About the Play:
The collection Plays by Anthony Clarvoe contains three full-length plays by Anthony Clarvoe. Included are the romantic comedy Let's Play Two; the thought-provoking drama The Living; and the riveting ripped-from-the-headlines drama Show and Tell, which is even more timely now, after the rash of school shootings Stateside and the escalating number of incidents of international terrorism.
Let's Play Two is a full-length comedy about baseball mania, bonding 34-year-old Grace with 28-year-old Phil. When not bellowing for the Atlanta Braves, the couple scrap over Grace's hard-bitten attitude versus Phil's optimistic one. An affecting romantic comedy about two totally opposite characters falling in love. (Cast: 1 female, 1 male)
Let's Play Two was first performed in 1992 South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa, California.
What people say:
"...Let's Play Two, Anthony Clarvoe's surprisingly affecting romantic comedy. Mr Clarvoe's low-key two-hander.... about a young woman made pregnant by an even younger man whose constancy she doubts has something to say about the notion of maturity. ...This may not be the most revolutionary concept ever considered on the American stage. Still, it's no shame to have basic human decency reiterated as a value now and again, especially when it is elucidated as compassionately as in Let's Play Two." — The New York Times
"Once in a while a play comes along that is so fresh, so different, so delightful, so damn charming it defies definition. you can't put your finger on what it is; but you sit there in the dark with a smile on your face from beginning to end, and talk about it all the way home. Let's Play Two is just such a play.... It's a simple story, really, about two totally opposite characters falling in love. That's it. That's all. But there are more spins on the development of their romance than there are on a champion pitcher's baseball. And it's their passionate love of 'the country's national pastime' that brought them together in the first place." — Drama-Logue
The Living explores London society during the Great Plague of 1665 as the Black Plague sweeps the city claiming more than 100,000 lives. This allegorical piece focuses on the individual and social forces that affect strategies for surviving a crisis. Clarvoe's script portrays the stories of individuals struggling to build a new community amid danger and personal loss. It was inspired by Daniel Defoe's A Journal of the Plague Year, Samuel Pepys's 1665 diaries and several other primary sources. Containing uncanny resonances with our experiences with COVID-19, Clarvoe's thought-provoking historical drama speaks to many contemporary issues and is ultimately filled with hope. (Cast: 2 female, 8 male)
The Living was first performed in 1993 by Denver Center Theatre Company in Colorado.
What people say:
"...The Living is not about death. Rather this remarkable, riveting drama is a compelling confirmation of life. And although it's set more than three centuries ago, Anthony Clarvoe's two-act parable (in which the reactions of the people and the government parallel those surrounding today's AIDS epidemic), maintains... stunning immediacy.... Often bitterly funny, often ineffably sad, this is the story of a few brave sometimes reluctantly so people who stood fast, doing what need to be done.... Propelled by Clarvoe's masterful handling of language...." — The Denver Post
"The play The Living is alive with lessons for tomorrow. Set in London in the bubonic plague year of 1665, the play is a scary morality tale, a ghoulish slice of history and an evening shining with hope.... Inevitably, the world wakes up from nightmares and learns to dance and grumble again. Clarvoe's play reveals much in its simple retelling of a real horror. The Londoners of 1665 knew nothing about the causes of the plague. In the end, it passed, as all things do. The lesson in The Living is about being tested and not being found wanting." — Rocky Mountain News
"...Clarvoe's thought-provoking script, which not only celebrates the strength of courage and compassion in a climate of overwhelming fear, but has a clear parallel in this country's muddled response to the dire beginning of the AIDS crisis...." — Back Stage West
Show And Tell: One morning, just before show-and-tell time, an instructor in a small suburban grade school leaves her students momentarily to retrieve her autoharp from the faculty lounge. In her absence an unimaginable and catastrophic event occurs. What follows is an intriguing crime scene investigation with a well-travelled forensics team joining with parents and teachers to track down the origin of the disaster. Show and Tell addresses issues that are both current and timeless. We are asked: what are the events we choose to remember; how do we decide (what do we keep) to remember them; what is our individual responsibility to each other in a crisis; what should the government's response be; how do we deal with survivors' guilt; how do we place blame for such a horrifying event? Despite the seeming darkness of the theme, there is humour, human attraction, and even redemption in the play. (Cast: 4 female, 2 male)
Show And Tell was first performed in 1992 by Repertory Theatre of St. Louis in Missouri.
What people say:
"All school kids — and their parents — know about 'Show and Tell'. Bringing objects from home is not only a lesson in history, but also an experience in contact, of one person reaching for another and the other reaching back. Playwright Anthony Clarvoe understands it too, and his drama is a powerful tale of contact, and of discovery, and of what it takes to survive. Corey teaches fourth grade, and her classroom literally explodes one morning during show-and-tell. The entire class of twenty-four children dies, but she had left the room for a moment, and survives. A team of government forensics experts arrives to re-assemble the bodies for identification and to seek the cause of the explosion.... They are tough and experienced, with the sardonic wit that they, and others who work constantly with death, need to survive. Show And Tell is a strong, well-written drama that is both entertaining and thought-provoking." — Saint Louis Post Dispatch
About the Playwright:
Anthony Clarvoe is an award-winning American playwright. His work has been produced or received commissions at Mark Taper Forum, Playwrights’ Horizons, Signature Theatre, TheatreWorks, San Jose Repertory Theatre, and The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, among others.