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Harold Pinter

HAROLD PINTER

  (1930 - 2008)
Nationality:    British
email:    n/a     Website:    Click here

Literary Agent:    Judy Daish Associates Ltd  (Estate of)

Playwright, poet, actor, political activist and Nobel laureate. NOBEL PRIZE >>>
Obituary by Michael Billington >>>

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below is a list of Harold Pinter's plays - click on a Play Title for more information

         Apart From That         Applicant         Ashes To Ashes         Basement, The         Betrayal         Birthday Party, The         Black And White, The         Caretaker, The         Celebration         Collection, The         Dialogue For Three         Dumb Waiter, The         Dwarfs, The         Examination, The         Family Voices         God's District         Heat Of the Day, The         Homecoming, The         Hothouse, The         Interview         Kind Of Alaska, A         Landscape         Last To Go         Lover, The         Mac-a Memoir         Monologue         Moonlight         Mountain Language         New World Order, The         Night         Night Out, A         Night School         No Man's Land         Old Times         One For the Road         One to Another         Other Places         Party Time         Pieces Of Eight         Precisely         Rememberance Of Things Past         Request Stop         Room, The         Silence         Sketches By Pinter         Slight Ache, A         Special Offer         Tea Party, The         That's All         That's Your Trouble         Trouble In the Works         Umbrellas         Victoria Station         Victory

Apart From That

Apart From That
Two people talking on mobile phones

Notes:
performed by Harold Pinter And Antonia Fraser At A charity event in Aid of Patrick pakenham Scholarships for young ex-offenders. the sketch was braodcast on BBC Radio 3 on 12 may 2006.

1st Produced:
the Inner Temple, London    11 May 2006

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
sketch

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Applicant

Synopsis:
Applying for a job, a young man is given a bizarre psychological test which leaves him gasping, blushing and rolling on the floor in shock.

Notes:
excerpt from the Hothouse

1st Produced:
BBC Third Programme    1964

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Radio Sketch

Parts:
Male:  6            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Ashes To Ashes

Synopsis:
This dark, elegiac play, studded with brutally and swaggeringly funny jokes is one of Pinter's most haunting works' Daily Telegraph

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1996   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Short Play One Act

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Basement, The

Synopsis:
the play, in the words of Edith Oliver, is "about a fussy, spinsterish bachelor whose carefully furnished basement flat is invaded late one night by his former roommate with a young girl in tow. Host is effusive in his welcome to former roommate, that is. Girl and former roommate strip naked and get into bed, as host, terribly rattled, continues to chatter. (the chatter is absolutely fine.) the intruders move in permanently, and soon the host's old pictures and bits of sculpture are replaced by a huge, bright, modern abstract. And there are other innovations. As the action progresses, the roles of lover and leftover switch back and forth, and the girl, like the old bum in the Caretaker, tries to set the men against each other and succeeds. there are scenes at a beach, in a cafe, and at a bogus deathbed, and there is a duel, which is fought on a dark stage with lighted broken bottles." In the end we are, it seems, back where we started. But not quite. We have seen, if only for a moment, the rather pathetic, tragic consequences

Notes:
Televised 1967

1st Produced:
Off Broadway, New York    1968

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Tea Party & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1967   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Play One Act

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Betrayal

Synopsis:
the play begins in the present, with the meeting of Emma and Jerry, whose adulterous affair of seven years ended two years earlier. Emma's marriage to Robert, Jerry's best friend, is now breaking up, and she needs someone to talk to. their reminiscences reveal that Robert knew of their affair all along and, to Jerry's dismay, regarded it with total nonchalance. thereafter, in a series of contiguous scenes, the play moves backward in time, from the end of the Emma-Jerry affair to its beginning, throwing into relief the little lies and oblique remarks which, in this timereverse, reveal more than direct statements, or overt actions, ever could.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
National Theatre, London    15 Nov 1978

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Eyre Methuen, London, 1978   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Drama 9 scenes

