Cover art by Kristin R Reutter

Monster

Neal Bell, from the novel by Mary Shelley

Play Description

Adapted from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, MONSTER takes a disturbing yet poignant look at one man’s obsession with creating life and the destructive after effects of abandoning his creation.

Production Info

Cast: 8 total (4 female, 4 male)
Full Length Drama (about 120 minutes)
Multiple Sets
Period Costumes

Categories: The Plays, Classics Tags: British, 19th Century

Reviews
About the Author(s)
About the Book
Special Notes
Productions

Press Quotes

“MONSTER, a slick and streamlined new stage adaptation of the Frankenstein saga written by Neal Bell … is faithful to Shelley, if not in all the exhaustive details, then at least insofar as it seizes on its thematic highlights. Mr Bell’s adaptation pucks the major events from the narrative, and his language treads a colorful path: a mixture of fanciful poetics, glib wisecrackery and an occasional Anglo-Saxon obscenity that lends a contemporary tint to things.” —Bruce Weber, The New York Times

“… a lean literate version of Shelley’s often much-embroidered classic. Exploring Shelley’s psychosexual undertones, Bell’s version is more creepy than shocking in effect. He also provides a viable new conclusion for the novel’s open-ended narrative.” —Michael Sommers, The Star-Ledger

“Starting from Shelley’s original, but with a sharp eye for cogency and a sharp ear for the turn of a phrase, [Neal Bell] has managed to locate the philosophic germ inside each of the horror myth’s iconic scenes. The scare is still there, but it now has other functions than merely frightening your inner child with fantasies of impotence, rape and castration on a dark and stormy night. If you really want to frighten yourself, there’s always today’s paper; if you want a dramatic story that makes you think about the meaning and purpose of life, you should probably go and see MONSTER.” —Michael Feingold, Village Voice

Author(s)

Neal Bell
Neal Bell's plays, including SPATTER PATTERN (Edgar Award), MONSTER, TWO SMALL BODIES, RAW YOUTH, COLD SWEAT, READY FOR THE RIVER, SLEEPING DOGS, RAGGED DICK, ON THE BUM, and SOMEWHERE IN THE PACIFIC, have appeared at Playwrights Horizons and Classic Stage Company in New York, and at regional theaters including Berkeley Repertory, Mark Taper Forum, South Coast Rep, La Jolla Playhouse, and Actors Theater of Louisville, where his ten-minute play OUT THE WINDOW was a co-winner of the 1990 Heideman Award. Mr. Bell has been a playwright-in-residence at the Yale School of Drama, and has taught playwriting at New York University, Playwrights Horizons Theater School, and the 42nd Street Collective. He is currently a member of the Theater Department faculty at Duke University. A recipient of fellowships from the Rockefeller Foundation, the National Endowment and the Guggenheim Foundation, Mr. Bell was awarded an Obie Award in 1992 for sustained achievement in playwriting.
Mary Shelley
Mary Shelley (1797 – 1851) was a novelist and the wife of poet Percy Bysshe Shelley. Her most famous novel is Frankenstein. She also wrote the novels Valperga (1823), The Last Man (1826), and the autobiographical Lodore (1835). Her final novel, Mathilde, was published posthumously.

Book Information

Publisher	BPPI
Publication Date	1/30/2006
Pages	96
ISBN	9780881452280

Special Notes

If original stage producers credits appear in bold below, all licensees are required to include them in the following form on the title page in all programs distributed in connection with performances of the Play and in all advertising in which the full cast appears in size of type not less than ten percent (10%) of the size of the title of the Play:

Originally produced by The Classic Stage Company, New York

In addition, the following must appear within all programs distributed in connection with performances of the Play:

Monster is produced
by special arrangement with Broadway Play Publishing Inc, NYC
www.broadwayplaypub.com