancer and whose profane, hard-drinking son, Floyd, has alienated
the neighbourhood by flaunting his fondness for young boys and throwing
noisy backyard parties. Suffocated by his overprotective mother and
rejected by his absent father, Chris strikes up a friendship with
Harold, a young hustler who has moved in with Floyd. But their relationship,
like the others in the play, founders on the pervading bitterness
and alienation which, inevitably, bring on a series of explosive
and emotionally charged confrontations. Eventually Chris, unlike
the others, does find the self-awareness - and courage - to overcome
his circumstances and, as the play ends, the suggestion is strong
that he will, in time, come to terms with the "dragons" which have
beset, and shaped, his troubled youth. Play. David Hare 1979. Esme Allen is a well-known West End actress at just the moment when the West End is ceasing to offer actors a regular way of life. The visit of her daughter, Amy, with a new boyfriend sets in train a series of events which only find their shape sixteen years later. David Hare mixes love, death and the theatre in a heady and original way. Period: 1979, 1995. |