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Gill Adams : Drama 2M 1F Interior set Set in December 1966, Jump to Cow Heaven is a gripping triumph of tension and suspense, the winner of the Fringe First Award for best new play at the 1997 Edinburgh Festival. In a small basement flat in London's East End, Frankie 'The Mad
Axe Man' Mitchell is in hiding, having just been sprung from Dartmoor
prison by the Kray Twins. With only his minder John for company and
Lisa, a prostitute provided by the Twins to see to his needs, Frank
awaits the car that will take him to a new life in the country. But
as the days go by and Christmas approaches, Frank's frustration leads
him close to the breaking point. On the night before Christmas he
disappears and the lips of everyone are sealed. Play.
Tom Stoppard The hero is a professor of moral philosophy, and the play is a serious attempt to debate the existence of a moral absolute, of metaphysical realty, of God. Unfortunately, George's trained hare disappears and an Inspector Bones arrives to investigate the rumour that one of George's team of gymnasts has been shot dead while performing in his sitting-room. Intelligent, surreal and zany, this is Stoppard at his best. Farce. Kurtz Gordon. 4 men, 8 women. Interior. Abby, Dot and Pat share an apartment while they try to make it on Broadway. The rent is due, and Minnie, their landlady, tells them to pay up - or else. Then Pat comes home with a box she has found in a garbage can (she got curious when she saw a man drop the box). They open it and find $50,000. Abby recalls the news that a ransom of $50,000 would be paid that day to Baby Face Ben for kidnapping Irene Manning. They are scared to notify the police, and, to add to their predicament, Baby Face Ben has followed Pat home. When Oscar, an astrologer, drops in by chance, they take him for one of Ben's Men. Having armed themselves, they surround Oscar and hilariously make him prove he's an astrologer. As they draft him to help put the money back, a brick is thrown through the window, bearing the note: "You have the money but that isn't all you're going to get!" What they get is Irene Manning, gagged and bound, on their doorstep, and of all times for Minnie to pop in, this would be it! She recognises Irene and runs for the police. With the ransom money and the kidnapped girl in their possession, the mere thought of the police petrifies them. Needless to say, all ends well. Comedy with music. George S. Kaufman and
Ring Lardner A gauche, naive, but talented young lyricist, Fred, arrives in New York to make a bit of money on Tin Pan Alley in 1929. There he falls into the clutches of Eileen - a money-grabbing vamp before he returns to his faithful true love, Edna. The play enjoyed a successful London revival at the Hampstead and Strand Theatres in 1992. '... wisecracking comedy.' Evening Standard Comedy. Seth Greenland. 8 men, 2-3 women (flexible casting). Unit set. John Stillman is an unassuming CIA station chief posted in the Congo in 1960. His lagging career gets an unexpected shot in the arm when he receives a cable from the Eisenhower White House telling him to assassinate the Congo's president, Patrice Lumumba. Dr. Felix Bender, a CIA assassin, will be coming to supervise a plan that is to include poisoned lipstick, a dinner party and the attempted seduction of the Congolese leader by an American agent. Stillman is horrified by the assignment and is further shocked when his wife, Patience, a preppie social climber, declares that killing Lumumba would be a great career move. When Bender's assistant takes sick, it is Patience who must step into the breach and seduce Mr. Lumumba. Into this mix come Bud Bradshaw, an auto parts salesman from Schenectady, and his dizzy wife, Alice. They are searching the Congo for their daughter who has run off with an African exchange student. The night of the dinner party arrives, but John gets cold feet. As Patience does her level best to seduce the Prime Minister, John cracks under the pressure and announces to everyone what he's been assigned to do. Bud and Alice, who have crashed the party, are swept into the farce with deadly results: poor, hapless Bud ends up giving Patience mouth-to-mouth, only to die from her lip poison. Disillusioned, John resigns, and he and Patience leave for the states, though not together. At the gate, he attempts a mock assassination of his wife, but after all she's seen, his Lady Macbeth is just not impressed. Play. Sean O'Casey A stark, uncompromising tragedy which unsparingly shows that Irish
gaiety and song are the despairing camouflage for a dirge. It is
the waste that is tragic- Juno's staunchness has to suffer a shiftless
strutting husband, 'Captain' Jack Boyle, the 'Paycock' of the title.
True, there arc moments of raucous comedy, but they are satire, O'Casey's
revelations by antithesis. Period 1922 Play. E. Katherine Kerr. 2 men, 1 woman. Interior. Cary, an aspiring actress, lives in a one-room, windowless apartment
on Manhattan's Upper West Side. She is a talented performer, but
a sloppy housekeeper. Dough, her ex-boyfriend and sometimes roommate,
is a composer and lyricist who has written a musicalized version
of As You Like It, presently in workshop with Cary in the
starring role. He survives by driving a cab and pushing marijuana.
Their lives are suddenly disrupted by the unexpected arrival from
California of Cary's older sister, Cecilia, who has left her husband
and two children after an argument. The two sisters are extreme opposites.
Cary uses foul language and is fiercely independent and ambitious.
Cecilia is well-groomed and conformist and is looked at askance for
her straight-laced style of living. No sooner has Cecilia appeared
than she transforms Cary's rattrap of an an apartment into a decent,
even attractive place to live, adding insult to injury by cooking
up a gourmet meal, much to Doug's delight and amazement. But the
sparks really begin to fly when Cary discovers that Cecilia and Dough
have spent the night together, after having shared a joint. From
then on, the play moves hilariously to its conclusion. By seeing
the value of change in their lives, the two sisters are reconciled;
Doug's musical is optioned for Broadway, with Cary in the lead; and
everything works out to its satisfaction of all, especially the audiences. Play. Alan Ayckbourn Dennis spends his spare time messing about in his untidy garage,
indifferent to the fact that his wife is being driven to distraction
by his possessive and jealous mother who is slowly undermining her,
both physically and mentally. Each scene occurs on the birthday of
one of the characters, but the comedy becomes increasingly sharp
and ironic as the action proceeds and darkens. (in South Africa Plays). Pieter-Dirk
Uys By South Africa's most charismatic playwright and performer, this
play deals with the pain of exile, and the longing for return. 'His
theatrical achievement is to bring these rancorously self-encapsulated
victims out into the fresh air, and to place their obsessive melodramas
in the wider context of comedy.' The Times. Play. Simon Gray Whenever Enid writes one of her best-selling novels, she adopts a domestic pet as a companion, sends her husband away and retreats to her converted lighthouse. This time there is a difference her adopted "pet" is Terri, her husband's PA. Chained up, but with plenty of home comforts, Terri is desperate to escape initally. Then she settles into the odd menage consisting of herself, Enid and the eccentric vicar, Ronnie. Dependence, obsession, redemption and retribution are all themes of this unusual and observant comedy. Comedy. John Waterhouse Harry is a zealous traffic warden. One of his hobbies is collecting
stuffed birds and this is a cause of great friction between him and
his wife. Harry's daughter, Ruby, is engaged to weedy Gerald who
has an allergy to the birds. However, Harry's hobby seemingly pays
off when he returns home with an owl stuffed with money. Enthusiastic
plans are made but when Inspector Travers arrives Harry discovers
he has been spending stolen money and he is led off to the police
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