The Birthday Party

A SAMUEL FRENCH, INC. TITLE

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Concord Theatricals

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Cast Size

2w, 4m
Target Audience

Adult, Teen (Age 14 - 18)

Details

Summary

Meg and Petey live in a small seaside boarding house with their boarder, a strange chap named Stanley. Two strangers, a sleek man named Goldberg and his musclebound henchman McCann, arrive unexpectedly. Meg naively accommodates them with a room, and decides to arrange a birthday party for Stanley. At the party, Goldberg and McCann play cruel games with the boarder, breaking his glasses, making a buffoon of him and ultimately pushing him over the psychotic precipice. The next morning, Stanley, reduced to a gibbering idiot, meekly leaves with the two men.

History

The Birthday Party premiered at the Arts Theatre in Cambridge, England, on April 28, 1958. The play made its Broadway debut at Booth Theatre on October 3, 1967.

Keywords

PETEY – A man in his sixties
MEG – A woman in her sixties
STANLEY – A man in his late thirties
LULU – A girl in her twenties
GOLDBERG – A man in his fifties
McCANN – A man of thirty

Time Period 1950s
Setting The living room of a house in a seaside town in England.

Media

“Fascinating... menacing, ominous and evocative of some dark and threatening doom.” – New York Post

“The most interesting play to be seen on Broadway.” – The New York Times

ON BREAKING CHARACTER

10 Plays for University Students
Cathy Thomas
April 10, 2019

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Authors

Harold Pinter

Harold Pinter (1930-2008) was born in London on October 10, 1930. He lived with Antonia Fraser from 1975 until his death on Christmas Eve 2008. (They were married in 1980).

After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and the Central School of Speech and Drama, he worke ...

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The Birthday Party