Playground is Downstage Left’s latest venture: the beginning of a series of experimental performances, based on topics we all can recognise. We started with perhaps the most universal theme of them all: love, or the lack thereof, and the age old question: How can you make love stay?
Downstage Left welcomes you to an evening of entertainment, laughter and possibly a few (happy) tears. We present a hand-picked selection of one-acts, sourced from five inspiring playwrights, from the well-versed Christopher Durang and the versatile Michael Frayn, to a troop of lesser-known, aspiring young writers from the New York based CRY HAVOC collective: Kitt Lavoie, Sharon E. Cooper and Jerzy Gwiazdowski.
Where and when?
Love in Pieces played on January 17 & 24, 2019, at De Nieuwe Anita
The running order:
[pwnd] (K. Lavoie):
With João Calado, Brian Ligthart & Katharina Olsen.
Directed by Ben Evans
Pig in the Middle (M. Frayn):
With Silvia Pietrosanti & Ben Evans
Directed by Andy Cowie
In the Meantime (S. E. Cooper):
With Borislava Todorova & Andy Cowie
Directed by Ben Evans
All Over Me (J. Gwiazdowski):
With Silvia Pietrosanti & Denis Burke
Directed by Andy Cowie
Wanda’s Visit (C. Durang):
With Borislava Todorova, Denis Burke, Katharina Olsen, Brian Ligthart, Ben Evans & Andy Cowie
Directed by João Calado
[Stage and backstage: Yulia Prokhorova and Annika Van Der Vegt]
The plays All over Me, [pwnd] & In the Meantime were developed with The CRY HAVOC Company (www.cryhavoccompany.org).
Wanda’s Visit is a short play by Christopher Durang (1986). This amateur production is presented by arrangement with Josef Weinberger Limited
Praise:
“Love in Pieces” was a feast of entertainment. Five one-act plays about the struggles and absurdities of love. All the acting and directing was marvelous! The second play “Pig in the Middle” was language-wise the most eloquent. Ben Evans and Silvia Pietrosanti found exactly the right tone to communicate their miscommunication. The last play “Wanda’s Visit” took the house down with a stunningly funny bubbling and surprising Borislava Todorova who stole the show. Playing a self-invited failed sex bomb invading the house of her former high-school boyfriend, played very subtly and cooly by Denis Burke, locked in a boring middle class marriage, we watch a storm of feminine manipulation, as the folder says, “rock like a hurricane”.
– Michael
Thought I was just going to see my study mate on stage and didn’t have any expectations but the play turned out amazing! So if you’re in Amsterdam and you like theater (and even if you do not yet), I really recommend seeing it. Touching, funny, well played and well written! Not to mention the amazing location
– Marina
Funny, witty, original and talented bunch of people.
– Dimitar
Downstage Left 