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Birthday Party, The

Synopsis:
Goldberg and McCann arrive at a seaside boarding house where Meg and Petey live with their guest Stanley. they inquire about Stanley: we soon find out that McCann and Goldberg have a job to do. Learning it is his birthday they give Stanley a party at which Stanley is verbally bludgeoned into submission. the next day Stanley is removed. It is the collective impact of the dialogue which welds the seemingly inexplicable actions of Goldberg and McCann into a menacing whole.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Arts Theatre, Cambridge    1958

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Birthday Party & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1960   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Black And White, The

Synopsis:
Two old buddies, with little to do and nowhere to go, make small talk over soup in a crowded milk bar.

Notes:
in One to Another

1st Produced:
Lyric Opera House, London    1959

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Revue Sketches Show

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Caretaker, The

Synopsis:
the New York Times comments: "An old bum receives shelter in a cluttered room of an abandoned house. His samaritan is a gentle young man whose kindness is so casual that he seems almost indifferent. Dirty, tattered, unkempt, itching and scratching, the tramp is by turns wheedling, truculent and full of bravado. . .He speaks the proud lingo of those who have untold resources awaiting them at near-by havens. He pronounces his meager phrases with the exaggerated precision of one unaccustomed to being heeded. He flails a fist into a palm or into the air with the belligerence of a fighter no one will ever corner. He associates himself with fastidious practices like soap as if they were his daily habit. He is very funny-at first. But the laughter shades increasingly into pity. Like a cornered animal, he cannot believe that anyone means to be kind to him. . .He hates foreigners. He trusts no one, and fears everyone. He alienates the two brothers who separately have offered him a job as caretaker of the premises

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Arts Theatre Club, London    1960

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Eyre Methuen, London, 1960   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Comedy/Drama Comedy

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Celebration

Celebration
All the action takes place in a swish London restaurant where two coarse-grained strategy consultants are dining with their respective wives. At an adjacent table a banker and his wife banter over his recently discovered affair. But while Pinter gets a lot of laughs out of these gold-plated philistines, he also suggests they are displaced people. Shorn of any inherited values, they live in an eternal present of sex, food and conspicuous consumption. - Michael Billington, Guardian

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Almeida Theatre, London >>>    16 Mar 2000

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Collection, The

Synopsis:
As George Oppenheimer describes "the action of the COLLECTION takes place on a divided stage, shared by a house in London's Belgravia and a flat in Chelsea. In the house live Harry, an older man, and Bill, a young dress designer. One night the life of Harry and Bill is distorted by an anonymous phone call, followed by a visit from a young man who refuses to leave his name. the visitor turns out to be James, owner of the flat where he lives with his wife, Stella, a decorative model, who has confessed to her husband that she had a one-night affair with Bill. James is obsessed with a desire to meet the man who had cuckolded him and when he does, a weird attraction-repulsion arise between the two young men. Harry discovers what is going on and in the end casts doubt on whether the affair ever took place and thereby reestablishes an uneasy status quo. All this is done with subtlety and good taste and affords a stimulating glimpse into the shadow abyss that lies between the true and the false, illusion and reality.

Notes:
Televised 1961

1st Produced:
London    1962

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Samuel French, London, 1962   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act. - - Gay, theme/character one act

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Dialogue For Three

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
BBC Third Programme    1964

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Stand" Newcastle vol 6, no 3, 1963   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Radio Sketch

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Dumb Waiter, The

Synopsis:
As the New York World-Telegram & Sun describes: "In the basement of a long-abandoned restaurant, two hired killers nervously await their next assignment. Barred from daylight and living public contact by the nature of their work, they expend their waiting time in bickering. So eerie is the situation that everything becomes comic, or grotesque, or both. Ben re-reading a newspaper and exclaiming in disbelief over the news items, Gus fussing with an offstage stove and offstage plumbing. Ben bludgeoning Gus into silence if he as much as mentions their work. Gus worrying that someone had slept in his bed. So then the ancient dumbwaiter comes to life, the suspense becomes almost unbearable-that expertly has Pinter put the nerves of his characters and audience on edge."

