About this Play:

Wasps is a full-length comedy by Sally Clark. Val McIntosh, a sane sensible librarian, marries in haste and repents at Gale Force Velocity. Wasps is a drawing room farce for distempered times.

Wasps is one of those plays where the whole is quite literally much greater than the sum of its parts – so much so that it becomes, in retrospect, the subject of the play, "what the play is about," and that doesn't hit you until you are half-way home after a fun evening of bizarre, exotic and hilarious entertainment. Although signified only by one minor character in the play, described by a nerdy head librarian named Val as "one of our multicultural patrons" (and, of course, by the rather more obvious acronym of the title itself), this is a play about the elements of our constructed tribal identities: incest, fashion, fetishism, style, populist art, amateur psychobabble and a fearful, murderous fascination with the other, hovering behind the cupboards over the sink, in the basements of suburbia, and in the filing cabinets of your local travel agent.

Wasps premiered in 1996 at Factory Theatre in Toronto.

Cast: 4 female, 2 male

What people say:

"Wasps a nest of fun and farce." — Vancouver Sun

"Wasps is driven by rage at hypocrisy, a wild appreciation for the absurdities of sex, and the good old fashioned evil pleasure of of watching somebody else have a really, really bad time… Wasps is about cultural absurdities as they’re manifested through character…." — Georgia Straight

About the Playwright:

Sally Clark is a critically acclaimed Canadian playwright who was born in Vancouver, where she currently lives. She is best known for her frequently produced play Moo, and has been playwright-in-residence at Theatre Passe Muraille and the Shaw Festival. She is also an accomplished painter, director and filmmaker. Her plays have received a Chalmers Award, two Dora Mavor Moore Award nominations, and a Governor General's Award nomination.