A SAMUEL FRENCH, INC. TITLE

Lost Generation

Full-Length Play, Dark Comedy  /  1w, 2m

NOTICE: Please be advised, this title is being made available now in manuscript form prior to its publication.

  • Cast Size
    Cast Size
    1w, 2m
  • Duration
    Duration
    120 minutes (2 hours)
  • Audience
    Target Audience
    Adult, Teen (Age 14 - 18)

Details

Summary
The complex and dangerous friendship of Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald with Ernest Hemingway is traced in this funny, surreal and dark play which presents their evolving attractions, entanglements, jealousies, conflicts, and madness. Scott worships Ernest and wishes he could be as strong a man and pure an artist as he imagines Ernest to be, but also tries to justify his sense that he has prostituted his talent to cheap popular magazines so he can finance the expensive life style Zelda needs. Ernest has some grudging respect for Scott's talent, but only contempt for the way Scott conducts his career and his life, and tries to convince Scott that Zelda is jealous of Scott's talent and secretly is trying to destroy him. Zelda loves Scott but thinks he behaves like a fool, and sees Ernest as a fake who is himself trying to destroy Scott. There is repressed sexual tension flying around in all directions, as the three of them work their way through an increasingly disturbing series of triangular struggles. Zelda's French lover keeps buzzing the house in his airplane. Ernest tries to convince Scott that Zelda should be put in a madhouse. Zelda makes fun of Ernest's exaggeratedly masculine pose, his passions for guns and bullfights, and his desperate ambition. They are strong and weak in turn, liars and truth tellers, mad and brilliant, each in their own way, and each is moving towards an inevitable self destruction that the others both facilitate and try to prevent. The play moves like an intense dream, a struggle over art, sex, fame, power and madness.
Cast Attributes
  • Time Period 1920s
  • Features Contemporary Costumes / Street Clothes
  • Additional Features Not Applicable
  • Duration 120 minutes (2 hours)
  • Cautions
    • Mild Adult Themes

Music

  • Musical Style N/A (Not a musical)

Licensing & Materials

  • Minimum Fee: $110 per performance

Scripts

Available Formats:

Add-Ons

Take a look below at how you can enhance your show!

Authors

Don Nigro

Don Nigro is among the most frequently published and widely produced playwrights in the world and has continued to build a deeply interrelated and diverse body of dramatic literature, employing a wide variety of dramatic conventions and styles of presentation. He has written ...

View full profile

Now Playing