Notes:
in German, Frankfurt 1959

1st Produced:
Frankfurt am Main, Germany    1959

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Birthday Party & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1960   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Dwarfs, The

Dwarfs, The
the play is concerned with three young men, Len, Pete and Mark, and the scene of action shifts back and forth between Len's house and Mark's. Sometimes all three come together, sometimes only two, and often Len is on stage alone. there are conversations and soliloquies filled with the brilliant convolutions of thought, the sudden flashes of truth which distinguish Pinter's unique style, with the mood ranging from calm introspection to explosive outpouring. Much of what is said hints at deeper thoughts left unspoken, and the sense of horror and alienation which often emerges is a searing indictment of our life and times. We meet, we talk, we tear at each other, but our insularity is seldom penetrated. We are together but alone, as though life were a mirror which reflects only our own image. But there is humor too, again distinctively Pinteresque in its startling swings from the direct to the illusive.

Notes:
Broadcast 1960

1st Produced:
New Arts Theatre, London    1963

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "A Slight Ache & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1961   978-0413308306

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Examination, The

Synopsis:
short prose piece

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
London    1978

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Short Play One Act

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Family Voices

Synopsis:
a series of parallel monologues between a mother and son in the form of letters probably written but never mailed, in which the facade of a happy family gradually disintegrates into a cauldron of recrimination.

Notes:
broadcast 22 Jan 1981, in Other Places

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Platform Performance by the NT

1st Published:
Next Editions, 1981   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
Theatre Record Volume I (1981) Page 69

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God's District

God's District
"I'm here in Putney to save souls."

Notes:
part of the revue then Again

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
sketch

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Heat Of the Day, The

Synopsis:
London is at war, couple are in love but a mysterious stranger intervenes.

Notes:
novel by Elizabeth Bowen

1st Produced:
Granada TV    1989

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1989   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
T.V. Play

Parts:
Male:  9            Female:  9            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Homecoming, The

Synopsis:
Eldest son returns to find his repeatability has made him a misfit amongst the squalor and amorality.

Notes:
Cardiff March 26, London June 3

1st Produced:
Cardiff    1965

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Hothouse, The

Synopsis:
the scene is a government institution, possibly mental or medical and presumably penal, where the inmates are kept behind locked gates and are referred to by number rather than name. In charge is Roote, a pompous ex-colonel who is surely as psychologically disturbed as his charges, and who is abetted by two main lackeys: the quietly sinister Gibbs and a seedy alcoholic appropriately named Lush. there is also the sexy Miss Cutts, whose favors appear to be shared by the various staff members. Among the matters at issue are the disturbing fact that one of the patients has given birth to a baby, though no one has filed an official report about having had sex with her and also the need for Roote to pull himself together to address the understaff Christmas party. In the final essence these bureaucratic crises hardly matter, however, as the play ends as ominously as it began, with a burst of lethal violence which leaves only one survivor to search for answers and, perhaps, to accept responsibility for the chaos which ensues.

Notes:
written 1958

1st Produced:
London    1980

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Eyre Methuen, London, 1980   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Black Comedy Comedy

Parts:
Male:  6            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Interview

Synopsis:
During an interview, the proprietor of a pornographic book store confides that the "security police" have dossiers on all his customers-and so does he. After all, they're a pack of Communists.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
BBC Third Programme    1964

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Plays 3" Faber, London, 1991   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Radio Sketch

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Kind Of Alaska, A

Synopsis:
a masterly study of a middle-aged woman waking up after 30 years passed in a coma induced by sleeping sickness. In her mind she is still 16, and her attempts to fathom the changed world into which she re-emerges is not only poignant and emotionally charged but, in the end, devastatingly brilliant theatre as well.

