Books in the Modern Plays series

Swimming with Sharks, adapted from the George Huang film by playwright Michael Lesslie, is an incisive look into the cut-throat world of Hollywood. The play had its world premiere at the Vaudeville Theatre, London, on 5 October 2007.

This boisterous and comic new play from Levi David Addai (93.2FM) looks beyond the glossy facade of the high street at the stories and ambitions of the workers within.

Published to tie in with the revival of this classic play by Harley Granville-Barker at the Almeida Theatre, 25 Sept - 15 Nov.

Set on the eve of the Thatcher victory, this new edition of Keeffe's classic, harrowing play coincides with the general election of 2010 and asks what's changed.

The Boy on the Swing is essentially a black comedy that confronts the power of a corpororation to brainwash and destroy an individual through the manipulation of emotions, beliefs and the truth. Joe Harbot's play is a brilliant tale of one such individual who ends up entwined in a series of dark power games.

Mongrel Island is a dazzlingly powerful and dreamlike comic play where madcap surreal humour meets the mundanity of everyday office life.

He wants me to fuck about with paper clips in some office with a smile on my face, fuck him . . . but there''s just one thing I''ve got to take care of first. I''ve got to do something to make this right.Four years on from the collapse of the Lehman Brothers and still we find ourselves in crisis. It''s time to work out what''s wrong. It''s time to look at the heart of the system.You Can Still Make A Killing is the story of the normal men and women who fill the City''s institutions, of a world radically altered when right became wrong, and of the private worlds that fall apart when there are no alternatives in sight. This production reunites director Matthew Dunster with playwright Nicholas Pierpan, following their collaboration in 2010 on Pierpan''s play The Maddening Rain (Old Red Lion and Soho Theatre). The cast includes Alecky Blythe (writer of London Road), which marks her much-anticipated return to acting, and Kellie Bright (Love and Money, Royal Exchange and Young Vic). It will run at the Southwark Playhouse in its main house (which holds 150 seats) from 10 October until 3 November 2012. A German production will open at Theatre Ulm in April, 2013.

A strongly issue-led play, Burning Monkey relates the story of a teenage couple and their interactions with an older war veteran, trying to rebuild his fractured relationship with his daughter. While their exchanges initially show a hostile and unsympathetic clash of generations, it soon becomes apparent that they share similar pain - based on their damaged family relationships, and absent parents/children - and they begin to feel empathy for one another's plight. In the background, the presence of war looms; the character of Old is haunted by memories of his time as a soldier and the character of Monkey looks forward to a time when he can escape the depressing realities of his life and join the army. In the midst of this, Shell is fifteen, madly in love with Monkey, and pregnant with his child. Her attempts to try and make the irresponsible, immature Monkey stay with her become increasingly desperate. Burning Monkey is a play that raises important issues for teenagers, addressing themes such as war, violence, separated families and responsibility.

An innovative text combining astronomical insight with themes of sight and blindness.

We're supposed to be having a party. It's s'posed to be fun. This is my house, and when I say everybody have fun, then everybody have fun.Thatcher's Britain - Brixton, 1981. As tensions mount on the streets, in the safety of their home, a group of Oxford University graduates barely notice what's happening on the streets outside as police and rioters clash, shops are looted, and buildings are set on fire. In both worlds there is a fight for rights... a fight for respect ... a fight for control. Who will win? Who will lose? Who will make the strongest cocktail? And when the dust finally settles the question remains... Will things ever change? Hard Feelings was first staged at the Oxford Playhouse in 1982 before transferring to the Bush Theatre in 1983, directed by Mike Bradwell. It was later broadcast as a BBC Play for Today. Hard Feelings was revived by Defibrillator Productions in a production at the Finborough Theatre in 2013.

An Englishman, a Northern Irishman, a Scotsman and a Welshman walked into a recording studio and created The Union. Commercially successful and critically acclaimed, the pioneering indie rock band is now on the verge of breaking up.When financial disaster strikes and Scottish guitarist Barry leaves the band, artistic differences go head to head with alliances that run deep, can The Union survive?With live music from a four-piece ensemble, I'm With the Band is a witty and timely response to our changing political landscape.

It was a very hot day - dazzling sunshine! - and Mum - she was wiping sweat from her neck. No, not wiping. Dabbing . . . Dab . . . Dab. Mum was a beauty. Not like me. And don't tell me I am because you'll be lying and I won't thank you for it. Not today. Not when this whole thing - us, here - is about me telling the truth. The latest from Philip Ridley is a beautiful, breathtaking new drama about one girl's craving for family and home, and the lengths she will go to achieve them. Dark Vanilla Jungle embarked on a national tour of Great Britain in spring 2014.This edition also features a selection of previously unpublished monologues by Philip Ridley alongside the play.

