A-Typical Rainbow E-Book

JJ Green

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

'I can change colours of objects by looking at them, hear the symphonies of household simplicities, taste the emotions in a room like sweet or bitter wine, and feel life's every heartbeat breaking through my ribcage in glorious technicolour. Just don't ask me to make eye contact.' An imaginative child's glorious fantasies – of dolphins and dragonflies, gingerbread houses and chocolate rivers – offer him an escape from hostile reality. When reality dictates he has to conform to the 'real world', he has to make a choice. Should he live authentically and risk stigma, or can he continue to hide? Based on real events from the perspective of the writer and the autistic community, JJ Green's A-Typical Rainbow is an uplifting play about the experience of growing up neurodivergent and queer in early 2000s Britain. It premiered at London's Turbine Theatre in June 2022, produced by Aria Entertainment, directed by Bronagh Lagan, and starring playwright JJ Green, who is a passionate advocate for autistic artists like himself. This edition includes the full text of the play along with contributions from the largely – and proudly – neurodivergent cast and creative team.

Leseprobe

JJ Green

A-TYPICAL RAINBOW

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Dedication

Author’s Note

Original Production Details

Characters

A-Typical Rainbow

Testimonials

About the Author

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

For my mother and all that she stood for

For Sophie and all that they are yet to stand for

&

For Jamie, who stands with me

Author’s Note

This play should feel otherworldly. The lens of autism is often portrayed as an outside-looking-in matter where the world is as it is seen by neurotypical people and the oddity is the autistic character within that world. With this play I want to reverse that imagery – here I want the lines between imagination and reality to appear blurred and neurotypical standards questioned. Due to large portions of the play taking place in imagination sequences, the shift between what is real and what is not should be unclear. This is a play through the eyes of an autistic person, consequently the rest of the world needs to appear through that lens, also. A polished, precise, bright but unnerving world. Inspiration of aesthetics drawn from Wes Anderson, Lemony Snicket, Tim Burton and Dr. Seuss. The pallet is pastel and of the sixties, everything clean, neat and perfect in look. Costuming, set and lighting should also resemble this world that is so crisp, clean, colourful and polished it’s beautiful but terrifying. The white picket fence and American dream presented as otherness.

Though this is not a musical, all monologues are to have themes played beneath them that swell in emotion similarly to that of musical theatre but remain spoken.

JJ Green

A-Typical Rainbow was first performed at the Turbine Theatre, London, on 30 June 2022. The cast and creative team was as follows:

BOY

JJ Green

MOTHER

Caroline Deverill

FATHER/DOCTOR

James Westphal

JAKE/DANIEL

Conor Joseph

ABBY/THOMAS/ LARA

Joy Tan

EMILY/MRS WHITEMAN/ RACHEL

Maya Manuel

Director

Bronagh Lagan

Set and Costume Designer

Frankie Gerrard

Choreographer

William Spencer

Composer and Sound Designer

Max Alexander-Taylor

Lighting Designer

Bethany Gupwell

Associate Sound Designer

Chris Czornyj

Video Designer

Matt Powell

Casting Director

Jane Deitch

Production Manager

Jack Boisseux

Deputy Stage Manager

Ryan Webster

Assistant Stage Manager

Alice Wood

Costume Supervisor

Emmy Tobitt

Stage One Bridge The Gap Placement

Sarah Jordan Verghese

For Aria Entertainment

Company Director and Producer

Katy Lipson

General Manager and Assistant Producer

Chris Matanlé

Production Coordinator

Ollie Hancock

Literary Manager and Assistant Producer

Characters

BOY, male presenting, has ASD. Playing age twenty to twenty-five. Slim build. Striking but non-conventionally attractive features. Intelligent, sarcastic, quick, quippy and curious, occasionally comical without knowing it.

