A Number

A Number

by Caryl Churchill

It's really sort of difficult to describe this play. A two-hander originated by Michael Gambon and Daniel Craig, A Number follows an elder scientist named Salter and his relationship with his son... and his son... and his son. Salter, it seems, has experimented with cloning, and after a problem with his original son, he started attempting to make a better version. However, as the original and the clones learn about each other, conflict arises beyond anything that Salter could have expected.

I read this play in hopes that it would fit into my Science on Stage class, but there wasn't really any discussion of the science of cloning. Of course, that's just fine. Churchill wanted to talk about something else - the emotional weight of fathers and sons. We may fail each other, we may let each other and ourselves down, but does that give us permission to toss those failures to the curb and start anew? Can we accept each other for who we are and what we have done? Can we erase those failures and still be who we are? Can we love each other because of rather than in spite of our faults?

And perhaps most importantly - is there a video anywhere of that original performance?!!? What I wouldn't give to get to see those two men perform this play! 

The Hatmaker's Wife

The Hatmaker's Wife

by Lauren Yee

A young woman referred to in the script only as "Voice" is moving in with her boyfriend Gabe. It should be immediate bliss, but the walls hold a story and they begin to share it. Voice hears the tale of the old hatmaker Hetchman and his wife who disappeared - he had refused to make her a perfect hat, instead expecting her to wait on him hand and foot. The story becomes increasingly mystical as he summons a Golem, and Voice gets increasingly wrapped up in the story, complicating her relationship with Gabe. The story twists and turns and intersects in interesting and charming ways, inviting the audience to think about the roles they and their partners may play in their own relationships.

I read this play not long after I read Julia Cho's The Language Archive, and while I wouldn't say that the plays are really all that similar, there was a common spirit that I sensed between the two plays. There is an epic sense of the scope of old relationships in both plays that serves as a mode for the younger characters in the play to encounter and interrogate their newer romances. It also made me think of Sheila Callaghan's Crumble (Lay Me Down, Justin Timberlake), as the walls of the home hold onto the emotional histories that unfolded within them, and become their own strange characters. I really enjoyed the theatricality and mysticism of this play, and I think it would be a lot of fun to explore a world like this!

Space Girl

Space Girl 

by Mora V. Harris

Arugula and her father Nancy are on a mission from their planet to gather information about Earth and its inhabitants, ostensibly to see how the planet might be improved - or possibly whether or not it deserves assistance at all. Arugula attempts to balance her burgeoning teen sexuality and her tendencies toward violence by taking up roller derby, but being a human teenager may be more than she or her father are prepared for.

I have to admit that I didn't love this play, but I did find some real charm to it. The general device of the fish-out-of-water teenager works pretty well, and I really did like the information we got about the home planet's (Zlagdor) inherent violence, and how that clashed with Arugula's attempts to find her place. The sacrifices that she ultimately had to make were a little heavy-handed, but ultimately it's a sweet story, and one that I suspect many of my students would find engaging and fun.

Witch

Witch 

By Jen Silverman

Elizabeth is an outcast in her historical English town, having been dubbed a witch. So when Scratch comes to town in search of souls, hers should be the easiest to collect, but things are not quite that simple.  In town, Sir Arthur is grappling with his disappointing son Cuddy, who is grappling with his father's obvious preference (as well as his own unexplained desire) for the confident and rakish Frank. As passions and ambitions flare, a variety of truths ooze out into the light.

This play is, not to mince words, badass. I read it and immediately wanted to perform it. Someone direct me as Elizabeth... PLEASE! It is sexy and emotional and human and supernatural in all of these really interesting ways. I think the thing that would chase some people away from it is the possible scope of production values - the props for the post-banquet scene alone could be quite a heavy lift (literally and figuratively). But the story and the characters and the relationships are so vivid and vicious, it absolutely leaps off the page.