Home At The End
CAST: 2 male, 2 female + 48 supporting roles
SYNOPSIS: Somewhere in the dark, cold past, an official talks with a naked and shivering individual. He complains about the cold and the mountain of paperwork on his desk, presenting a violin to the individual, asking them to play it. He rubs their cold hands before letting them play, eventually ordering them back outside with “the others”. Meanwhile, a little girl named Molly appears unnoticed.
Light reveals the scene as a decrepit fishing shack. Molly encounters a bearded tramp, and the two eye each other warily. Molly’s mother, Andie, enters, who is also suspicious of the tramp. The tramp tells Molly and Andie a sad but beautiful story, summoning objects from within the shack as the story’s characters. Upon finishing the story, the tramp appears confused and upset, insisting that Molly and Andie leave.
The exit into the house they have recently moved into with Molly’s father (and Andie’s husband), Joe, a writer. Andie mentions having seen the fishing shack on a walk earlier that day, as well as an earlier memory of Vinacea, the Italian town that served as the backdrop for the tramp’s story about Lorenzo. They begin to flirt, and are in a rather compromising position when Molly enters, unable to sleep in the unfamiliar house.
The scene shifts back to the fishing shack, andhe tramp tells Molly and Andie another story set in the town of Vinacea, this time a supernatural tale about a beautiful woman and a talented, but blind, musician.
The scene transitions again to Joe and Andie’s house, where Joe has prepared a charming, but distinctly suburban, meal. Joe discusses his lack of writing progress, and is struck by the banality of death. Andie proposes they go for a walk and a bite of lunch near the fishing shack the following weekend, and their conversation is interrupted by strange music they can’t locate the source of.
In the final scenes of the first act, the tramp hears the music too. He tells another story set in Vinacea, about a woman who dies in an attempt to prevent her son’s death. The tramp warns Andie not to visit a particular café, though he also agrees to have lunch with her there.
Inside the café, Joe and Andie are testy with each other as they discuss what to order. The strange music begins again, and a worried Andie asks to leave. Joe agrees, but leaves for the toilet first, narrowly missing the sound of screams and gunshots.
The play’s second act begins as Joe realises the terrible fate that has befallen Andie and Molly. He mistakes a nurse for Andie, and a carnivalesque group of policemen suggest Joe’s loosening grip on sanity. Joe engages with Dr Hicks, a mental health professional attempting to help Joe process his grief, though the spectre of Andie questions the legitimacy of her approach. He does not fare much better with a support group or a team of doctors, though a perceptive psychologist, Susan, elicits information from Joe about his increasing reliance on alcohol to numb grief and survivor’s guilt. He deteriorates further, and in the play’s closing scene, stumbles upon a decrepit old fishing shack…
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“Only a very confident playwright could write a play with the depth of humanity, insight and complexity of “Home at the End”.
(City News)