Notes:
in Other Places

1st Produced:
London    14 Oct 1982

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Drama One Act

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Landscape

Synopsis:
a middle aged couple, housekeeper and chauffeur sit in the huge bare kitchen of a country house pursuing their own thoughts aloud in a ghastly semblance of conversation.

Notes:
Broadcast 1968

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Pendragon Press, 1968   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Last To Go

Last To Go
A coffee stall. the attendant and an old newspaper seller chat idly about a variety of pointless topics which probably mean little to either of them.

Notes:
in Pieces of Eight

1st Produced:
Apollo Theatre, London    1959

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "A Slight Ache & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1961   978-0413308306

Music:
-

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Genre:
Revue Sketches Show

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Lover, The

Synopsis:
As the New York Herald-Tribune outlines "A husband goes to his office politely asking if his wife's lover will be coming today. She murmurs 'mmmm,' and suggest he not return before six. In order not to return before six he will no doubt visit a prostitute. A competition is glossily established. When the lover does come, he is the husband, which is not surprising. the kind of sex-play follows that suggests this is the necessary titillation, and the necessary release of hostility, between a man who means to be master of the house and a wife who means to be both wife and mistress, whatever the house may be. But there is a flaw in the accommodation. the lover is weary of his mistress; she is no longer particularly appetizing. By the time he returns, as husband, in the evening, his wife is still disturbed by the news. the performance of the afternoon has begun to carry over into the reality (or pretense) of the evening. Suddenly the husband is not quite husband, diffident over his drink.

Notes:
Televised 1963

1st Produced:
Arts Theatre Club, London    1963

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "the Collection & the Lover" Methuen, London, 1963   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Mac-a Memoir

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
-    1969

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Plays 3" Faber, London, 1991   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Monologue Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Monologue

Synopsis:
Woolf, in a seedy room, talks to the empty chair in which he is seated.

Notes:
Televised 13 April 1973

1st Produced:
London    1973

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Covent Garden Press, 1973   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Moonlight

Moonlight
In a dark space you can't measure, a once visceral Father lies on his deathbed, looking over his life, his youth, loves, lusts and betrayals of his wife. At the same time, in another bedroom, somewhere in the same space, the man's two sons intellectually, clinically and conspiratorially speak of their relationship with their father. Side-stepping their estrangement from him, they rationalize their love-hate relationship with him and defend the distance they are incapable of closing, even when their mother calls them home. In contrast to these closed sons, is the man's daughter, the baby sister, who refuses the dourness and bridges the space between the light and dark, youth and age, and death and life.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Almeida Theatre, London >>>    07 Sep 1993

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Play/Drama 80 min

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  2            Other:  1g

Further Reference:
Theatre Record Volume XXXI (2011) Issue 08 Page 394

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Mountain Language

Synopsis:
Furthering the theme of political consciousness expressed so forcefully and eloquently in his earlier play ONE FOR the ROAD, the author's present play takes place in an anonymous country where individual liberties have been forfeited to the state. Set in a prison where the inmates are forbidden to speak their own language, the play is comprised of four terse, arresting scenes which make masterful use of nuance and subtle understatement (with sudden bursts of violence) to create an overwhelming sense of terror and shocking futility. In one scene uniformed officers taunt and belittle the women who have come to visit their men, who are political prisoners; in another a mother and son are allowed to speak only in "the language of the capital," which they do not know; in the third scene a young woman accidentally sees a guard holding a limp, tortured man whom she knows to be her husband; and, in the final scene the old woman reunited with her bloody, trembling son and, though told she may now speak.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
London    20 Oct 1988

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1988   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
4 brief scenes One Act

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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New World Order, The

Synopsis:
Two men stand above a third-tied and blindfolded-talking to each other, but addressing the third man. the insinuations and threats about what will become of-and what will be done to-this third man, represent the forces in today's world which stifle freedom in its many forms. the fear and uncertainty conveyed by this short piece powerfully reminds us that the evils of the world will always try to conquer us if we don't heed the warnings.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Granata" No 37, 1991   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Ten Min

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Night

Synopsis:
long married couple cast their minds back to their first meeting.