What are we doing then? Come on, lets go - all of us, lets tell everyone in the street, its too late we've lost, all the years of hardship, being murdered, imprisoned, having your homes taken, your jobs, your fields, your olives, your ability to move from one place to another - everything you have endured has been for nothing. They'vewon. So let's just leave it to them, disappear. It's what they want. You are doing what they want. You are an educated young Palestinian man. We need you here. Stay.Scenes from 68 Years is a selection of intertwined vignettes telling the story of ordinary Palestinians at a very human level with mischievous humour. It offers snapshots of the routine of life in the shadow of occupation: we look into an Israeli household with a rebellious pro-Palestinian teenager, join a tediously long queue at an Israeli check point, and get swept into an absurd act of civil disobedience by Palestinian civilians in a desperate attempt to get worldwide media attention. Scenes from 68 Years was selected from 100 scripts by the Arcola Theatre and the play received its world premiere at the Arcola Theatre on 5 April 2016 in a production by Sandpit Arts.

We're just the least lucky girls in all the world. All three of us. You and me and Ruthy have been given a big sad spoon of bad luck. A girl growing up in a battered part of Stockport in a battered time at the end of the Seventies falls in love with the man who will break her heart into a thousand pieces. Blindsided is a surprising and romantic play about warped love, jealousy, and damaged lives, spanning from the beginnings of the Thatcher Government in 1979 to the birth of New Labour in 1997.This edition features an introduction by Dr Jacqueline Bolton.

Women are running for president. Men are exfoliating. It''s all jumbled: you can''t read the signs.Can any woman have it all? After university Catherine and Gwen chose opposite paths: Catherine built a career as a rock-star academic, while Gwen built a home with a husband and children. Decades later, unfulfilled in opposite ways, each woman covets the other''s life, and a dangerous game begins as each tries to claim the other''s territory. Sparks fly and the age-old question arises: what do women really want?Gina Gionfriddo dissects modern gender politics in this breathtakingly witty and virtuosic comedy, set in a small New England college town. Traversing the experiences of women across the generations, this play is a hugely entertaining exploration of a new style of feminism, ripe for the twenty-first century.Rapture, Blister, Burn was commissioned by Playwrights Horizons, where it premiered, with funds from the Harold and Mim Steinberg Charitable Trust. It received its UK premiere at the Hampstead Theatre, London, in January 2014.

The weight of what is to come is unbearable. It is crushing me.The sound of the crying, it never ceases. I carry this inside and now tell only you.Charles, a disgraced New York Times journalist, arrives in Rwanda for an exclusive interview with two Hutu nuns. Charged with war crimes, the nuns must convince the world of their innocence during the 1994 genocide. When an unknown survivor contradicts the nuns'' story, Charles must decide between saving his career or telling a murkier truth that might condemn the nuns to a life in prison.Ken Urban''s award-winning Sense Of An Ending shines a light on journalistic truth and morality amid the atrocity of the Rwandan genocide. The play was produced and published during the twenty-first century anniversary of the genocide, and is a striking and compelling political thriller asking if forgiveness is possible in a world where truth is never simple.Sense Of An Ending was premiered at Theatre503, London, on 12 May 2015.

One day you''re you. The next you''re - I can''t even say the word. Dembe and Sam have been seeing each other for a while. They should be wondering where this is going and when to introduce each other to their families. But they''re gay and this is Uganda. The consequences of their relationship being discovered will be violent and explosive. Especially for Dembe, whose brother goes into the pulpit each week to denounce the evils of one man loving another.A Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting winner in 2013, The Rolling Stone received its world premiere at the Royal Exchange, Manchester, on 21 April 2015.

'I wasn't throwing up. I was dying. I was very ill . . . And do you know what? In the middle of all that . . . malaise, I remember thinking "This is what it's like to be married." But I'd do it again'An elderly couple sit in a dark room in their house, doing the crossword, taking their tablets and knitting, all the while raking over a traumatic past that has all but destroyed them.Conservatory is a compelling play about loss and family which shows that happiness is not a necessary condition of togetherness. It premiered at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, in March 2014.

