 |
|
Play. John Wilson | M 13. A barn/court-martial room. Hamp crawls out of a shell-hole at Passchendale and walks away from
the battle. He is court-martialled for desertion in the face of the
enemy. Many people try to make him realise that the court could insist
on the maximum penalty. Obtusely, Hamp has utter faith in his counsel's
power of words and believes that everybody is too busy with the war
to trouble about his insignificant crime. But it is decreed: Hamp
has to meet a death as unceremonious as the Army can make it. Period
1917 The Hamster Wheel (in The Crack in the Emerald) Marie Jones : 2m 3f Drama. Single interior set. When one partner in a marriage becomes unable to look after themselves and is completely dependent on the other, what happens to the relationship between them? This play covers an issue which is seldom talked about and creates 'a powerful, wholly theatrical experience' Irish Times. ISBN1854592378 Play. Richard Everett M5 (20s, late 40s, 50s) F2 (40s). A patio and living-room. Angus, returning home to convalesce after a serious heart attack
brought on by City job stress, fords a less than peaceful household.
Sid and Gary, archetypal British workmen, are endeavouring to finish
a kitchen extension; son Philip conducts a 24-hour shares dealership,
and inept brother Roger and his long-suffering wife, Gwen, bring
their never-ending financial problems round. Comedy. Jonathan Troy. 4 men, 6 women. Interior. Marion and Meg Bradford, two ex-actresses, have made their Hollywood
boarding house a second home for the aspiring performers who live
with them. The mortgage is invariably behind and the menus could
stand improvement, but the two sisters offer their guests a sincerity
of interest and compassion rare in the movie capital. Marion writes
plays and Meg watches TV, but they both share the ups and downs of
their boarders, a varied and intriguing group, to say the least.
Into this lively setting comes Laura Williams, a lovely young actress
glowing with talent and determination. A romantic triangle forms,
Marion sells a play to a movie producer, and then tragedy strikes
when Laura is injured in an automobile accident. But in the end all
is set right, and everyone finds his or her "rainbow,"
and the "pot of gold" which awaits. Play. Mark Medof. 4 men, 5 women. Unit Set The place is a university resident theatre in the southwest, where
a brilliant but unstable former faculty member, Howard Bellman, has
returned to direct a new play after a stay in a drug and alcohol
rehabilitation centre. The play, a first effort by a talented deaf
writer named Madera Yerby, purports to be about a woman who shot
her alcoholic husband because he beat her - but the intuitive, probing
director quickly senses that Marieta has withheld a key element in
her story, an element which could change the work from a "little
revenge piece" into a "big play about domestic violence." Despite
her resistance, Bellman sets out to extract the truth from Marieta,
a process in which his relentless, bullying tactics soon threaten
both his own position and the future of the project itself. But,
as the pressure mounts, the unique nature of the collaborative process
is brilliantly underscored and when Madera eventually confesses that
the real story is of her rape by her drunken father, the resulting
emotional catharsis both chastens the participants and frees them
to find new levels of artistic expression. In the end the truth becomes
the play - or vice versa - and those involved, in delving ever more
deeply and unsparingly into the meaning of their shared enterprise,
must also, for better or worse, come to confront the truth about
themselves as well. Play: William Gibson : 1 man, 1 woman. Bare Stage. The first of many confrontations between Molly Egan, a feisty, salty-tongued
activist nun in her early 70s and District Court Judge Henry Pulaski,
a conservative jurist in his 60s, occurs when she appears in his
courtroom after being arrested for picketing a local arms research
laboratory. Molly is a tough survivor who refuses to accept the notion
that her destiny and that of the civilized world is something over
which she has no control; Henry is a man devoted to logic and the
law, who believes that vigils and protests are counter-productive.
But as Molly is hauled back into his court again and again. Henry
begins to develop a grudging respect for her courage and spirit,
and eventually the two begin to hear each other out on a personal
as well as professional level. Molly, who had three husbands and
four abortions before becoming a nun, proves to have not only a strong
sense of purpose but also a wise, compassionate heart; and Henry,
widowed and alienated from his only son, is both lonely and vulnerable
behind his stern exterior. In the end, weakened by a protest fast,
Molly dies but her sacrifice, if only because of the change it works
in her one time adversary and eventual admirer, is not in vain. Play. Ronald Harwood Cressida and Julian live comfortably in the English countryside with their elderly Ukrainian odd job man and friend of the family, Romka. Suddenly the police arrive. What has Romka done? Is he guilty? Is there a time limit on revenge and punishment? The Handyman looks at questions surrounding culpability, retribution, universal responsibility and the possibility of evil. 'Harwood's best and finest play. Its questions hurt because they are never theoretical: they are wrung from the flesh and mind of his characters.' Sunday Times |