"Death and the Maiden"

a dark drama

Written by: Ariel Dorfman

Directed by: Tracee Royall

*** DUE TO SUBJECT MATTER AND CONTENT, THIS PLAY IS SUITABLE FOR ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY ***

SIX performance dates:

Thursday March 23

Friday March 24

Saturday March 25

Thursday March 30

Friday March 31

Saturday April 1

Brookman Street Theatre, 7 Brookman Street Kalgoorlie

Home of the Goldfields Repertory Club 1931 (Inc.)

All performances commence at 8pm

*****SPECIAL PRICE*****

Thursday March 30th ONLY - Two tickets for $20

The story...............

She's got the gun jammed into the fleshy folds of his neck. He's completely powerless - bound to her kitchen chair with nylons and gagged with her panties.

That's how things start to unfold early on in Ariel Dorfman's play "Death and the Maiden". This intense drama poses probing questions about the possibilities of ever finding true justice, or satisfying revenge, for wrongs done.

Dorfman, a Chilean writer who barely escaped alive from the overthrow of Allende's government by General Pinochet's coup in 1973, penned "Death" in 1992. It takes place in an undefined Latin America country that has reverted to a democratic form of government after enduring a military dictatorship for several years. Gerardo, an official appointed to investigate the previous regime's abuses, is given a ride home from his stranded vehicle by a friendly stranger, Dr. Miranda. Gerardo's wife Paulina, a survivor of dictatorship-directed torture and rape, recognizesMiranda's voice and believes him to be the leader of her past tormentors.

Paulina pistol-whips Miranda, ties him up, and gags him despite the disbelieving protests of her husband, who advocates a more reasonable confrontation. She then turns the tables on her former oppressor, interrogating him unmercifully, despite his protests that he has never met her, and is not who she thinks he is. Her ferocious attempt to force a confession from her captive allows Dorfman to delineate with brutal clarity (and explicit language) the mechanics of totalitarian abuses, and to illuminate Paulina's still-tortured soul.

Dorfman maintains tension by keeping things teetering on the edge of explosive violence, in a way that holds the audience hostage as well. Paulina's thirst for vengeance is unquenchable, stalemating her struggle and underlining the seeming impossibility of ever attaining justice.