The Trap Door Theatre Presents 'The Unconquered!'
By: Steve Leary Oct. 22, 2008
The TRAP DOOR THEATRE presents:
The American Premiere of….
The Unconquered
Written by: Torben Betts
Directed by: Beata Pilch
Cast: Tiffany Bedwell, John Kahara, Kevin Lucero Less, Beata Pilch
Torben Betts’ The Unconquered is a fast-moving satirical portrait of patriarchy, political indolence and over-reaction. The laughs begin when the "re-liberation" knocks on the door of your average upper-middle class family after aggressive revolutionaries have overthrown the government. Strange and unsettling, their new found freedom provokes the parents to reminisce about the comfort of life under the previous aristocracy while their spirited daughter criticizes her parent's banal and conforming attitudes with great, yet impotent, ferocity. The piece is a reflection of war's long-reaching effects on the domestic front, demonstrating the encompassing ambiguity of a public out of touch with reality. With great wit, poetics and charm, Betts sketches the self-hypocrisy that materializes during times of opaque identity and societal partition.
Torben Betts is an English playwright born in 1968 in Stamford, Lincolnshire. He attended the University of Liverpool and originally trained and worked as an actor. He was writer-in-residence at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough where he met the prolific master of British farce and comedy, Sir Alan Ayckbourn, who has since commissioned Betts’ plays The Optimist (2002), Her Slightest Touch (2003) and The Swing of Things (2006). Betts has been hailed as a successor to writers such as Ayckbourn and Howard Barker. Among a dozen plays written by Betts and staged so far are, A Listening Heaven (1996), Incarcerator (1997), Mummies and Daddies (1998), and Clockwatching (2000). The Unconquered opened on February 14, 2007 in a production by the Stellar Quines Theatre Company at the Byre Theatre in St. Andrews and was Best New Play in the 2006-7 Critics Awards for Theatre in Scotland. Betts is currently under commission by Stellar Quines to write Constantina, a tragedy for four actresses set in Ancient Rome. For more info visit www.torbenbetts.com.
Choreographer Lindsay-Rose Kane / Dramaturge Milan Pribisic / Lighting Designer Gina Patterson / Set Designers Andrew Holder & Ben Freyinger/ Costume Designer Sir Iris Bainum-Houle/ Sound Designer Bob Rokos / Stage Manager Gary Damico/ Graphic Designer Michal Janicki / Fight Choreographer Andrew Luckenbill
Opens: Thursday, November 13, 2008 at 8 PM.
Closes: Friday December 19, 2008 at 8 PM.
Runs: Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 PM. Sundays December 7 & 14th at 7PM. No show Thursday November 27 (Thanksgiving).
Admission: $20 (2-for-1 on Thursdays)
What:
* Torben Betts’ The Unconquered is a fast-moving satirical portrait of patriarchy, political indolence and over-reaction that examines the long reaching effects of war on the homefront.
*The Unconquered, in the midst of political upheaval a fiercely intelligent young girl relentlessly questions her parents need to conform.
* The Unconquered, a satirical reflection of war's long-reaching effects on the domestic front.
Where: TRAP DOOR THEATRE, 1655 W. Cortland Ave., Chicago, IL 60622
Info/Reservations: 773-384-0494
To purchase tickets online: www.trapdoortheatre.com
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