About the Play:

Innocent Thoughts, Harmless Intentions is a full-length drama by John Heuer. This absorbing, theatrically innovative play contrasts the turbulent barracks life of a young soldier in a remote Alaskan outpost during the Korean conflict, with a second theme involving his mother's experiences with her straight-laced family as a pregnant, unmarried teen-ager 20 years earlier.

Innocent Thoughts, Harmless Intentions is a sometimes chilling exploration of the intertwinings of lives and conflicts. The central action of the play takes place in an army barracks in a remote Alaskan outpost during the Korean conflict. Restive from boredom and the numbing cold, the men, egged on by a sadistic corporal, turn on Paul Johnson, a "misfit" whose sensitivity and original turn of mind set him apart from the others. As the taunting of Johnson progresses from high-spirited pranks to near cruelty, a second story is unfolded in a small playing area downstage: A young girl, hidden away as she waits out her illegitimate pregnancy, laments the abandonment and indifference of her family and friends. She is Johnson's mother, whose heart-rending plight is echoed and extended in the parallel action of the army scenes, and through the shocking fate which, sadly but inevitably, befalls her son.

Innocent Thoughts, Harmless Intentions premiered in 1980 by the renowned Circle Repertory Company in New York City. This play contains a scene study staple for one woman and one man.

Cast: 2 women, 9 men

What people say:

"As acting and as drama it is one of the few unequivocally good nights I have had in the theatre this season… This is a play of style, compassion and thought." — New York Post

"An important new voice in the theatre…." — The Record

"Innocent Thoughts is the best play I have seen in many months. It's the type of thought-provoking, moving theater that I would see again and encourage friends to see." — Suburban Sun Times

About the Playwright:

John Michael Heuer is an American actor, playwright, and screenwriter. He also wrote for many television shows, including several popular soaps like Another World, Guiding Light, and As the World Turns. A 14-year resident playwright for the famed Circle Repertory Company, he lives with his wife in the Hudson River village of Hastings-On-Hudson.