MICHAEL FRAYN (1933 - )
| Nationality: | English |
| Literary Agent: *: | |
| Email: | n/a |
| Website: | n/a |
* If shown, click on the literary agent's name for full contact details and links to all the Playwrights they represent.
Plays by Michael Frayn
Afterlife |
| 1st Produced: | 2008 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | - | - | ||
| To Buy This Play: | I don't think the play has been published but you could try abebooks.com or the playwright direct where their email is shown at the top of the page | |||
| Genre: | - | Play/Drama | Parts: | Male | - | Female | - |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: Max Reinhardt, one the greatest impresarios of theatrical history, had a lifelong ambition - to dissolve the boundary between theatre and the world it portrays. Each year at the Salzburg Festival he directed a famous morality play, Everyman, about God sending Death to summon a representative of mankind for judgment. The victim he chooses is a man who, like Reinhardt, rejoices in his wealth and all the pleasures that money can buy. Then in 1938 Hitler declares his own day of reckoning and sends Death into Austria - whereupon Reinhardt, a Jew, is left as naked and vulnerable as Everyman himself. Afterlife is the story of how Reinhardt achieves his great ambition; though in a way he can scarcely have foreseen. | ||||
Alarms And Excursions |
| 1st Produced: | Gielgud, London | 1998 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1998 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | eight short playlets | - | Parts: | Male | 16 | Female | 14 |
| Parts Other: | can be 2m 2f | |||
Notes: Alarms; Doubles; Leavings; Look Away Now; Heart to Heart; Glasnost; Toasters; Immobiles | ||||
Synopsis: Alarms. Two couples embark on a dinner party which is doomed to failure as labour-saving devices and furniture become hostile. Doubles. Two couples in adjacent hotel rooms have similar problems to those in Alarms. Leavings. The dinner-party is revisited. Look Away Now. Passengers ignore their airliner's safety lecture. Heart to Heart. Deals with the impossibility of communication at a noisy drinks party. Glassnost. Presents us with a political speech sabotaged by a harassed autocue operator. Toasters. Shows the problems of trying to eat and work standing up at a function. Immobiles. This is acted out entirely over the phone, as a couple try to decide where they should be meeting their German guest. | ||||
Alphabetical Order |
| 1st Produced: | 1975 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Samuel French, London | 1976 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Play/Drama | Parts: | Male | 4 | Female | 3 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: The library office of a provincial newspaper is a scene of utter confusion - the cluttered chaos of the room matching the lives of its staff. It is also a scene of warmth and light-heartedness. In comes Leslie, a new young assistant with a passion for organisation who transforms the office and the lives of its inhabitants into something orderly and neat - and also arid and colourless. An announcement that the paper is to close leads to a struggle between chaos and order. | ||||
Audience |
| 1st Produced: | Lyric Theatre, London | 1987 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Samuel French, London [Oberon, London 2007] | 1978 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | One Act | Parts: | Male | 6 | Female | 7 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: Audience was first performed in Colin Blakely, a Celebration at the Lyric on 4th October 1987. With a second act added it was presented under the title Look Look at the Aldwych on 17th April 1990 | ||||
Synopsis: the theory that the audience may be more interesting than what its watching | ||||
Balmoral |
| 1st Produced: | 1978 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1987 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Farce | Parts: | Male | 6 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: aka Liberty Hall | ||||
Synopsis: It is 1937. Twenty years earlier the Revolution took place in Britain instead of Russia and the Soviet Republic of Great Britain is at the height of the purges. The royal residence of Balmoral is now a State Writer's Home with Godfrey Winn, Warwick Deeping, Enid Blyton and Hugh Walpole among its current inmates. | ||||
Bear, The |
| 1st Produced: | Unproduced | - | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1988 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Adaptation | Parts: | Male | 2 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: Original Playwright - Anton Chekhov | ||||
Synopsis: No I'm not interested in the beginning of a love affair and I'm not interested in the en, haven't you noticed they are the same. Let's go back to the middle | ||||
Benefactors |
| 1st Produced: | Vaudeville Theatre, London | 1984 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1984 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Play/Drama | Parts: | Male | 2 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: won the Standard, Plays and Players and Laurence Olivier awards for the Best Play of 1984. Spanning fifteen years this complex, well-structured play traces the story of the destruction of David's architectural dream by the embittered Colin and Colin's marriage to the inept Sheila, contrasting those who help and those who are helped; those who create and those who destroy. '. . . a beautifully crafted play, economically written.' Time Out | ||||
Birthday |
| 1st Produced: | BBC 1 | 1969 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1990 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | TV Play | - | Parts: | Male | 6 | Female | 9 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: Modern | ||||
