About the Play:

Toyer has long been a favourite of acting teachers for Female/Male Scene Study showcases.

Toyer is a full-length drama adapted for the stage by Gardner McKay, from his own international best-selling novel of the same name. It is a mind game play that dives into the dark and twisted world of deliberate, sickening acts of crime. Toyer is someone who toys; he is a mass paralyzer who toys with his victims. He does not murder or rape, he seduces and then immobilizes. We are led to question our own ability to hurt, to kill, to change forever the life of another.

Toyer revolves around the arrival of a charming stranger at psychologist Maude Christopher's remote house in the L.A. hills. An innocent encounter soon becomes a sexually charged battle of wits. Maude has devoted her life to changing peoples’ minds. A lauded clinical psychiatrist, she is logical, precise, highly intelligent. But these are human qualities, and can just as easily be found in one who would use them not to heal, but to destroy. Is he merely a playful admirer or the 'Toyer,' a disturbed man who performs unspeakable acts of violence on his female victims. A cat and mouse game of verbal, psychological and physical intrigue ensues, where one player must outwit the other.

Toyer was first staged in 1982 at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., starring Kathleen Turner and Brad Davis, following productions in Los Angeles and the Actors Studio in the 1980s. It was produced in 1994 at the Redgrave Theatre in England, starring Rupert Graves, and later in London's West End. The play has become a favourite scene study vehicle in acting classes and workshops and is regularly performed in regional repertory, fringe festival, college, and community theatre productions.

Cast: 1 female, 1 male

What people say:

"Strong stuff…. Outlandish mind games. Riveting, breathtaking." — Herald Examiner

"A classic mystery that always keeps you guessing on the edge of your seat." — Variety

"Powerful." — Washington Post

"Deeply disturbing and entirely relevant." — National Public Radio (NPR)

About the Playwright:

Gardner McKay (1932-2001) was an American actor, artist, college instructor, author and a professional skipper. He was a sculptor and had done some bit-part acting before he was noticed at a Hollywood restaurant and plucked from obscurity to star in TV's Adventures in Paradise, based loosely on the writings of James Michener. The 1959-62 ABC series was high-profile but his greater joy was travelling the world and writing plays and fiction. He received a Drama Critics Circle Award for one of his plays, and three National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) grants for writing.