Notes:
Originally presented As one of eight plays under the title "We Who Are About To. . ." At the Hampstead theatre Club on February 6th 1969, which was subsequently presented As "Mixed Doubles" At the Comedy theatre, London on April 9th 1969

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Landscape & Silence" Methuen, London, 1969   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Short dialogue One Act

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Night Out, A

Night Out, A
Living at home with his widowed, domineering mother, Albert is a meek, hen-pecked fellow for whom the invitation to an office party is a rare and welcome chance for a bit of fun. With his mother's exhortations to behave himself ringing in his ears (and his dinner in the oven lest he lose his nerve and turn back home), Albert meets his friends and goes off to the party. Once there, he struggles to overcome his shyness and join in the small talk, but when he is falsely accused of pinching a girl the resulting furor is more than he can cope with. Slinking home he is confronted with maternal diatribe which is, for poor Albert, the last straw. In a rage he rushes back into the London night and, picking up a girl at a coffee stand, goes with her to her room. But when they are alone the girl rambles on incessantly about what a lady she really is and Albert, perhaps sensing in her the personification of all the prattling women in the world, turns on her vindictively and annihilates her seamy and pathetic pretensions.

Notes:
broadcast 1960; part of triple bill "Counterpoint"

1st Produced:
Dublin    1961

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "A Slight Ache & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1961   978-0413308306

Music:
-

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Genre:
Play One Act

Parts:
Male:  10            Female:  5            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Night School

Synopsis:
man leaves jail and returns home to find his two aunts have let his room.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Associated Rediffussion    1960

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Tea Party & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1967   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
T.V. Play

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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No Man's Land

Synopsis:
Involves the confrontation of two aging writers, one a success, one not. they meet at the comfortable flat of the successful author for a nightcap, even though it is not clearly apparent that they are previously acquainted, and the failed, seedy writer is soon forced to acknowledge that he now works as an attendant in a pub. the rich author, Hirst, having drunk too much, is put to bed by the two rather sinister servant-bodyguards who attend him, and his guest, Spooner, is left alone-with the door locked. In the morning the mood changes. Spooner is served a lavish breakfast, and then a rejuvenated Hirst bursts in, greeting Spooner as though he were a dear old school chum, and the sharer of many past escapades. Spooner plays along, and there is the sudden hope that he will be able to secure their relationship to his personal benefit. But Hirst can only acknowledge the cold around him, and order the curtains drawn, before slipping irretrievably into that place which never changes-the icy, silent no man's land.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
London    1975

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Eyre Methuen, London, 1975   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Old Times

Synopsis:
the scene is a fashionably remodeled farmhouse in the countryside somewhere beyond London, where a prosperous and urbane couple are entertaining the wife's former roommate and friend whom they have not seen for twenty years. At first the husband and wife banter, then the friend joins them and a flood of intertwining memories ensues. the action shifts back and forth in time, as recollection of what did-or, perhaps, did not-happen are pondered and, as the tension builds, we are aware that the husband and the friend have become locked in a duel for the wife's very soul. Reveries and ambiguities abound, hinting at much more than is said, and forming together into a surprising entity which challenges the heart and mind and will linger on enticingly in the memory.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Oxford Playhouse    1971

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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One For the Road

Synopsis:
powerful statement about the abuse of human rights by totalitarian governments, finds an unctuous and "civilized" interrogator humiliating the doomed members of a family who have become enemies of the state.

