The Glory of Living

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The Glory of Living
Written by Rebecca Gilman
Date premieredDecember 5, 1996 (1996-12-05)
Place premieredForest Park, Illinois
Original languageEnglish
GenreDrama
SettingTennessee, Georgia and Alabama

The Glory of Living is a 1996 play by Rebecca Gilman. The play received its first production at the Circle Theatre Chicago in Forest Park, Illinois. The play has won several awards and was a finalist for the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

Play (theatre) form of literature intended for theatrical performance

A play is form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of dialogue or singing between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. Plays are performed at a variety of levels, from Broadway, Off-Broadway, regional theater, to Community theatre, as well as university or school productions. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference as to whether their plays were performed or read. The term "play" can refer to both the written texts of playwrights and to their complete theatrical performance.

Rebecca Gilman is an American playwright.

Circle Theatre Chicago founded in 1985 by Karen Skinner, Joe Bass, and Wayne Buidens, is a theatre company in Oak Park and Chicago, Illinois. They chose the name "Circle Theatre" to represent both Circle Avenue and the concept of infinity. Their work began in public buildings, and then settled in a church in 1987. A few years later, a fire destroyed the church and forced Circle to find its own space. The company was led by Karen Skinner until 1998 when she turned the artistic leadership over to her daughter Alena Murguia, and two company members Tony Vezner and Greg Kolack. The company left its building in 2012 to produce plays in a series of rented spaces in Chicago.

Contents

Plot

The play opens with the main characters Lisa and Clint meeting for the first time. Clint has accompanied a friend to Lisa and her mother's mobile home to see Lisa's mother, a prostitute. Clint picks up on Lisa's unease about her mother's situation and begins charming her. The next scene opens a few years later and Clint and Lisa have married and have twins who are being cared for by Clint's mother. The couple has been living in a series of motel rooms and are playing a scam whereby Lisa lures young girls into the room where Clint rapes and abuses them. Afterwards, Lisa murders the girls and disposes of their bodies. Plagued with guilt, Lisa calls the police with anonymous tips on the location of the bodies. Act I concludes with the couple's arrest.

Mobile home prefabricated structure attached to a chassis

A mobile home is a prefabricated structure, built in a factory on a permanently attached chassis before being transported to site. Used as permanent homes, or for holiday or temporary accommodation, they are left often permanently or semi-permanently in one place, but can be moved, and may be required to move from time to time for legal reasons.

Motel Motor hotel in which all rooms face directly onto a car park, or low-cost hotel

A motel or motor lodge is a hotel designed for motorists and usually has a parking area for motor vehicles. Entering dictionaries after World War II, the word motel, coined as a portmanteau contraction of "motor hotel", originates from the Milestone Mo-Tel of San Luis Obispo, California, which was built in 1925. The term referred initially to a type of hotel consisting of a single building of connected rooms whose doors faced a parking lot and in some circumstances, a common area or a series of small cabins with common parking. Motels are often individually owned, though motel chains do exist.

Rape type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse without consent

Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or against a person who is incapable of giving valid consent, such as one who is unconscious, incapacitated, has an intellectual disability or is below the legal age of consent. The term rape is sometimes used interchangeably with the term sexual assault.

Act II deals primarily with the couple's punishments but focuses on Lisa and her motives for her actions. The audience is shown that Lisa has not been able to emotionally mature and that has led her to live the life she has lived.

Notable productions

London Capital of the United Kingdom

London is the capital and largest city of both England and the United Kingdom. Standing on the River Thames in the south-east of England, at the head of its 50-mile (80 km) estuary leading to the North Sea, London has been a major settlement for two millennia. Londinium was founded by the Romans. The City of London, London's ancient core − an area of just 1.12 square miles (2.9 km2) and colloquially known as the Square Mile − retains boundaries that follow closely its medieval limits. The City of Westminster is also an Inner London borough holding city status. Greater London is governed by the Mayor of London and the London Assembly.

An Off-Broadway theatre is any professional venue in Manhattan in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, inclusive. These theatres are smaller than Broadway theatres, but larger than Off-Off-Broadway theatres, which seat fewer than 100.

MCC Theater non-profit organisation in the USA

MCC Theater is an Off-Broadway theater company located in New York City, founded in 1986 by artistic directors Robert LuPone and Bernard Telsey along with six graduates of the New York University drama department, including Jana Herzen, now president of Harlem-based Motema Music.

Dublin capital and largest city in Ireland

Dublin is the capital and largest city of Ireland. It is on the east coast of Ireland, in the province of Leinster, at the mouth of the River Liffey, and is bordered on the south by the Wicklow Mountains. It has an urban area population of 1,173,179, while the population of the Dublin Region, as of 2016, was 1,347,359, and the population of the Greater Dublin area was 1,904,806.

Awards and recognition

Pulitzer Prize U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature, and musical composition

The Pulitzer Prize is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine and online journalism, literature, and musical composition in the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of American (Hungarian-born) Joseph Pulitzer who had made his fortune as a newspaper publisher, and is administered by Columbia University in New York City. Prizes are awarded yearly in twenty-one categories. In twenty of the categories, each winner receives a certificate and a US$15,000 cash award. The winner in the public service category of the journalism competition is awarded a gold medal.

Joseph Jefferson 19th-century American actor and author

Joseph Jefferson, commonly known as Joe Jefferson, was an American actor. He was the third actor of this name in a family of actors and managers, and one of the most famous of all 19th century American comedians. Jefferson was particularly well known for his adaptation and portrayal of Rip Van Winkle on the stage, reprising the role in several silent film adaptations. After 1865, he created no other major role and toured with this play for decades.

Chicago City in Illinois, United States

Chicago, officially the City of Chicago, is the most populous city in Illinois, as well as the third most populous city in the United States. With an estimated population of 2,716,450 (2017), it is the most populous city in the Midwest. Chicago is the principal city of the Chicago metropolitan area, often referred to as Chicagoland, and the county seat of Cook County, the second most populous county in the United States. The metropolitan area, at nearly 10 million people, is the third-largest in the United States, and the fourth largest in North America and the third largest metropolitan area in the world by land area.

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References

  1. ↑ Burbank, Carol."Victim of Innocence" chicagoreader.com, December 5, 1996
  2. ↑ Billington, Michael."Guardian Review. I rape, you kill " The Guardian, 19 January 1999
  3. ↑ Hernandez, Ernio. "Hoffman-Helmed NYC Premiere of Gilman's 'Glory of Living' at MCC, Oct. 30-Dec. 2" playbill.com, October 30, 2001
  4. ↑ " The Glory of Living Listing" aboutfaceireland.com, accessed May 20, 2015
  5. ↑ "Pulitzer Prizes Listing of Finalists and Winners" pulitzer.org, accessed May 20, 2015

The Lortel Archives, also known as the Internet Off-Broadway Database (IOBDB), is an online database that catalogues theatre productions shown Off-Broadway.

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