Mosquitoes E-Book

Lucy Kirkwood

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

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

A play about families and particle physics. Alice is a scientist. She lives in Geneva. As the Large Hadron Collider starts up in 2008, she is embarking on the most exciting work of her life, searching for the Higgs Boson particle. Jenny is her sister. She lives in Luton. She spends a lot of time Googling. When tragedy throws them together, the collision threatens them all with chaos. Lucy Kirkwood's play Mosquitoes premiered at the National Theatre, London, in July 2017, in a production featuring Olivia Colman and Olivia Williams, and directed by Rufus Norris.

Leseprobe

Lucy Kirkwood

MOSQUITOES

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Title Page

Original Production

Acknowledgements

Dedication

Epigraph

Characters

Mosquitoes

About the Author

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

Mosquitoes was first performed in the Dorfman auditorium of the National Theatre, London, on 25 July 2017 (previews from 18 July). The cast was as follows:

ALICE

Olivia Williams

JENNY

Olivia Colman

THE BOSON

Paul Hilton

LUKE

Joseph Quinn

NATALIE

Sofia Barclay

KAREN

Amanda Boxer

HENRI

Yoli Fuller

JOURNALIST/SONOGRAPHER

Vanessa Emme

GAVRIELLA BASTIANELLI/POLICEWOMAN

Cait Davis

SECURITY GUARD

Ira Mandela Siobhan

Director

Rufus Norris

Designer

Katrina Lindsay

Lighting Designer

Paule Constable

Music

Adam Cork

Sound Designer

Paul Arditti

Video Designers

Finn Ross

Ian William Galloway

Movement

Ira Mandela Siobhan

Fight Director

Kev McCurdy

Company Voice Work

Charmian Hoare

Staff Director

Nicola Miles-Wildin

Originally commissioned by Manhattan Theatre Club, Lynne Meadow, Artistic Director, Barry Grove, Executive Producer, with funds provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Acknowledgements

This play was a Sloane commission from the Manhattan Theatre Club, and I am very grateful to everyone there who has supported it over the years, especially Annie MacCrae, Lynne Meadow and Doug Hughes.

I would also like to thank:

Rufus Norris.

The creative team, cast and crew of the National Theatre production.

Connie Potter, Gordon Watts, Paul Laycock and Chris Thomas at CERN who have been so generous and imaginative with their help in the writing of the play.

Lyndsey Turner.

Ben Power.

James Yeatman.

The many actors who have participated in readings.

Yoli Fuller for correcting and improving my appalling French.

Most of all, Ed Hime, for bringing order to chaos.

L.K.

In memory of Alex Willie Singerman

For Sophie

‘The general public has long been divided into two parts; those who think that science can do anything and those who are afraid it will.’

Mason & Dixon, Thomas Pynchon

‘We are all susceptible to the pull of viral ideas… No matter how smart we get, there is always this deep irrational part that makes us potential hosts for self-replicating information.’

Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson

Characters

THE BOSON

ALICE

JENNY

LUKE

NATALIE

KAREN

HENRI

GAVRIELLA BASTIANELLI/POLICEWOMAN

JOURNALIST/SONOGRAPHER

SCIENTISTS

Key

A forward slash (/) indicates an overlap in speech.

Words in brackets are spoken aloud but are incidental.

An asterisk (*) before a line indicates simultaneous speech.

A comma on its own line (,) indicates a beat. A beat is shorter than a pause. It can also denote a shift in thought or energy.

The text has been punctuated to serve the music of the play, not grammatical convention. Dashes are used sparingly and generally indicate a hard interruption.

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

ACT ONE

IN THE BEGINNING

Summer 2006. A house in Luton, England, beneath a flight path. JENNY, heavily pregnant. She walks, always in motion. ALICE sits. She is forty-one and JENNY is thirty-nine.

JENNY. Just it’s like waves.

ALICE. And but which part in particular is worrying you?

JENNY. It’s the part which, I think it’s mainly the part where it comes out.

ALICE. This is very natural Jenny.

JENNY. Mike says millions of women do it every day. He says ‘look at the animal kingdom’.

JENNY sits down.

ALICE. Don’t worry about Mike. He’s just feeling powerless and redundant.