Blue Surge

Curt is a small-town cop in the Midwest

Sandy is the nineteen-year-old prostitute he first tries to arrest, then attempts to help, at the cost of his badge

What Rebecca Gilman makes of this familiar scenario is something startlingly real and compelling, delving deeply into the small space that can divide a feeling of hope from one of hopelessness, as Curt and Sandy both try to get a foothold in the American dream of a house, a job, a life, a relationship with another human being

Gilman's previous play, Boy Gets Girl, was acclaimed by Time magazine as the best play of 2000, saying that "with Spinning into Butter, her play about race relations on campus, Rebecca Gilman gave notice that she was a playwright to watch

And with this intense drama of a woman's encounter with a stalker, she became one to hail . . . It's not just a gripping play but also an important one. Marked by Gilman's characteristically sharp delineation of character, pitch-perfect dialogue, and effortless use of humor that is both biting and silly

Blue Surge is a worthy successor to these plays - an intimate look at the class struggle in America today as well as a brilliant example of the dramatic craft from one of today's most accomplished practitioners

REVIEWS

"Remarkable ... Gilman is - quite unabashedly - an old-school dramatist, conjuring recognizable characters and situations .... She does not think theater should be a metaphor for life or a poetic expression of life, but rather that it should BE life" ~ New York Post

A new play about a policeman and a prostitute - and the dead-end lives they both face - by a "writer of surprising gifts" ~ Chicago Tribune