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I
Have Been Here Before.
Play. J. B. Priestley Dr Görtler believes that a future
dimension of time can be entered in dreams, and is drawn to
a Yorkshire inn in search of proof. He had dreamed of an
unhappy couple coming to this inn, the wife meeting a lover,
and the discovery driving her husband to suicide. To his
horror, Dr Görtler sees the dream in danger of becoming
reality. He warns them of the potential unhappiness and
fortunately, they heed him. Written in 1938 I
Have Five Daughters.
Comedy. Adapted from Jane Austen's novel Pride and
Prejudice by Margaret Macnamara The author has adapted Jane Austen's
great novel with the particular problems and needs of the
amateur stage in view. The actual course of events has been,
in the author's words , 'pretty drastically simplified', but
the essential spirit of the novel has been delightfully
retained. Period early nineteenth century I
Love My Love. Play.
Fay Weldon Trendy magazine Femina offers two
contrasting wives - country-bumpkin Anne and sophisticate
Cat - £1000 to swap places for a week to compare
lifestyles. Anne goes to London to run the chic apartment of
Cat's advertising executive husband, while Cat journeys to
deepest Devon to cook, clean and care for gentle, sexually
repressed, shopkeeper Derek. Violent snowstorms mean that
Cat and Derek are cut off, and when the snow ploughs
eventually arrive the life-swap has become a wife-swap. A
witty, finely observed study of middle-class contrasts. I
Remember Mama. Play.
John Van Druten The play opens with Katrin Hanson, a
young Norwegian girl living in San Francisco, reading from
the manuscript of her autobiography. Then follow scenes from
an important period of her life giving us glimpses of the
career of this delightful, affectionate, impecunious family
of Hansons. Mama, the real heroine, is responsible
ultimately for Katrin's literary career, in which I
Remember Mama is her first success. Period 1910 I
Thought I Heard a
Rustling. Play. Alan
Plater An ex-miner turned poet is appointed
writer-in-residence at Eastwood branch library. Ellen,
senior librarian, soon realises the feckless but charming
Geordie is no poet. Despite this she finds him highly
entertaining, much to the disgust of Nutley, an earnest
young man who covets the writer-in-residence role. These
three find themselves an unlikely but united strike group
when the Libraries sub-committee proposes demolishing the
library. '... warmth, affection and humour ... ' Sunday
Telegraph Ice
cream. Play. Caryl
Churchill Produced to acclaim at the Royal Court Theatre, this eighty-minute play was subsequently produced in New York as a double bill with Hot Fudge. A middle-class American couple travel to England on a genealogical search and find third cousins who are decidedly lowlife and whom they aid following a violent event. Who is the worse: the doer of evil deeds or he who enables him to continue? 'Highly comic ... works like a short, sharp shock: an acidly entertaining statement about mutual cultural incomprehension.' Guardian If
We Are Women. Play.
Joanna McClelland Glass Jessica, a writer approaching middle age,
her mother Ruth (who is unable to read or write) and her
Jewish mother-in-law, Rachel, find themselves emotionally
stranded in Jessica's Connecticut beach home. Weighing the
choices each have made as women, as daughters, as mothers,
their recollections of guilt and regret are punctuated by
wry observations on sex, history, ideas and their
relationships with the men in their lives. I'll
Be Back Before Midnight!
Thriller. Peter Colley Following a nervous breakdown, Jan is
brought to an isolated farmhouse by her husband Greg,
ostensibly to complete her recovery. But unsettling things
start to happen as soon as they arrive. First, Greg's sister
Laura, with whom he seems to have an unnaturally close
relationship, arrives. There is also George, the slightly
demented old farmer who lives nearby. A nightmare of
frightening occurrences results in a thrilling and
heart-stopping ending! I'll
Get My Man. Farce.
