Author(s): BREALEY DARREN

New Poetry & Verse

This book holds a very interesting group of plays. They seem to hit their targets very precisely, as the settings do not have a locale-specific context. FERGUS' ENVY invites us to the eccentric Lord Florien Thurst's mansion where a week-long birthday party is in full swing for his pet dog, Fergus. THE STAIR has a nice Kafkaesque, Pinteresque, Beckettesque feeling of menacing pointlessness. Darren Brealey's sharp, all-encompassing vision takes us swiftly from a smart drawing-room 'house party' scenario to a car repair shop at the witching hour (lunch time), and thence to the lounge area of a multiplex cinema. THE CHICKS is like a glimpse into another and more dreadful world, but alas, truthful. Cynical? You could say. When one of the characters in DISTURBING MAVIS exits pursued by a bier, you know you have a playwright with a special take on life. Be warned, the personalities portrayed in Performing The Goat might actually exist - what a tragedy that would be. Richly humorous, sometimes extreme in its language, and devastating in its portrayal of social pitfalls, this collection of one-acters will make you laugh out loud, and then wonder about it all. 'The Goat' in the title is surely a reference to the Greek tragos, which gave us tragedy ... something you may feel tinges many of our lifetime antics.