Chi è di scena
Snake in the Grass
uno spettacolo di Alan Ayckbourn
presentato in inglese da Wonderwall Entertainment
regia di Michael Fitzpatrick
dal 24 al 29 aprile 2018
ore 20,30, sabato e domenica ore 17,30
Produced by Special arrangement with Samuel French Ltd.
Biglietti: Intero € 15,00 -
ridotto € 13,00 -
Bambini e studenti € 10,00
Info e prenotazioni: wonderwallenter@gmail.com Tel: 347-8248661
First performed at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, June 2002, the play revolves around two sisters, Annabel who returns to the family home shortly after their father's death and her younger sister Miriam who still lives there. Annabel comes back to a series of unsettling surprises while her sister seems to be rather scatty and naive - but is she really? The two sisters are also blackmailed by their father’s former nurse Alice, who claims to have been purposely fired by Miriam and demands compensation. The plot gradually unravels with a series of sensational turns and twists of events, leaving the audience in suspense until the very end. Snake in the Grass is a thriller but also a black comedy and play raising uncomfortable questions about whether abusive love is preferable to no love at all. It may also be a ghost story or possibly not, it would be wrong to give anything away. In Ayckbourn’s own words “the phantoms lie within us, born out of a past that continues to haunt us”.
Snake in the Grass was written as a female companion piece to the 1994 play Haunting Julia, in 2008 these two plays, together with a new play Life and Beth were folded into a trilogy named Things That Go Bump.
"A creepily, scarily, eerily enjoyable evening."
- Sunday Times
"It's a suspense drama about murder, blackmail and haunting; there is depth and subtlety..."
- Financial Times
"Subtle and powerful."
- The Guardian
“Snake In the Grass surprisingly ends up having more in common with Hamlet than Gaslight."
- Plays International
Extract from the Author’s note
“A few years ago I wrote a short play called Haunting Julia. It was a departure for me on two counts. It had a cast of only three men, the first time I had written a ‘single sex’ play, and it was, in part at least, a ghost story. Here, eight years later, is its ‘sister’ counterpart “Snake in the Grass”. On the whole, the scholarly departments of the literary and dramatic worlds tend to be a little stuffy about certain genres of fiction. Crime novels, science fiction stories and, in theatre, comedies or farces as well easily dismissed as if they were some alternative easy option to the real thing; the poor relations of serious, heavier literary or dramatic works.
I’m still recovering from the question asked of me by a journalist (some years ago, admittedly) as to whether I had any ambitions to write a serious play. I have this maxim that to be truly respectable as a comic dramatist you need to be dead preferably for several hundred years. Once time has rendered all the best jokes completely unintelligible, then the scholars really come into their own.
As for the humble thriller, those are the ones that many read or watch but few ever own up to, of course. Yet it seems a curious distinction to make. Can’t serious things be said equally validly whilst gripping, bewitching or reducing an audience to tears of laughter? (…) The answer is, of course, yes. Just as, conversely, a so-called ‘serious’ piece of work can occasionally end up saying absolutely nothing of any relevance so a good detective thriller can often say a good deal (…).”
- Alan Ayckbourn, from the original programme, June 2002
Presentazione e Sinossi
Nell’ambito della rassegna del teatro in lingua Inglese al Teatro San Genesio, va in scena dal 24 al 29 Aprile 2018, l'opera incisiva e mordente di Alan Ayckbourn, Snake in the Grass, per la regia di Michael Fitzpatrick e presentata da Wonderwall Entertainment (compagnia filantropica dedita alla promozione di eventi artistici e culturali). Snake in the Grass è una pièce singolare di Ayckbourn, grandissimo e pluripremiato drammaturgo britannico dalla penna acuta, divertente e pungente. Scritta nel 2002, combina un sottile e potente umorismo nero alla suspense di un thriller dai risvolti suggestivi, a tratti inaspettatamente comici e dal finale inaspettato. Nello sfondo una denuncia chiara ed evidente del dramma degli abusi nei confronti delle donne.
La trama si svolge attorno alle sorelle Annabel e Miriam. La prima ritorna nella casa di famiglia dopo moltissimi anni di assenza, in seguito alla morte del padre. Appena arrivata, si imbatte in Alice, ex infermiera del padre, la quale accusa Miriam di averla licenziata per poter uccidere il padre e chiede alle sorelle un risarcimento di 100.000 sterline. Da questo incontro-scontro inziale si snoda una storia di intrecci, sotterfugi e rivelazioni che terrà il pubblico con il fiato sospeso fino all’ultimo, svelando verità e retroscena a sorpresa.
Inizialmente scritta come risposta in chiave femminile del precedente Haunting Julia con tre personaggi maschili, Snake in The Grass è una pièce acclamata da pubblico e critica, riscuotendo favore e successo. Le due pièce assieme all’opera Life & Beth furono in seguito unite nella trilogia The Things That Go Bump.