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We Found Love and an Exquisite Set of Porcelain Figurines Aboard the SS Farndale Avenue. Comedy. David McGillivray and Walter Zerlin Jnr Flushed and following on from their previous successes (?), the
stalwart veterans of the F.A.H.E.T.G. Dramatic Society are poised
to conquer another dramatic idiom. In romantic vein aboard an ocean-going
liner for their excursion into the world of thirties' musical comedy à la Noel
and Gertie, the ladies prove that the age of elegance, glamour and
enchantment is not dead ... well, not quite anyway. We Have Always Lived In the Castle Melodrama. Hugh Wheeler. Based on the best-selling novel by Shirley
Jackson. The home of the Blackwoods near a Vermont village is a lonely, ominous
abode, and Constance, the young mistress of the place, carA go out
of the house without being insulted and stoned by the villagers.
They have also composed a nasty song about her because Constance
is looked upon as the local Lizzie Borden, with double the murders
attributed to her. Though she has been acquitted, it is believed
that she had done away with four of her relatives by feeding them
rat poison. There are two of the relatives left, however, and they
share her gloomy seclusion. One is a dotty old uncle, who is confined
to a wheelchair. He is writing a book on the case, but he can't remember
some- of the details. The other is her pretty little sister of 15
who is fiercely protective toward Constance. There is, in addition,
a small black boy living in the house, who looks on the eerie events
as a game. Then a youthful cousin arrives from abroad, and falls
in love with Constance, though there is a suspicion that he is mainly
after her money. With the atmosphere of impending doom properly taken
care of, the play sets out on the project of unveiling what actually
took place that homicidal night in the Blackwood dining room, and
I hope it isn't unfair to reveal that all the murders are not those
of the lethal family evening. Mystery/Comedy. Jonathan Troy. Having been confined to a wheelchair for many years, the ailing
and irritable Minerva Osterman has turned her isolated mansion into
a virtual prison not only for herself but for her spinster daughter,
Stephanie; her long-suffering housekeeper, Nora; and her personal
physician, Dr. Adler. Fearing that her death may be imminent, Minerva
has drawn up her will and summoned her two nieces, Mary and Belle,
so that she may confront all her possible heirs in person, and watch
their reactions as the will is read. She had asked her nieces to
come alone, but they arrive with respective fiancés, whom
Minerva grudgingly allows to stay. Before revealing the contents
of her will, however, she has the mysterious Dr. Adler put her into
a hypnotic trance, during which she picks up a deck of cards and
turns over the three of clubs - the card of death. Her prediction
is that someone in the room will die before the weekend is over -
a prediction which comes true when she herself dies of a spider bite.
After that more bodies turn up, and fear and suspicion grows among
the remaining. The will disappears, a diabolic plot is revealed and
then, at last, the murderer is unmasked - in a chilling, exciting
climax which is held off until the final, perilous moments of the
play. Play. Robert David MacDonald Premiered at the Citizens', Glasgow, and revived at the Old Red Lion in London, this Grand Guignol is based on the few known facts of the great Jacobean playwright's life and on conjecture about his lost play The Guise. Trapped and embittered by an appalling family, Webster seeks solace with the attractive boy actors in his company. But then he disagrees with his patron and the theatre manager... 'This brawling, sprawling play makes a wonderfully entertaining evening ... The language is scatalogical and downright.' Financial Times The Wedding Of the Siamese Twins Play. Burton Cohen. Based on the true story of Chang and Eng, the
famous Siamese twins. Having amassed a considerable fortune through their world tours,
Chang and Eng, the renowned Siamese twins (who were born connected
by a band of flesh in the breastbone area) decide to settle in North
Carolina, where they buy a prosperous farm. They are also hopeful
of finding suitable wives, and when the Yates sisters, Sally and
Adelaide, appear on the scene, the two brothers are smitten. Wooing
the sisters proves easier than convincing their skeptical parents
that the two "freaks" would be suitable husbands, but the lack of
other suitors and the fact of Chang and Eng's obvious wealth soon
tip the scales - and lead on to an unique double union which produces
a total of twenty-one children. The brothers had long since developed
an ability to "go away' from each other when privacy demanded, to
achieve a state of detached oblivion which gives them as much "separateness" as
their physical situation will permit, and this allows their marriages
to work. But, in time, Chang and Eng begin to weary of touring and
of being constantly together: Chang turns increasingly to drink,
and Eng gambles away much of his fortune. Yet, in the end, when Chang
contracts a fatal illness which spells death for both of them, the
real depth of their closeness and dependency, both physical and spiritual,
is made eloquently clear - it, in truth, is what has sustained them
through the years and will now do the same for their grieving widows. Comedy. Norman Robbins Alison Murchison, fat, straight-haired, bespectacled, is the last
sort of girl one would visualise as a heroine, but Uncle Frank decides
to make her one by entering her as a prospective candidate for a
Wedding of the Year competition, selecting a designer to create her
wedding dress even before he has found her a suitable husband. His
eye falls on Walter Thornton's son, Melvyn, a frustrated inventor
and an appallingly clumsy young man. However, the best-laid plans
... (in Dutch Plays) - Judith Herzberg. Trans D. Couling This is no ordinary wedding party: both the betrothed have been
previously married and these previous partners are present at the
wedding. Through a series of short, interchangeable filmic scenes
we gradually find out about the characters and their personal histories,
and also about the thoughts they choose not to tell the others ...