Everything can be quantified. All worth can be quantified. Artistic worth. Human worth. Material worth. Everything. Some food is simply better than other food. Isn't it? Some clothes are better than other clothes. Aren't they?The last week of a massive international tour and rock star Paul is at the height of his fame. Everybody knows his name. Whatever he wants he can have. He can screw anybody he wants to. He can buy anything he desires. He can eat anything. Drink anything. Smoke anything. Go anywhere. As the inevitability of the end of the road looms closer and a return home becomes a reality, for Paul the music is starting to jar.Birdland received its world premiere at the Royal Court Theatre Downstairs on 3 April 2014.

From the despair of aninut, even in a short shiva, the ice inside you is thawing, Mordecai, it will open you to the world if you let it. After, shloshim. After a year, yizkor, yarhrzeit. And yes, sorrow, but also hope, hope in those who'll welcome you, love you. Let them love you. Don't neglect God now that you need him.In Judaism you have seven days to mourn a loved one, unless interrupted by a high holy day. Sadie died yesterday, Yom Kippur is tomorrow, so Mordecai only has tonight to say goodbye to his wife. Exploring themes of identity, love and faith, Shiver is a comic play about grief and Judaism. With moments of farce, as well as a touch of the surreal, this is a skilfully written play that marks the start of an exciting playwriting career for Daniel Kanaber.Shiver received its world premiere at Watford Palace Theatre on 3 February 2014, starring David Horovitch (Hysteria, Hampstead Theatre; Grief, National Theatre; Seven Jewish Children, Royal Court).

In Nigeria, a frightened child puts an old roll of film into the hands of Dublin-bound teacher Sister Martha. In Dublin, ex-con Larry, with a wounded backside, has to get out of the city to rob a convent. Meanwhile, Scarab Oil plans to unleash its new clean fuel of the future. The film roll Martha is carrying attracts the urgent interest of some very powerful and ambitious people.A play written for two actors and filled with memorable characters, Little Thing, Big Thing is the latest production from the innovative and outstanding Irish theatre company Fishamble.

They call it a civil war, but there is nothing civil in this. Nothing civil at all. They came from Damascus, from Halab, from Banias where the bombs fall day and night and the wounded children look like sleeping angels. Now they live in camps and abandoned buildings in Lebanon or Jordan. Now Syria is just a distant memory, a home forever lost.This urgent and extraordinary play explores the crisis in Syria through the stories of its two million refugees. Oh My Sweet Land received its UK premiere at the Young Vic Theatre, London, on 9 April 2014.

A modern parable set against the backdrop of the first Old Firm clash of the season. Funny, hard-hitting and thought-provoking, the second edition of Scarfed for Life tells the story of two teenage friends caught in the crossfire of polite suburban prejudice and garden equipment. Ideal for secondary school students, the play draws on what sectarianism and prejudice actually mean to young Glaswegians, and how it affects them and their peers. Scarfed for Life is a hard-hitting play based on the experiences of discrimination and prejudice among the young people of Glasgow.The play toured secondary schools in Scotland in 2011 and Scottish prisons in 2013. The language in this edition has been revised specifically with school-age students in mind, and is an ideal, issue-led play for students 14+.

-I want things to get better, not worse.-There''s hundreds of thousands worse off than us.Ideals are worthless if you can''t pay the bills.Anita and Sam live in East London. Burdened by debt and on the eve of giving birth to their second child, Anita begins to wonder whether it was a good idea for Sam to become a social worker. Can they survive in David Cameron''s London on Sam''s wage with two children? Anywhere else it would be fine, but where he''s needed most, can Sam make ends meet? Will their marriage take the strain as the needs of family are pitted against the greater good?Bitingly funny, challenging, angry and deeply humane, My Girl 2 is Barrie Keeffe''s reworking of his iconic 1989 play. This edition published to coincide with the premiere of the updated version at the Old Red Lion Theatre, London, in 2014.

There is no such thing as a happy colonised people.Never has been and never will be.That is our basic delusion.December 2011. Watching video footage from a drone, Pentagon officials see a huddle of people - unarmed smugglers, with mules - treading their familiar path across the Turkish-Iraqi border. Hours later, Turkish Armed Forces drop bombs on the group. 34 civilians are killed.The Roboski massacre is one of the most controversial episodes in the 'war on terror'. Piecing together the fragments of the tragedy, Anders Lustgarten's startling new play dares to ask what a massacre is made of.Shrapnel is a story of malicious commands and mournful commemorations; an urgent, powerful insight into the state of modern warfare. This edition was published to coincide with the UK premiere at the Arcola Theatre, London, on 11 March 2015.