Play List: Theme : Psychology

Here you can find a selection of theatrical plays that feature hotels. Each play listed includes cast size, genre, the setting and a review. All the plays listed have been tested with my play reading group.

Key:

Cast Sizes - Small 2-6; Medium 7-12; Large 13+

Copies - Number of copies currently held at the NewSPAL library

in Ewell, Surrey

Arthur Miller : The Death of a Salesman

Genre: Drama Cast: Mixed, Medium, Copies 8

Setting Late 1940s, Brooklyn, USA

The play revolves around Willy Loman, a traveling salesman whose aspirations for success and social status(The American Dream), and for the success of his children, too, are unravelling, together with his mental state. The story is told through memories, dreams, and arguments. The play ends with Willy's suicide and subsequent funeral. A very powerful and moving play. Also worth watching the film with Dustin Hoffman.

Mark Madoff : Children of a Lesser God

Genre: Drama Cast: Mixed, Medium, Copies 9

Setting USA, modern

A teacher at a State School for the Deaf falls in love with a woman who has been deaf since birth. She was once a student there, but is now a maid, and would rather clean bathrooms in silence than learn to speak. But she falls in love with the teacher, and together they have to find a place of communication between the hearing and the deaf, between sign language and speech.

The can be quite hard to read, as the script gives the words Sarah is signing, and James repeats them. So, as we can hear, we hear double and it can become tedious. We eventually leant to ignore Sarrah's "words". It's definitely worth it.

Terry Johnson : Hysteria

Genre: Drama, Comedy, some Farce Cast: Mixed, Medium Copies 10

Setting Hampstead, London, 1938

Psychologist Freud (at the end of his life, very ill) and artist Salvador Dali meet for tea at Freud's house in Hampstead . At the same time a mysterious woman (Jessica) arrives looking for answers to questions she has about his treatment of her mother and his theory of pre-sexual shock. Freud, who is trying to put his affairs in order, soon finds himself up to his neck explaining both his life's work and the female undergarments in his garden, Despite the dark subject matter the play in sometimes seriously funny - especially Dali!! Sexual references, some a but shocking

Tennessee Williams : A Streetcar Named Desire

Genre: Drama Cast: Mixed, Medium Copies 28

Setting A poor neighbourhood in New Orleans. late 1940s

Cut away from her family home and prosperous life, but still with pretensions of a former glory, ex southern belle Blanche Dubois moves into the shabby apartment of her younger sister Stella and her husband Stanley Kowalski.

Blanche and Stanley take an immediate dislike to one another. The conflict between them heats up as Blanche attempts to convince her sister to leave her abusive husband. Tensions mount with tragic consequences for Blanche.

Shelagh Stephenson : The Memory of Water

Genre: Drama, comedy, some farce Cast: Mixed, Small Copies 15

Setting Yorkshire, UK. Winter, modern

Three sisters come together before their mother's funeral, each haunted by their own demons. The play focuses on how each sister deals with the death and how it directly affects them. The three each have different memories of the same events, causing constant bickering about whose memories are true. As the three women get together after years of separation, all their hidden lies and self-betrayals are about to reach the surface. And Vi, the mother, is shown as being adrift among a series of islands of her own identity.

Very funny, and quite naughty in places. Be warned.

Shelagh Stephenson : Dancing at Lughnasa TBC

Genre

Rattigan Deep Blue Sea TBC