About
the Play:
Winner of the 2004 Governor General's Award for Drama (Canadian
equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize)
Girl in the Goldfish Bowl is a full-length comedic drama by
Morris Panych. The play is set in the 1960s and tells the
story of a precocious preteen's last few days of childhood. Her
goldfish goes missing, her mother leaves and the Cuban Missile Crisis
starts. At the same time, a mysterious man appears who she believes
is her goldfish reincarnated and can bring her family together again.
Girl in the Goldfish Bowl tells the story of a young girl,
Iris, who is preoccupied with the events leading up to what she
describes as "the last few days of my childhood." After the
death of her goldfish, Amahl, broken-hearted Iris finds a man washed
up on the beach and thinks he is the reincarnation of her beloved
pet. She brings the elusive stranger, Mr. Lawrence, back to her home
thinking he can bring her divided family together again. It is into
the goldfish bowl of this dysfunctional family of lethargic piranhas,
existential bottom-feeders, and aggressive guppies that the audience
peers with incredulity, acute recognition, hysterical laughter, and
an overwhelming sense of the creative healing power of the
imagination.
Girl in the Goldfish Bowl premiered in 2002 at the Arts
Club Theatre Company in Vancouver. Since
then the play has been produced widely at
professional theatres throughout Canada, the U.S., Europe, Asia,
Australia and New Zealand, and
has been mounted by community theatres and colleges as a showcase of
student talent.
Cast: 3 women, 2 men
What people say:
"The Girl In The Goldfish
Bowl is a Canadian modern classic that taps the glass of
life and see what flounders and what rises to the surface."
— Prince George Citizen
"…beneath the humour and
moments of pure farce there is a fascinating study of that sad moment
when childhood is lost and innocence is replaced by experience."
— John Highfield, The Stage Co. (UK)
"Arguably Morris Panych's
best play to date." — Canadian Literature
"Emotionally waterlogged…
We soak up [Iris’s] story as seen through her eyes – the
distorted, confused, yet extremely perceptive eyes of a child
desperate to keep her broken family together… a memory play where
reality and fantasy swim and churn together in a
theatre-of-the-absurd style that examines the existential themes but,
at its heart, is a child’s recollection of a traumatic experience
through dysfunction and abandonment." — The Sault
Star
"An uncommon, quirky blend of
humour and compassion…" — National Post
"A quirky cocktail consisting
of equal parts Pinter, Orton, and Disney, shaken by author-director
Morris Panych in his own distinctive style."
— Variety
About the Playwright:
Morris Panych is one of Canada's most significant
contemporary playwrights. He has written more than 25 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.