A SAMUEL FRENCH, INC. TITLE

The Sonic Life of a Giant Tortoise

Full-Length Play, Dramatic Comedy  /  2w, 3m

Aya Ogawa, Toshiki Okada

by Toshiki Okada
translated by Aya Ogawa

The Sonic Life of a Giant Tortoise probes the everyday lives of urban adults. Everything seems comfortable – jobs, relationships. But beneath the surface runs a powerful undercurrent of longing.

The Sonic Life of a Giant Tortoise

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  • Cast Size
    Cast Size
    2w, 3m
  • Duration
    Duration
    90 minutes
  • SubGenre
    Subgenre
    Fables/Folktales
  • Audience
    Target Audience
    Adult, Teen (Age 14 - 18)

Details

Summary
A man dreams that his girlfriend is dead. Not because he wants to kill her but because he imagines his life would be more meaningful to have a girlfriend who has died. A woman dreams she is riding the subway, forever. She arrives at a mysterious gathering deep underground, and when she returns to her real life, she finds that decades have gone by and her boyfriend is aged and dying. The Sonic Life of a Giant Tortoise is a modern folktale set against an urban landscape, about our collective longing for the extraordinary, and the mundanity of everyday life.
History

The American premiere of Sonic Life of a Giant Tortoise was produced by PlayCo, and presented at Jack, under the direction of Dan Rothenberg. 

Keywords
Performing Groups
ACTOR 1
ACTOR 2
ACTOR 3
ACTRESS 1
ACTRESS 2
  • Time Period Contemporary, Present Day, New Millennium/21st Century
  • Features Contemporary Costumes / Street Clothes
  • Additional Features No intermission
  • Duration 90 minutes
  • Cautions
    • Mild Adult Themes

Media

REVIEWS

"CRITIC'S PICK. A reverie of a play." - The New York Times, Read More

"These are the serious questions, and I, like the characters may be sleeping through them. In those moments, the play feels like a knife in the gut." - Time Out New York, Read More

"Maybe it's our fate to always wish for more, but Okada hits that something more is all around us, if only we could step outside ourselves and see." - The Village Voice, Read More

"Toshiki Okada is the Thornton Wilder for the Google generation." - NY Theatre Now, Read More

Videos

  • THE SONIC LIFE OF A GIANT TORTOISE youtube thumbnail

    THE SONIC LIFE OF A GIANT TORTOISE

Licensing & Materials

  • Minimum Fee: $120 per performance

Scripts

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Authors

Aya Ogawa

Aya Ogawa
Aya Ogawa is a Brooklyn-based writer, director, translator and performer. As a playwright and director, her play Serendipity was the winner of the Kennedy Center/American College Theatre Festival and finalist at Humana Festival. Eating Dirt was produced at SoHo Rep, and she ...
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Toshiki Okada

Toshiki Okada
Toshiki Okada was born in Yokohama in 1973 and formed the theater company 'chelfitsch' in 1997. Since then he has written and directed all of the company's productions, practicing a distinctive methodology for creating plays, and has come to be known for his use of hyper-coll ...
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