Notes:
part of Other Places

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  1b

Further Reference:
-

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One to Another

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
written by Patrick Gowers (mus, sk, lyr) And Joseph Horovitz (mus,t'sk, lyr) And Stanley Myers (mus, sk, lyr) And Humphrey Searle (mus, sk, lyr) And Charles Cansley (sk, lyr) And Robert Benchley (sk, lyr) And John Cranko (sk. lyr) And Serge Gainsbourg (sk. lyr) And Bamber Gascoigne (sk, lyr) And David Heneker (sk. lyr) And Roddy Maude-Roxby (sk, lyr) And Julian More (sk, lyr) And John Mortimer (sk, lyr) And David Nobbs (sk, lyr) And Monty Norman (sk, lyr) And Dorothy Parker (sk, lyr) And Harold Pinter (sk, lyr) And Alistair Sampson (sk, lyr) And William Sansom (sk, lyr) And N.F. Simpson (sk, lyr) And Keith Statham (mus, sk, lyr) And Brian Tester (sk, lyr).

1st Produced:
Margate: Theatre Royal    30 Jun 1959

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Samuel French, London, 1960   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Sketches in Revue

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
Wearing - the London Stage 59.155

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Other Places

Synopsis:
Family Voices; Victoria Station; A Kind of Alaska

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
London    14 Oct 1982

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
3 * 1 Act Plays One Act

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Party Time

Synopsis:
A party in an elegant flat. Below, in the streets, a military presence. the party goes on.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Almeida Theatre, London >>>    31 Oct 1991

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1991   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Pieces Of Eight

Pieces Of Eight
Last To Go; Request Stop; Special Offer

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Oxford: New Theatre    31 Aug 1959

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "A Slight Ache & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1961   978-0413308306

Music:
-

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Genre:
Revue

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Precisely

Synopsis:
in anti-nuclear weapons show, how many dead would be acceptable ?

Notes:
Part of the Big One

1st Produced:
Apollo Theatre, London    18 Dec 1983

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "the Big One" Methuen, London, 1984   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Sketch

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Rememberance Of Things Past

Synopsis:
Proust's recollection of his childhood in the French countryside of the 1870's, his move to Paris and the story that unfolds as France goes into the first world war.

Notes:
the novels of Marcel Proust Adapted by Di Trevis from the screenplay by Harold Pinter.

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Adaptation

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  cast of 30

Further Reference:
-

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Request Stop

Request Stop
A brief monologue by a "lady" waiting in a bus queue. Is it her fault if the men she asked directions of should race to the wrong conclusions?

Notes:
in Pieces of Eight

1st Produced:
Apollo Theatre, London    1959

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "A Slight Ache & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1961   978-0413308306

Music:
-

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Genre:
Revue Sketches Show

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Room, The

Synopsis:
While her taciturn husband remains engrossed in his magazine, Rose bustles about getting breakfast. As she works she carries on a monologue touching on the weather, the coziness of their cramped quarters, and the mysterious tenant who occupies a damp, windowless room in the basement. the aged landlord, Mr. Kidd, enters, and while he at least responds to Rose's small talk, he does little to allay her nameless fears of the room below. After Mr. Kidd and Bert, the husband, depart, a young couple appears in search of lodgings and Rose discovers that they had wandered into the basement room while looking for the landlord. their description of what they saw, or rather felt in the darkness only heightens her growing sense of apprehension. then, after they have gone, Mr. Kidd returns to tell Rose that she must see the man who has been waiting for her below, waiting for Bert to be gone. the stranger, when Mr. Kidd brings him in, proves to be a blind black man with a message for Rose, and while she disclaims any knowledge.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Bristol    1957

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Birthday Party & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1960   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Silence

Synopsis:
spoken reminiscences of three seated people hidden behind a grey screen.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Landscape & Silence" Methuen, London, 1969   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Sketches By Pinter

Synopsis:
Night Out; Night School; Revue Sketches

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
New York    1969

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in"Early Plays2 Grove Press, New York, 1968   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
sketches Sketch