MOTHER/RACHEL/ENSEMBLE, British female. Playing age thirty-five to forty. Kind, comforting, caring and compassionate yet brave and firm. She focuses on all but herself. She uses love for others to cope. A kind, slim face and build with resemblance to that of her son. Rachel is of the same age and look but far more outgoing.

FATHER/DOCTOR/ARMY COACH/ENSEMBLE, male. Playing age twenty-five to thirty-five. Muscular/masculine build and demeanour. 5’9”– 6ft. Must be able to convey age differences in his acting due to the fact his characters span two decades. The Father, Doctor and Army Coach are aggressive, assertive and direct. They lack any emotion that isn’t anger or disdain.

THOMAS/ABBY/LARA/WITNESS ONE, female. Playing age twenty to thirty. An innocent and youthful but expressive face. 4’5” – 5’6”. The brother, the first small love-interest, the friend. Thomas is meek, loyal, understanding but overshadowed. Abby appears fake and self-obsessed but is secretly kind, lost and struggling to find her avenue to shine. Lara is confident, strong, self-assured and motherly, aware of all those around her. These three characters are a direct development of each other, resembling the journey of youth to adulthood.

MRS WHITEMAN/EMILY/WITNESS TWO/ENSEMBLE, British female. No specific playing age or height so long as the actor can convey youth and adulthood well. Mrs Whiteman is stern yet unsure of herself, a professional. Emily is sharp and shallow. She is the girl we all knew in high school; entirely detestable.

JAKE/DANIEL/EMILE/JUDGE/ENSEMBLE, male. Playing age twenty to thirty. 5’9”– 6’2”. Any look. Jake is a typical high-school bully. Daniel is kind, compassionate, fun-loving and free. For the Judge see Father/Doctor.

Please cast as diversely as possible, where possible.

This ebook was created before the end of rehearsals and so may differ slightly from the play as performed.

ACT ONE

Scene One

A stage resembling a small house in framework only. On the back wall are medical drawers and filing cabinets capable of being pulled out. The house has a small bed with a rainbow bedside lamp. A singular man (BOY) sits on a Victorian trunk centre stage. The house is dimly lit, and the bedside lamp is on. The stage will transform by use of puppetry and accessible projection as the BOY’s monologue progresses. MOTHER enters. She tidies the drawers at the back of the stage.

MOTHER. Teeth brushed?

BOY nods.

School bag packed?

BOY nods.

Into bed then.

BOY jumps into bed. MOTHER approaches to tuck him in.

Story of choice?

BOY looks to her. Beat.

(Tenderly.) Fine. But quickly.

BOY nods.

And only one verse.

BOY nods.

She strokes his hair and sings the opening verse of ‘Over the Rainbow’. No instrumental. Imperfect vocally. BOY settles in bed. The lamp dims. MOTHER kisses his head and exits.

The sound of a plane landing, seatbelt signs on. BOY sits upright in bed.

BOY. Hi. I’m seven. Not literally. I am figuratively seven for the context of what we’re doing now. Which is here which is this which is talking. I’m literally seven in the same way that after doing your tax return you are not literally dying. You, your bank account, happiness and parents’ pride are figuratively dying. Not literally dying. You may be literally dying in a month however when a Tesco meal deal starts to feel a little bit like caviar.

Me trying to explain the emotions I have is like taking a fourteen-day rambling holiday with your high-school geography teacher across the Himalayas equipped only with a pair of Crocs, a Lucozade Sport and a stick you think makes you look like Gandalf. I reach base camp when I realise I had the map upside down and I’m meant to be somewhere on the Yorkshire Dales. My brain to me is mundane. But to everyone else – it’s a little broken.

I remember a child at school once bragged to me how on her last holiday she swam with dolphins. Her name was Emily and she was repellent. She was the kind of child who cartwheeled everywhere she went. She grew up into one of those people who when faced with a coffee cake stupidly staggers over to it before saying ‘Well, I shouldn’t but I will’, is drawn like a moth to a flame at the sight of a Gymshark logo and thinks Love Island is a modern-day Jane Austen novel.