Philip King Peter, a famous television series hero,
seeks refuge at a country rectory with his mild Uncle
Humphrey from all the females who continually chase after
him. Humphrey. horrified by the dismissal of his housekeeper
by his formidable sister, advertises for a wife, but
absent-mindedly omits the important word 'marriage'. Answers
to the advertisement arrive by the sack-load and the arrival
of the dignified Bishop of Lax adds to the hectic
confusion. I'll
Leave it to You.
Comedy. Noel Coward A poor widow with five grown-up children,
Mrs Dermott turns to her rich brother Dan for help. When Dan
arrives, he finds the charming, lazy family all ready to
live on his supposed wealth. He announces that he will leave
his fortune to the member of the family who has accomplished
the most in three years; after three years he then informs
them he has no money at all. Period 1920 I'm
Not Rappaport.
Comedy. Herb
Gardner This warm comedy concerns two octogenarians determined to fight off all attempts to put them out to pasture. Nat is a lifelong radical determined to fight injustice (real or imagined) and has a delightful repertoire of eccentric personas, which makes the role an actor's dream. The other half of this unlikely partnership is Midge, a black apartment janitor who spends his time hiding out from tenants who want him to retire. The
Imaginary Invalid.
Play.
Molière. Adapted by Miles Malleson To reduce his medical fees, hypochondriac
M. Argan decides to many off his daughter Angelica to a
physician's son. Unfortunately, Angelica loves
Cléante. Argan's brother Béralde and Toinette,
an inventive maid, save the situation for the lovers and
expose Mme Argan's schemes to bleed her husband of his
fortune. Then they persuade the hypochondriac to turn
physician so that he can quack himself free of charge.
Period 1674 Imaginary
Lines.
Comedy.
Reggie Oliver Wanda takes things Very Seriously Indeed.
Matchmaker, idealist dreamer, she is the despair of the men
- gentle, serious bookshop owner Howard and successful MP
and publisher Sir Michael Thurston - who love her and who
try vainly to beat paths, imaginary or otherwise, to her
door. This delightful new comedy was first seen at the
Stephen Joseph Theatre in the Round in a production directed
by Alan Ayckbourn. Impact.
Play.
Olive Chase and Maureen Nield An exciting intriguing play to keep your
audience guessing. Susan kills her unfaithful husband, Leo.
With the help of the calculating Dr Stark she casts
suspicion on her sister-in-law, who is in a vulnerable
emotional state exploited in hypnosis by Dr Stark. Mike
Kincaid seems an outsider but has deeply personal reasons
for becoming involved with this family, and is instrumental
in bringing a conclusion to the tangled state of
affairs. The
Importance of Being
Earnest.
Comedy.
Oscar Wilde Jack Worthing is 'Ernest' in town. He
wins Gwendolyn's hand, but Gwendolyn declares that she
chiefly loves him for his name - Ernest - the name Jack has
allotted his non-existent brother whose peccadilloes explain
his frequent absences from his country home where lives his
pretty ward, Cecily. Meanwhile, Cecily has decided to marry
rake-hell 'Ernest' and when Algernon presents himself in
this guise, she immediately accepts his smitten proposal.
However, through some highly improbable coincidences, all is
happily resolved. Period 1890s The
Importance of Being
Earnest.
Oscar Wilde.
Four-act version reconstructed by Vyvyan Holland Wilde originally wrote this play in four
acts, but it was thought too long and he was asked to reduce
it to three. In 1954 the BBC broadcast the 'lost scene' with
Mr Gribsby, an amusing character with a short scene in the
second act. Dramatic critic James Agate commented, 'The fun
in the scene Wilde deleted is better than any living
playwright can do.'
The
Importance of Being
Earnest Wilde's best loved comedy, in which Jack
has invented a fictional younger brother named Emest so, as
this alias, he can live in London free from all
responsibilities. He decides it is necessary to reclaim Jack
and 'kill off' Ernest when he falls in love with a wealthy
heiress, Gwendolen. Unfortunately, his opportunity to
propose marriage to Gwendolen comes before he has told her
his real name, and she is thrilled with the proposal because
she has always been convinced she is destined to marry a man
named Ernest. First performed in 1895.
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