About the Play:

HARD TO FIND BOOK, only a very limited number of copies are still available.

Bea's Niece is a full-length drama by David Gow. Rich storytelling, poignant character portraits and unconventional dialogue combine in an exploration into the mind of a female novelist, secluded in a mental hospital. She is surrounded by characters and happenings which challenge our understanding and perception. Bea's Niece is an engaging, illuminating psychological mystery.

Bea's Niece is the story of a novelist who must choose between the truth and her own perceptions of reality in order to survive mental illness. Set in a room in a mental health-care facility, it revolves around the strange world of Anne Hirsch, a successful novelist struggling to separate fantasy and reality as she's visited by her dead husband and a long-lost great aunt Bea. A free-spirited loose cannon who describes Anne's condition as "the family dilemma," Aunt Bea's etiquette and common sense require a woman to have on hand for all occasions: "...a bottle of whiskey, a well-oiled revolver and, as the rarest of treats, a stainless steel syringe with just the tiniest supply of opium." With rigour and humour, Bea's Niece deals with memory and grief, sanity and reality, psychology and spirituality.

Bea's Niece premiered in 1999 by the 25th Street Theatre in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan and has since been produced across Canada and in regional theatres throughout the US.

Cast: 3 female, 1 male

About the Playwright:

David Gow is a Canadian playwright. An actor since his youth, he also writes for the screen, directs in film and theatre, and produces for his own company.