Ctrl + Alt + Delete
Description
Tech whiz kid Eddie Fisker joins forces with a new technology leader to create what amounts to a billion dollar house of cards. Surrounded by corporations that remember books as “little paper websites” and remind each other of various characters from the Muppets, the two try to survive the shockwaves, real and imagined, that threaten to topple their new product’s success.
Production Info
Full Length Drama (about 100 minutes)
Minimal Set Requirements
Contemporary Costumes
Press Quotes
“Anthony Clarvoe’s acerbic new comedy eavesdrops on the hot-wired world of high-pressure scheming and manipulation that accompanies a breakthrough in technology. It’s an insinuating satire of glossy commercialism, laced with sharp, cynical humor. The play pops and crackles with witty dialogue … Eddie Fisker is a junior analyst and the dubious mastermind behind an unnamed compact wireless unit referred to as the gizmo. The all-in-one, handheld communication device not only houses a pager and cell phone, but contains breakthrough technology expected to revolutionize the industry and turn the world on its ear … this smart, savage satire definitely has legs.” —Robert L Daniels, Variety
“CTRL+ALT+DELETE is the keyboard command to start up a computer after it has crashed. The playwright, Anthony Clarvoe, provides an ingenious payoff that drives home the larger meaning of a jargonistic title, no matter if you’re a technophobe or an information technology specialist. And that payoff is warming, the promise of a ray of hope for us all. It may sound odd that an inside look at insider antics and duplicities in the I P O (read: stock manipulation) game (read: racket) should turn upon its cynical self in time for an upbeat ending. Having it both ways is not the way of satire, and CTRL+ALT+DELETE has the smarts and social consciousness to rate as satire, true and unstinting. Against all odds, Mister Clarvoe pulls it off. Shameless image-making is laid bare, not to mention everyone’s lust for cashing in … the playwright transforms a remorseless statement of single-minded contemporary savagery into an affirming ode to the visionary. The hard-boiled comedy with the cultish title turns out to be a morality play for everyman, its heartbeat unstilled.” —Alvin Klein, New York Times
Author
Anthony ClarvoeAnthony Clarvoe’s plays PICK UP AX, SHOW AND TELL, THE LIVING, LET’S PLAY TWO, THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV, AMBITION FACING WEST, WALKING OFF THE ROOF, CTRL+ALT+DELETE, THE ART OF SACRIFICE, GUNPOWDER JOE, and PEOPLE WHERE THEY ARE and his translations of Henrik Ibsen’s GHOSTS and THE WILD DUCK are published by Broadway Play Publishing, Inc. He has received American Theatre Critics, Will Glickman, Bay Area Theatre Critics, Los Angeles Drama Critics, Garland, Elliot Norton, and Edgerton New American Play awards; fellowships from the Guggenheim, Irvine, Jerome, and McKnight Foundations, National Endowment for the Arts, Theater Communications Group/Pew Charitable Trusts, and Kennedy Center; commissions from South Coast Rep, Mark Taper Forum, and Playwrights Horizons; the Berrilla Kerr Award for his contributions to American theater; and many others. He teaches dramatic literature at OLLI@UC Berkeley and playwriting in Oakland, CA. A native San Franciscan and long-time resident of New York City and the Midwest, he lives with his family in Berkeley, CA.
Book Information
| Publisher | BPPI |
|---|---|
| Publication Date | 1/1/2007 |
| Pages | 80 |
| ISBN | 9780881452549 |
Special Notes
World premiere by San Jose Repertory Theater
by special arrangement with Broadway Play Publishing Inc, NYC
www.broadwayplaypublishing.com
