About the Play:

Smash: An Adaptation of George Bernard Shaw's Novel An Unsocial Socialist is a full-length comedy by Jeffrey Hatcher. This political comedy features a runaway groom who ditches his bride at the alter so he can overthrow the British government. However, when he chooses to begin the revolt at a women's college, he is taught amusing lessons in both love and war. Buckle up for a witty face-off between socialism and capitalism, intermingled with some battle-of-the-sexes fun.

Smash is an adaptation of George Bernard Shaw's novel An Unsocial Socialist, set at the twilight of Edwardian England, in 1910. The story centres on Sidney Trefusis, a very wealthy young man who leaves his bride, Henrietta, on their wedding day so he fulfill his duty to save England by starting a socialist revolution. He declares only two possibilities for Britain's future: "Socialism or Smash." Sidney vanishes "underground" – disguises himself as a grounds keeper and infiltrates Alton College, a girls' school where well-bred young women are "fitted and fatted to be put on the marriage market." His plan: Take over the school and plant the seed of radical Socialism into the fertile brains of the future consorts of cabinet ministers and kings. Henrietta, however, disagrees with his plan to use women to revolutionize the country – shouldn't they be allowed to decide their own political fate without the urgings of a man? What Sidney doesn't plan on is the presence of one Agatha Wylie, a rebellious finishing school pupil, who falls hopelessly in love with both Sidney and his politics, and just happens to be his deserted wife's cousin. Love triangles, mistaken identity, and outrageous characters make this British farce a jolly good time in the theatre.

Smash premiered in 1996 at the Intiman Theatre in Seattle, Washington. It received a variety of favourable reviews and has become a popular choice for high school and college theatre productions as a showcase of student talent.

Cast: 5 female, 5 male

What people say:

"Smash is witty, cunning, intelligent, and skillful. It is also generous, something cleverness isn't always. Like Tom Stoppard, the author makes you the audience feel just as clever as he. Brillliant writing." — Seattle Weekly

"Smash is a wonderfully high-style British comedy of manners that evokes the world of Shaw's high-minded heroes and heroines, but shaped by a postmodern sensibility … The result is uncanny, a hybrid with two voices that, depending on your reference points, either feels like the practice of channeling or more like a well-thought-out (albeit posthumous) artistic collaboration." — Seattle Herald

"The story mixes equal parts political comedy with comedy of manners…it is a sparkling evening of Shaw for our post-Stoppard age, with loads of clever wordplay and impassioned debate about the structure of society and the preferred form of change … a fine evening out in high Shavian fashion." — Backstage

About the Playwright:

Jeffrey Hatcher is an award-winning American writer for stage, screen, and television. He grew up in Ohio before attending New York University to study acting. After a brief career on stage, he turned his attention to writing. His many award-winning plays, original and adaptations, have been performed on Broadway, off-Broadway and in theatres around the world.

George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although born in Ireland, he spent most of his adult life in England, and wrote more than 60 plays for the English stage. He won the 1925 Nobel Prize for Literature, the highest honour available to any writer in the world, and an Academy Award for the screenplay of Pygmalion in l938.