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Is Life Worth Living? (aka Drama at Inish)
Is Life Worth Living? (aka Drama at Inish)
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Author: Lennox Robinson Publisher: Samuel French Format: Softcover # of Pages: 91 Pub. Date: 1938 ISBN-10: 0573610762 ISBN-13: 9780573610769 Cast Size: 5 women, 8 men
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About the Play:
Is Life Worth Living? is a full-length comedy by Lennox
Robinson. A pair of married
actors heading up a troupe of travelling
players in Ireland who bring their high-toned repertory of Russian
and Scandinavian drama to the seaside resort town of Inish.
Is Life Worth Living? is a gloriously goofy comedy that imagines the undesirable effects a steady diet of serious drama might have on the amiable residents of the small, seaside, Irish village of Inish. Can Chekhov, Strindberg and
Ibsen be bad for you? That provocative question is posed in Is
Life Worth Living? (sometimes
billed as Drama at Inish). Usually the Summer theatrical season at Inish has consisted of rude, low comedy, but this year the fun begins when the town elders decide to improve the tone of the place. Enter Hector de la Mare and his wife Constance Constantia of the De La Mare Repertory Company – committed exclusively to "psychological and introspective drama: the great plays of Russia, an Ibsen or two, a little Strindberg; because," as Hector puts it, "they may revolutionize some person's soul." Whether or not the souls of Inish require revolution is the question this comedy poses while delightfully exaggerating and celebrating the transformative power of the theater. After
a week or so of Ibsen, Chekhov, and Strindberg, the town is driven
mad. The steady diet of
"psychological and introspective drama" leads to an
outbreak of crime, violence and irrational acts of morality. The the
amiable residents start to
develop neuroses, complexes and inhibitions like the characters of
the plays.
Is Life Worth
Living? premiered in 1933 at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin as Drama
at Inish, but in London and on Broadway it was called Is Life Worth
Living? It played on Broadway three times in the 1930's and was successfully revived Off-Broadway in 2009 by New
York’s Mint Theatre Company. It had a successful run at the Shaw
Festival in 2011.
Cast: 5 women, 8 men
About the Playwright:
Lennox Robinson (1886-1958) was an Irish dramatist, poet
and theatre producer and director. A prolific playwright and one-time
manager of Ireland’s renowned Abbey Theatre, he was equally adept
at comedy and tragedy, a talent that shines through the poignant
laughter of his popular play Is Life Worth Living?
(sometimes billed as Drama
at Inish). |
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