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Slight Ache, A

Slight Ache, A
Flora and Edward sit at the breakfast table chatting of flowers and wasps and of the slight ache which Edward feels in his eyes. their conversation, which seems so simple and is yet so strangely revealing, then shifts to the mysterious matchseller who has been standing by their back gate for many weeks. Somehow his presence intimidates them, particularly Edward, whose ache becomes aggravated as they discuss who the matchseller may really be, and they resolve to call him in for a direct confrontation. Flora goes out to invite him to come into the house, and when he appears he proves to be an old man, dressed in rags, and so feeble that it is doubtful whether he can see or hear. Seating him in a chair Edward speaks to him in an unnaturally jovial and somehow terrifying manner and soon Edward, without a word of reply from the matchseller, is so unstrung that he cannot go on. Flora takes over the interrogation, and again the old man's silence spurs the spilling out of buried frustrations and fears.

Notes:
broadcast 29/07/59

1st Produced:
Arts Theatre Club, London    1961

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "A Slight Ache & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1961   978-0413308306

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  one man is non speaking

Further Reference:
-

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Special Offer

Special Offer
-

Notes:
in Pieces of Eight

1st Produced:
London    1959

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "A Slight Ache & Other Plays" Methuen, London, 1961   978-0413308306

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
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Genre:
Sketch

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Tea Party, The

Synopsis:
As the New Yorker describes: "TEA PARTY is about a middle-aged self-made business man named Sisson who engages a young secretary, marries a beautiful young second wife, and takes his new brother-in-law into his business-all in the same day. Mysteries abound. What is going on between the wife and her brother? Are they indeed brother and sister? Sisson has his doubts about that (and so do I). Why does Sisson feel that there must be something wrong with his eyes, although he knows that he can see clearly and his eye doctor has assured him that his vision is perfect? He forces his secretary to tie a chiffon scarf over his eyes, and then he is able to make a pass at her, in response to one of her many come-ons. Ordinary events assume a sinister tinge. Sisson's two sons, giving him the deadpan treatment that little boys have been inflicting on their elders from time immemorial, seem as eerie as characters out of a ghost story. Always the questions remain. Is there a conspiracy against Sisson.

Notes:
Televised 1965

1st Produced:
New York    1968

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Comedy One Act

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  4            Other:  2b

Further Reference:
-

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That's All

Synopsis:
It sings, often beautifully, of how love came and worked its transfiguration and then went away. Harold Hobson

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
BBC Third Programme    1964

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Plays 3" Faber, London, 1991   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Radio Sketch

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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That's Your Trouble

Synopsis:
Two men in a park engage in a heated discussion about where a aman carrying a sandwich board will feel the strain first-and most.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
BBC Third Programme    1964

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Plays 3" Faber, London, 1991   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
Radio Sketch

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Trouble In the Works

Synopsis:
A worker tells the boss that the men in the mill are satisfied with working conditions-its the products they object to.

Notes:
in One to Another

1st Produced:
Lyric Opera House, London    1959

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Revue Sketches Show

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Umbrellas

Synopsis:
set on the sunbathed terrace of a large hotel with two men in shorts discussing umbrellas

Notes:
part of the revue "You, Me And the Gatepost"

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Guardian Newspaper, London 25 Oct 2011, page 3   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
sketch

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Victoria Station

Synopsis:
brilliantly funny yet eerily chilling dialogue between a bewildered taxi driver (who may have gone mad) and the exasperated dispatcher who is trying, without success, to direct him to a waiting fare. the driver, who says he has fallen in love with the passenger who is asleep (or perhaps dead) on his back seat, doesn't seem to know his own location, much less that of Victoria Station.

Notes:
in Other Places

1st Produced:
London    14 Oct 1982

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
One Act

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Victory

Synopsis:
Conrad's last major novel tells the story of a Swedish baron who seeks solitude in the Dutch East Indies. He is brought back into the world, however, when he becomes involved in the life of the young English girl he rescues-only to find himself in a deadly duel with her exploiter.

Notes:
from J Conrad's novel

1st Produced:
-    1990

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Collected Screenplays Volume 2 Faber and Faber, London, 2000   -

Music:
-

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Genre:
screenplay

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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