About the Play:

Stuck is a full-length drama by David Rubinoff. Follows a chemically dependent unemployed actor, on a desperate journey in search of money, drugs and alcohol. As he wanders the streets of Toronto, his series of wild encounters include nuns on the make, Mormons on the hustle, venal directors, and a host of venereal and utterly unforgettable characters. Events build until they finally bring him face to face with his own last chance – to get unstuck.

Stuck is a solo-show written in gritty, rhythmic language. It charts the rollicking roller-coaster odyssey of Jack, who thinks he's the Canuck Kerouac, but he's just a struggling actor looking for sex, drugs, and cash. New York and heartbreak have nothing on the mean streets of Toronto if you're a down-on-your-luck actor. Jack treads a boulevard of broken dreams as he searches for the ultimate fix, a fresh start and, ultimately, himself. Taking place over an incredibly surreal day, Stuck follows its hero through a series of wild encounters that include flaming telephones, Irish gangsters, little old ladies and randy nuns. William S. Burroughs makes an appearance, as do Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac – prophets of the Beats, purveyors of a drug-and-sex-laced freedom. Stuck is a showy vehicle with a high-performance engine about the vagabondage of the actor's life.

Stuck began in 1996 as hit show at the Toronto Fringe Festival that toured across Canada. Its US premiere struck some critical sparks in 1997 at HERE Theatre off-off-Broadway in New York City. The European premiere earned some worthwhile plaudits in 2001 at the Focus Theatre during the Dublin Fringe Festival. Stuck picked up the Chalmers Play Award in Toronto where it was originally performed and was critically acclaimed in New York and Dublin by every major newspaper. It had a sell out run in each of these places. Since then it has often been performed as a "pop-up" fringe play to spotlight a local actor.

Cast: 1 male

What people say:

"Stuck is alternately humorous and pathetic... It features a twisting narrative structure and unexpected revelations rich in poetry, wit and humanity... A piece of theatre that grabs you by the throat and does not let go to the very end." — Variety

"Raw poetry and frantic energy…. Rubinoff produces this very hard if realistic view of humanity with a stream of poetry inspired by beat and rap, seamlessly incorporating passages of hallucination and dream into the already surreal narrative. …Stuck is a real shocker, one of those brief evenings of theatre that grab you by the throat and drag you into their world, whether or not you wish to go." — The Globe and Mail

"Playwright David Rubinoff, through his use of internal rhymes and bizarre associations, has constructed a one-man solo opera. Jack is given soaring prose arias wherein the mind is released to run amuck through the winding labyrinth of an altered reality. They're held together by quieter recitative that is no less attention grabbing, but serves to move this tale along." — Vue Weekly (Edmonton)

"David Rubinoff's poetic, frenetic, splenetic Fringe Festival tale of one man's paranoid journey through the streets of Toronto." — Toronto Life

"Rubinoff retains the Beats' playful excitement with language and flair for sharp, heightened perception...." — NOW Magazine (Toronto)

"A powerful hour of performance…absorbing, disturbing and very funny." — The Irish Times

"...enthralling… riveting…the play is hilarious." — Evening Herald (Dublin)

"Clippy and energetic, David Rubinoff's Stuck offers a sharp and gritty portrait of a city's underbelly… the bleak tragedy of Jack's predicament is offset by the pieces great humour." — The Sunday Times (UK)

About the Playwright:

David Rubinoff is a Toronto-based Canadian actor and playwright. After receiving his Honours BA from York University, he attended Dalhousie Law School. However, upon discovering that he preferred plays to statutes, he departed Dalhousie and began his theatrical journey. In the years since, he has been directing, acting, and writing.