Mike Bartlett Plays: Two

📖 The Scoop

Five ambitious and exciting plays by the multi-award-winning playwright, hailed as "one of the prime movers in a new golden generation of British playwrights" (Independent), and introduced by the author.

Earthquakes in London (National Theatre & Headlong, 2010) is an epic drama about climate change, population explosion, social breakdown and worldwide paranoia, travelling from 1968 to 2525 and back again. "The theatrical equivalent of a thrilling roller-coaster ride" (Daily Telegraph).

Love, Love, Love (Paines Plough & Drum Theatre Plymouth, UK tour, 2010; Royal Court & Paines Plough, 2012) examines the baby boomer generation, from coming-of-age in the 1960s to retirement-age more than forty years later, in a play that "does the clash of generational world views with a devastating precision" (Guardian).

The Enemy is a short play in which a journalist seizes an opportunity to interview the man who shot Osama bin Laden. It was staged by Headlong as part of Decade (St Katherine's Dock, London, 2011), exploring 9/11 and its legacy.

13 (National Theatre, 2011) is a panoramic drama in which a young man returns to London, a city riven by social protest and upheaval, with a radical vision for the future. Premiered on the National's largest stage, it confirmed Bartlett's ability to tackle epic themes with supreme assurance: "His ambition is distinctive and immense" (Evening Standard).

Medea (Headlong, UK tour, 2012) is a startlingly modern version of Euripides' tragedy, exploring a woman's private fury at her husband's infidelity, while imprisoned in her marital home. "A savage play for today, superbly well done" (Mail on Sunday).

Genre: Drama / General (fancy, right?)