About the Play:
Detroit was a Finalist
for Pulitzer Prize and a Finalist for Susan Smith Blackburn Prize
Detroit is a full-length dark comedy by Lisa D'Amour.
When Sharon and Kenny move into a long-empty house in the suburbs of
an American city, they are welcomed by neighbours Ben and Mary. But,
fuelled by alcohol and backyard barbecues, their new friendship veers
rapidly out of control as inhibitions are obliterated, laying bare
the fragility of Ben and Mary's off-the-shelf lifestyle.
Detroit is a wicked satire about our uncertain economic
times. In a first-ring suburb just outside a city that might be
Detroit, barely middle class Ben and Mary see
sudden signs of life at the deserted house next door and invite their
new neighbours Sharon and Kenny over for a barbecue. The
neighbourly connection they find threatens Ben and Mary's notion of
the values that have long kept them on the straight and narrow middle
class path as it is revealed that Sharon and Kenny met at rehab,
neither is employed, and they don't own a stick of furniture. The
quintessential American back-yard party soon veers out of control,
shattering the fragile hold that newly unemployed Ben and burgeoning
alcoholic Mary have on their way of life – with unexpected comic
consequences. Detroit is a fresh, offbeat look at what happens
when we dare to open ourselves up to something new.
Detroit premiered in 2010 at the Steppenwolf Theatre
Company in Chicago. Since
then the play ran Off-Broadway
in fall
2012 at Playwrights Horizons, made its UK premiere that same year at
the National Theatre in London, and
has been mounted by community theatres.
Cast: 2 women, 3 men
What people say:
"Detroit is a
brilliantly observed piece of art about a particular time and place.
That time is now – and by now I mean the current post-recessionary
America. That place is a pair of backyards in the suburb of a great
American city that has been rocked on its heels." — The
Chicago Tribune
"…sly, timely and neatly
surprising ... very much an of-the-moment American play ... D'Amour
perfectly captures a certain pervasive lifestyle of today: atomized,
mediated, ersatz and culturally leveled ... cascading, hilarious
monologues and minutely calibrated chitchat." — Time
Out NY
"A sharp X-ray of the
embattled American psyche as well as a smart, tart critique of the
country's fraying social fabric, Ms. D'Amour's dark comedy is as rich
and addictively satisfying as a five-layer dip served up with a
brimming bowl of tortilla chips." — New York Times
"…totally nails the great,
deep malaise of middle-class suburbia, with a sustained energy and a
wicked eye for telling details ... funny as hell." — New
York Post
"Convincing and compelling and
tartly funny.... This may well be the most effective play yet
produced about our current economic doldrums." — Variety
"…a tense, terrific, funny
new play." — New York Observer
"…savvy, frequently poetic,
and ultimately bittersweet…." — TheaterMania.com
About the Playwright:
Lisa D'Amour is an Obie Award winning American playwright
and one half of Pearl Damour, an interdisciplinary performance
company she runs with Katie Pearl. Her play Detroit was a
Pulitzer Prize Finalist. Her work has been produced by theaters such
as Steppenwolf Theatre, Children s Theater Company, Clubbed Thumb,
the Walker Arts Center, and the Kitchen. She received her MFA in
playwriting from the University of Texas at Austin and currently
splits her time between Brooklyn and New Orleans.