At a ceremony, symbolic of the joining of souls, we witness the disintegration
of relationships and of society as a whole. Comedy: Gore Vidal. The story tells of a Republican Senator who is about to announce
his candidacy for his party's nomination for the Presidency when
his son returns from a long stay in Europe bringing with him a Negro
girl who is his sweetheart and possibly his fiancée. The Senator
and his associates are shocked by the news and he thinks of withdrawing
from the race. But he boldly decides to acknowledge the inter-racial
union, only to have the entire nation hailing his great courage.
But not before he has been obliged to deal with his son's attempted
blackmail, his black butler's disastrous self-righteousness, and
the middle-class prejudices of the girl's very distinguished - and
conservative - parents. He remains deftly opportunistic to the end,
but it is the simple virtues of fairness and compassion which eventually
carry the day - and hopefully always will, despite the calculated
manoeuvers of the politicians and the cold-eyed professionals who
attend them. Play. Michael Palin Cantankerous, misanthropic, miserable, world-weary ... think of an adjective synonymous with 'crabby' and it will apply to Stephen Febble. All he wants is to be left alone, but, to his horror, his long-suffering wife Virginia fills the house with guests for the weekend. Stephen responds in the only way he knows how -with a monstrous display of rudeness. A riot of a comedy with an ever-present dark side. Play. John Godber John Godber's striking, easily staged play explores the complex
relationship between a thirty-three year old theatre studies teacher
and his elderly parents. Martin Dawson has invited his parents, Joan
and Len, to visit him in the Lake District. This 'enjoyable' weekend
break evolves into an opportunity for the release of the pent-up
frustrations of a lifetime. Godber successfully combines biting humour
with serious intent in this thought-provoking comment on age, communication
and life in general. David Blomquist. Play. Laurie and Dan are an average blue-collar couple, he a warehouse
worker, she employed in a restaurant, who have an eleven-year old
son; a tacky, cheaply furnished apartment; and an urge to get ahead
like "other people." In a series of seemingly inconsequential domestic
scenes, separated by the sound of overheard television commercials,
the two talk about the books they should be reading (instead of watching
TV); the exotic foods they should be trying (in place of frozen meat
pies); and the fine wines they should be enjoying (rather than the
omnipresent cans of beer). Hungry for the "good life," Dan is buoyed
by the prospect of a promotion which has been dangled before him
by his dashing new boss. When it falls through he explodes at Laurie
and she, fed up with his pretensions, explodes back. But inevitably,
and a bit sadly, they accept the truth - that what they have is all
they ever will have, and what they hoped for, in fact, only a more
affluent version of the bankrupt existence which is already theirs. Conor McPherson In a bar in rural Ireland, the landlord and three regulars attempt
to spook a young woman who has recently arrived from Dublin. But
as the conversation moves on it is Valerie who scares the men ...
'A spellbinder that transfixes you ... No praise in fact is too high' Guardian.
Conor McPherson won the 1997 Evening Standard and Critic's Circle
Awards for Most Promising Playwright with this play which was commissioned
and premiered by the Royal Court Theatre. Play. Larry Shue. Drawn from the author's own experience, the play tells of the return
to Czechoslovakia, in 1974, of a former college drama professor,
Vince Corey, who is researching a book (begun during a visit five
years earlier) on the explosion of artistic creativity which flowered
under the now overthrown, liberal Dubcek government. Accompanied
by a young student, Dooley, the professor is shocked to find that
the free speech and artistic freedom which he encountered on his
earlier visit have been crushed by the Soviet masters who have taken
over the country. In a series of vivid, yet often brightly funny
scenes, Vince and Dooley look up a succession of Vince's former friends
and contacts, including his translator and her husband; a great actor
now reduced to doing propaganda films; a shamed but nervously helpful
government functionary; and a brilliant writer whose resistance to
authority has led to his virtual banishment from society - all, in
the New York production, played by the same actor and actress. While
humor abounds as the two move from one sharply etched encounter to
another, the play also offers a thoughtful and moving comment on
the nature of oppression, artistic and otherwise, as the two Americans
begin to comprehend the fear and suspicion which their friends must
now contend with, and the dreadful grayness which descended on their
once promising lives when the famous "Prague Spring" gave way to "Prague
Winter." Comedy Emest Thompson. Holding out indomitably against advancing age, dwindling finances
and failing health, Margaret Mary Elderdice, a widow and former concert
pianist, resists the attempts of her violin-playing spinster neighbor,
Cara Varnum, to move in with her. While she enjoys playing duets
with Cara and gossiping about the other tenants in their upper West
Side apartment building, Margaret Mary values her independence above
the dubious comforts which the constant presence of the priggish
Cara might provide. So Cara is shocked when Margaret Mary engages
Robin Bird, a rather kooky young would-be actress, as her paid; live-in
companion. Relations between the three are strewn with hilarious
pitfalls from the start, with additional comic complications being
provided by a malaprop-prone Rumanian building superintendent and
an eager young lawyer-suitor whom Robin Bird brings home for dinner.
Ultimately things do fall into place, and largely so because of the
spirited will of Margaret Mary, who goads the others to rise above
their problems, to stake a personal claim on life, and to resist,
with all their strength, the infirmities and misfortunes that flesh
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