Stunning and Other Plays

David Adjmi

• Publisher: Theatre Communications Group
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9781559366755
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: American Drama
• Index: Literature

“Nearly everything about David Adjmi’s Stunning has an original ring to it, from the setting... to the brassy bleat of the dialogue." – Time Out New York

This volume of distinctive work includes Stunning, set in an insular Syrian Jewish community, where a teenage bride’s world is disrupted by her intellectual African American housekeeper; Evildoers, about the collapse of two privileged couples; and Elective Affinities, a post-9/11 monologue.

David Adjmi ’s work has been produced at Lincoln Center Theatre, Yale Repertory Theatre, Woolly Mammoth, and the Royal Court in London. He has received numerous commissions and is the recipient of a 2009 Kesselring Fellowship and a Bush Artist Fellowship.

Stunning

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Special Thanks

(In no order) Rebecca Taichman, Lisa Portes, Morgan Jenness, Mark Subias, Adam Greenfield, Polly Carl, Stephen Willems, New York Theatre Workshop, Paige Evans, André Bishop, Emily Shooltz, Dartmouth College, Danny Mastrogiorgio, Quincy Tyler Bernstine, Laura Heisler, Charlayne Woodard, Cristin Milioti, Michael Goodfriend, Gabrielle Fernandez-Coffey, Abby Wood, Clint Brandhagen, Lecy Goranson, Jeanine Serralles, Steve Rattazzi, Sas Goldberg, Nilaja Sun, April Yvette Thompson, Howard Shalwitz, Elissa Goetschius, Miriam Weisfeld, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Kathy Sova, Paul Rusconi, Heidi Schreck, Kip Fagan, Jim McCarthy, Gloria Peterson, Anne Kauffman, Tory Stewart, Kath Tolan, Philip Himberg and all my friends at Sundance, Olivier Sultan, Corinne Hayoun. And to all the actors who participated in countless readings, workshops, etc., of this play who weren’t mentioned here. Thank you.

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Production History

Stunning was developed by New York Theatre Workshop (James C. Nicola, Artistic Director; William Russo, Managing Director) and Manhattan Theatre Club (Lynne Meadow, Artistic Director; Barry Grove, Executive Producer). The world premiere was produced in Washington, DC, by Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company (Howard Shalwitz, Artistic Director; Jeffrey Herrmann, Managing Director) on March 10, 2008. It was directed by Anne Kauffman; set design was by Daniel Conway, costume design was by Helen Q. Huang, lighting design was by Colin K. Bills, sound design was by Ryan Rumery; the dramaturg was Miriam Weisfeld, the dialect coach was Sasha Olinick and the production stage manager was Rebecca Berlin. The cast included:

LILY	Laura Heisler
BLANCHE	Quincy Tyler Bernstine
IKE	Michael Gabriel Goodfriend
SHELLY	Gabriela Fernandez-Coffey
JOJO	Clinton Brandhagen
CLAUDINE	Abby Wood

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Stunning was produced at Lincoln Center Theater (LCT3; André Bishop, Artistic Director; Bernard Gersten, Executive Director; Paige Evans, Director of LCT3) in June 2009. It was directed by Anne Kauffman; set design was by David Korins, costume design was by Miranda Hoffman, lighting design was by Japhy Weideman, sound design was by Rob Kaplowitz; the stage manager was Megan Schwarz. The cast included:

LILY	Cristin Milioti
BLANCHE	Charlayne Woodard
IKE	Danny Mastrogiorgio
SHELLY	Jeanine Serralles
JOJO	Steven Rattazzi
CLAUDINE	Sas Goldberg

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Characters

LILY SCHWECKY: Cute, slight, naifish, something of an oddball. The “baby”—she’s sixteen going on about eleven; she’s a bit regressed. Her mind works quickly but her thoughts are incredibly scattered. A follower, but it’s more out of a need for connectedness than an innate passivity.

BLANCHE NESBITT: Lily’s new housekeeper. African American; an extremely intelligent, voluble and terribly sensitive autodidact. Damaged, but maintains a great sense of irony and dry humor. She adapts to survive—she’s performative, and the performance wears her down eventually. An outsider. Forties.

IKE SCHWECKY: Lily’s new husband. Controlling, brute, bumptious, but there’s something fragile in him, broken—he’s more transparent than he thinks. Mid-forties.

SHELLY: Lily’s big sister. A leader; she’s got a stentorian quality, but naturalizes this by cultivating “girly” preoccupations. The laziness of her r’s and a’s feels calculated and somehow hostile. Early twenties.

JOJO: Shelly’s uxorious husband. Basically a good guy but limited; rather put upon, has trouble sticking to his guns. Thirties/early forties.

CLAUDINE: A bit hysterical; unselfconscious—even brutish—in her bids for approval. She has a desperate conformity. Nineteen.

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Setting

The play takes place largely within the confines of the Midwood section of Brooklyn—a very affluent, largely Jewish area; one that exerts a centripetal force on the people who live there. Despite the proximity to Manhattan, there’s a provincialism to it, an insularity, but also an extremely tight-knit sense of community.

Time

Early 2000s.

Se...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Stunning
• The Evildoers
• Elective Affinities
• Copyright Page