The Wooden Breeks
Play Description
Set in the fantastical, miserable village of Brood, Glen Berger's ingenious play conjures up a marvelously imaginative world peopled by a large cast of dreamers, schemers and would-be lovers. Tormented by the memory of a beautiful young girl he adored and lost, and saddled with the child she left behind as a painful reminder of their doomed romance, a village tinker turned poet tries to ease his pain by conjuring up a hilarious and extremely moving tale, a story made up for the young boy as they sit in front of the dying embers of their hearth. When the last spark is extinguished, we have gone along with them on a magical journey filled with music, shadow, and light, meeting along the way a town full of comically misguided characters and an enchanting young saleswoman of casket bell devices for the prematurely buried. A rich and delightful fairy tale for everyone who remembers what a great story sounds like.
Production Info
Cast: 9 total (3 female, 6 male)Full Length Drama (about 140 minutes)
Single Set
Contemporary Costumes
- Reviews
- About the Author(s)
- About the Book
- Special Notes
Press Quotes
“Just to get your bearings, you might want to think of THE WOODEN BREEKS — Glen Berger’s altogether whimsical and verbally intoxicated play — as a variation on BRIGADOON. But it’s a BRIGADOON as might be reimagined by such cross-century literary aces as Thomas Hardy, Charles Dickens, James Joyce, Dylan Thomas and Dave Eggers. Sound a bit mind-boggling? Well, it is … this impossibly brainy, altogether quirky, simultaneously heartfelt and satirical examination of mortality turns out to be perfectly comprehensible and more than a little enchanting.” —Chicago Sun-Times
“The success of Berger’s play is no riddle: his knack for dialogue and storytelling is irresistible, and the result is full of Dickensian delight in human eccentricity.” —The New Yorker
“I enjoyed this play immensely — so much, in fact, that it is somewhat embarrassing. It is, after all, just a ghost story — and a love story (seven, in fact) and a pre-urban legend of mythical proportions, and a fairy tale and a shaggy dog story. THE WOODEN BREEKS is incredibly and indelibly engaging … a very good play, very well done. Go and enjoy.” —Juneau Empire
“Playwright Berger displays rare virtuosity in his richly comic portraits … This quirky gem never fails to engage.” —Los Angeles Times
Author(s)
Glen BergerGlen Berger's plays include UNDERNEATH THE LINTEL (more than 450 performances off Broadway; several Best Play awards; more than 200 productions; translated into eight languages), O LOVELY GLOWWORM (2005 Portland Drammy Award for Best Script), and GREAT MEN OF SCIENCE, NOS. 21 & 22 (1998 Ovation Award and L A Weekly Award for Best Play). His television credits include two Emmy Awards (twelve total nominations) and more than 150 episodes for children's series, including Arthur (P B S), Peep (Discovery/The Learning Channel), Big and Small (B B C), and Fetch (P B S), for which he was head writer for all five of its seasons. Berger was the co-bookwriter for SPIDER-MAN TURN OFF THE DARK on Broadway, directed by Julie Taymor, with music by Bono and Edge of U2. He wrote a book of that experience — Song of Spider-Man — which was published by Simon & Schuster in 2013. He is an alumnus of New Dramatists.
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:
THE WOODEN BREEKS was produced in New York at the Lucille Lortel Theater
by the Manhattan Class Company (MCC) Theater in February 2006
In addition, the following must appear within all programs distributed in connection with performances of the Play:
by special arrangement with Broadway Play Publishing Inc, NYC
www.broadwayplaypub.com
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