Science fiction

6m, 6f

Int.

This is science-fiction but with an important difference. It is set, not in outer space or in some imagined future era, but in the here-and-now. And there are no special effects, fanciful costumes, or complicated props to build; the action is confined to an ordinary living room set. The story concerns Professor Lucius Brandon and his likable family, and the strange and exciting events that occur in their home during one fateful afternoon and evening. Brandon is a top-flight physicist who has been working on a very hush-hush government project known as "Operation Milky Way." A mysterious woman who calls herself Countess Fraschetti has recently occupied an isolated desert house about five miles from the Brandons. There are whispers that the Countess is not what she pretends to be, and there are some who swear that they have seen flying saucers landing on her private airstrip. The Countess arrives at the Brandon house to pay a neighborly visit (so she says), and it is this arrival that sets in motion the fantastic yet always believable occurrences that follow. Slowly, as one tense scene succeeds another, the audience becomes aware that there is something going on here outside the limits of ordinary human experience. What that something is finally becomes explicit in the explosive, hair-raising climax to one of the most unusual plays we have ever published.

FEE: $75 per performance.