About the Play:

Winner of the 1998 Jessie Richardson Award for Outstanding Original Play, The Sydney Risk Award

7 Stories is a full-length comedy by Morris Panych. A man stands on the seventh floor of a tall building. He is about to jump. He contemplates his death. He is interrupted by the colourful characters of the seventh floor, who are too preoccupied with their own existence to bother about the life of man prepared to end it all. A phenomenal Canadian play filled with interesting characters, great life lessons and a man trying to make sense of it all. Particularly suitable for schools and play contests.

7 Stories takes a satirical look at life from the peculiar perspective of a man who has a bird's-eye view of the world. Imagine standing on a seventh-storey building ledge, considering jumping, when you're interrupted by a couple bickering in the window next to you about a wallet. Fast-paced, full of energy, great one-liners, and a wonderful parade of characters, a leap of faith never had more surprising results. Endlessly interrupted by a variety of quirky building residents, he becomes drawn into the absurdity of their daily lives. So self-absorbed are his neighbours, that no one even bothers to ask why he's out there! In 7 Stories, Canada's king of eccentric dark comedy creates a meta-theatrical gem, full of fanciful characters. This quick-witted, absurdist tragicomedy will have your audience philosophizing about life and death, right up to its existential conclusion.

7 Stories premiered in 1989 at the Arts Club Theatre in Vancouver to enthusiastic response from audiences and critics alike and has become Morris Panych's most produced play; it won the Jessie Richardson Award for Outstanding Original Play (British Columbia's Tonys) in 1990. Since then the play has been produced widely at professional theatres throughout Canada, the U.S., Europe, Asia, Australia and New Zealand, and is regularly performed in repertory, college, high school and community theatre productions.

Cast: 2 female, 3 male

What people say:

"The play opens with a man in a suit standing on the seventh-storey ledge of a building, about to jump. Suddenly a window flies open, and a succession of inhabitants prattle on about the ups and downs of their own day, seemingly oblivious of the life and death scenario playing out before them. Provocative, cynical, whimsical, absurdist, Morris Panych has defined contemporary Canadian theatre in tone and form. He's ... lived or had work produced in virtually every province — a true Canadian all-star." — The Book of Lists

"Morris Panych's 7 Stories is a sweet and funny little play about a man on an apartment building's window ledge whose deliberations, presumably about whether to jump, keep being interrupted by nutty residents who poke their heads out of windows. How do you know this is a well-conceived work? Because each of the interlopers seems interesting enough to be the subject of a play as well." — The New York Times

"Panych's text delivers: It is funny, philosophical, often poetic and shows no signs of dating." — The Globe and Mail

"Twenty years after its creation, 7 Stories seems more entertaining and yet more relevant than ever. It's the kind of fate that every author should enjoy." — Toronto Star

"Morris Panych's 7 Stories, which premiered at the Arts Club's Seymour Street Theatre in 1989, is still standing proud artistically – and it will no doubt remain a lovely, always precariously balanced monument to frailty and hope." — The Georgia Straight

About the Playwright:

Morris Panych is one of Canada's most significant contemporary playwrights. He has written more than 30 works for the stage and directed nearly 100. He is the winner of two Governor General's Literary Awards for Drama, the country's most prestigious literary honour. He has won 14 Jessie Richardson Awards, three Sidney Riske Writing Awards and five Dora Mavor Moore Awards.