MEN IN BLACK:
I've written a number of plays over the years but never had one produced. The nearest to success was one called "Men in Black" [1973, long before the film of the same name] which drew praise and a special interview (but not production) from the Abbey Theatre in Dublin. Too many characters, he said (aren't there always?), more suitable for TV, he said.
The only TV station that replied was the BBC who gave it even more elaborate praise but said it was more suitable for the Abbey Theatre in Dublin. I should send it there.
THE DOGS THAT FOLLOW
I lately tried the Abbey again with another play, the Dogs that Follow. Six months wait. Then a "summary", the contents of which made me realise that the reader had read only a part of the first Act. Damning with faint praise. Rejected.
So now, the text of the whole play is available for any drama group or theatre to produce for free.
The following message is on my Facebook page:
"Anyone interested in a new 2-act play "The Dogs that Follow"? Read it here. Would love if some drama group produced it. Please get in touch if you are interested.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1aGLX1Ke5tkUlRsc0pXR2NzX1E/view?usp=sharing"
MY SUMMARY
Here is a summary of the play THE DOGS THAT FOLLOW
Set in midsummer 1978 in the graveyard of Drumcliff Co Sligo Ireland where William Butler Yeats is buried.
The action is around another grave near Yeats's where RIC Sergeant Joe Duffy, his wife and two infants lie. The RIC were the Royal Irish Constabulary, the police force of the then governing British State in Ireland.
ACT ONE: Two teachers, Jim and Niall arrive from Dublin to tidy the grave. Friends but with different viewpoints on women and politics. They are working on this grave because Jim's wife, Maeve, is a niece of the dead infants buried there.
During the two friends' conversation on death, the politics of the day, love, the poetry and personality of Yeats and the bonds between women, it transpires that Jim's marriage is in deep trouble because he is living with his mother-in-law, Mabel.
Two female US students arrive to see the poet's grave and introduce a little banter
Jim's wife and mother-in-law, Mabel and Maeve, arrive at the grave. Mabel eventually insults Jim, rows with Maeve and has a panic attack - which always heralds trouble for Niall and Maeve's relationship.
ACT TWO: Night has fallen, Jim has fallen out with Maeve and is alone in the graveyard.He has three supernatural visitations: fairy dancers. a beautiful younger version of Mabel and, later, the ghost of WB Yeats.
"Young Mabel" tells Jim about her father's death from pneumonia after he had been left out all night by an IRA volunteer group and how no-one in Sligo attended his funeral because of fear. Jim is overcome with love or infatuation for young Mabel and at her invitation they make love.
In their encounter with Yeats, Jim and young Mabel ask him about his own influence on the rebels of 1916, They both question his support for violence in his plays. Jim asks for his opinions on women, especially how to handle the powerful bond between mother and daughter. Yeats responds adroitly.
As dawn breaks on the shortest night of the year and Niall has come with sleeping bags, Yeats and young Mabel fade away, Yeats shouting to the night his discovery of the new word, Ze, to replace “he or she”, - a subject on which he has soliloquised earlier in the night
Jim recounts to a worried Niall his sexual encounter with young Mabel and his discussion with Yeats.
Eventually old Mabel and Maeve arrive and are overcome with the warm reception given to old Mabel by Jim.
All is changed utterly for the better – or is it? We are left with Old Mabel's puzzling remark to Jim:
"Don't think I've forgotten what happened in the middle of the night!”
PS
THE PLAY'S TITLE comes from a contemptuous comment by Yeats in which he appears to compares men who are acceptable to certain types of haughty women as "dogs that follow at their heels".
I've written a number of plays over the years but never had one produced. The nearest to success was one called "Men in Black" [1973, long before the film of the same name] which drew praise and a special interview (but not production) from the Abbey Theatre in Dublin. Too many characters, he said (aren't there always?), more suitable for TV, he said.
The only TV station that replied was the BBC who gave it even more elaborate praise but said it was more suitable for the Abbey Theatre in Dublin. I should send it there.
THE DOGS THAT FOLLOW
I lately tried the Abbey again with another play, the Dogs that Follow. Six months wait. Then a "summary", the contents of which made me realise that the reader had read only a part of the first Act. Damning with faint praise. Rejected.
So now, the text of the whole play is available for any drama group or theatre to produce for free.
The following message is on my Facebook page:
"Anyone interested in a new 2-act play "The Dogs that Follow"? Read it here. Would love if some drama group produced it. Please get in touch if you are interested.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1aGLX1Ke5tkUlRsc0pXR2NzX1E/view?usp=sharing"
MY SUMMARY
Here is a summary of the play THE DOGS THAT FOLLOW
Set in midsummer 1978 in the graveyard of Drumcliff Co Sligo Ireland where William Butler Yeats is buried.
The action is around another grave near Yeats's where RIC Sergeant Joe Duffy, his wife and two infants lie. The RIC were the Royal Irish Constabulary, the police force of the then governing British State in Ireland.
ACT ONE: Two teachers, Jim and Niall arrive from Dublin to tidy the grave. Friends but with different viewpoints on women and politics. They are working on this grave because Jim's wife, Maeve, is a niece of the dead infants buried there.
During the two friends' conversation on death, the politics of the day, love, the poetry and personality of Yeats and the bonds between women, it transpires that Jim's marriage is in deep trouble because he is living with his mother-in-law, Mabel.
Two female US students arrive to see the poet's grave and introduce a little banter
Jim's wife and mother-in-law, Mabel and Maeve, arrive at the grave. Mabel eventually insults Jim, rows with Maeve and has a panic attack - which always heralds trouble for Niall and Maeve's relationship.
ACT TWO: Night has fallen, Jim has fallen out with Maeve and is alone in the graveyard.He has three supernatural visitations: fairy dancers. a beautiful younger version of Mabel and, later, the ghost of WB Yeats.
"Young Mabel" tells Jim about her father's death from pneumonia after he had been left out all night by an IRA volunteer group and how no-one in Sligo attended his funeral because of fear. Jim is overcome with love or infatuation for young Mabel and at her invitation they make love.
In their encounter with Yeats, Jim and young Mabel ask him about his own influence on the rebels of 1916, They both question his support for violence in his plays. Jim asks for his opinions on women, especially how to handle the powerful bond between mother and daughter. Yeats responds adroitly.
As dawn breaks on the shortest night of the year and Niall has come with sleeping bags, Yeats and young Mabel fade away, Yeats shouting to the night his discovery of the new word, Ze, to replace “he or she”, - a subject on which he has soliloquised earlier in the night
Jim recounts to a worried Niall his sexual encounter with young Mabel and his discussion with Yeats.
Eventually old Mabel and Maeve arrive and are overcome with the warm reception given to old Mabel by Jim.
All is changed utterly for the better – or is it? We are left with Old Mabel's puzzling remark to Jim:
"Don't think I've forgotten what happened in the middle of the night!”
PS
THE PLAY'S TITLE comes from a contemptuous comment by Yeats in which he appears to compares men who are acceptable to certain types of haughty women as "dogs that follow at their heels".