Black And Silver |
| 1st Produced: | London | 1970 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Fontana, London | 1970 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | One Act | Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: in "The Two Of Us" | ||||
Synopsis: New baby interferes with romance when returning to honeymoon tryst | ||||
Cherry Orchard, The |
| 1st Produced: | National Theatre, London | 1978 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Eyre Methuen, London | 1978 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Adaptation | Parts: | Male | 9 | Female | 5 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: Original Playwright - Anton Chekhov | ||||
Synopsis: the story of mortgage with the grounds of the proud house being sold to pay off debts | ||||
Chinamen |
| 1st Produced: | London | 1970 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Fontana, London | 1970 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | One Act | Parts: | Male | 3 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: in "The Two Of Us" | ||||
Synopsis: Personal problems revealed at dinner party | ||||
Clockwise |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1986 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | Screenplay | - | Parts: | Male | - | Female | - |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: | ||||
Clouds |
| 1st Produced: | 1976 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Eyre Methuen, London | 1977 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Comedy | Parts: | Male | 4 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: two journalist on a fact finding mission to Cuba with the title as a metaphor for the characters themselves | ||||
Copenhagen |
| 1st Produced: | 1998 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1999 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Historical | Parts: | Male | 2 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: two physicists who together had revolutionised atomic science in the 1920's are now on opposite sides in WW2 | ||||
Crimson Hotel, The |
| 1st Produced: | 2007 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 2007 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | absurdist comrdy | One Act | Parts: | Male | 2 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: part of Absudia | ||||
Synopsis: In this absurdist comedy two lovers escape to a discreet and charming Parisian hotel ,conjured from a desert landscape. As the walls, door and crimson curtains of Room 322 materialise around the playwright and his lead actress,a fumbling of fastenings ensues. But they're not the only couple intent on escaping from reality. . | ||||
Democracy |
| 1st Produced: | 2003 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | Historical Drama | - | Parts: | Male | 10 | Female | 10 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: | ||||
Donkey's Years |
| 1st Produced: | Globe Th, London | 1976 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1977 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Comedy | Parts: | Male | 8 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: Twenty years after graduation, six former students return to their university college for a reunion dinner. Whilst their lives may have had varying degrees of success, all are connected by a common past. Once locked in college for the night, the graduates begin to relive their youth, and old friendships, feuds and the much-desired but absurdly proper Master's wife come tumbling back into the present . . . | ||||
Evils Of Tobacco, The |
| 1st Produced: | Unproduced | - | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1988 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Adaptation | Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | - |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: Original Playwright - Anton Chekhov | ||||
Synopsis: very short talk by husband on wife's views of tobacco | ||||
Exchange |
| 1st Produced: | 1989 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1990 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Adaptation | Parts: | Male | 10 | Female | 9 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: Original Playwright - Yuri Trifonov; Guildhall 1986 with student actors | ||||
Synopsis: attempt to exchange a cramped flat in Moscow highlights the tensions between two families and their clash of opposing values | ||||
First & Last |
| 1st Produced: | BBC 1 | 1989 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1989 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | TV Play | Screen Play | Parts: | Male | 27 | Female | 20 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: This is a screenplay about a recently retired insurance manager who is ill. He decides to combat his illness by walking from Land''s End to John O''Groats and in doing so becomes a healthier and more aware human being. It is a gentle comedy with serious overtones by the author of 'Clockwise' | ||||
Fruits Of Enlightenment, The |
| 1st Produced: | National Theatre, London | 1979 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Eyre Methuen, London | 1979 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Adaptation | Parts: | Male | - | Female | - |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: Original Playwright - Leo Tolstoy | ||||
Synopsis: a changed translation from the norm | ||||
Headlong |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1999 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | - | Parts: | Male | - | Female | - |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: | ||||
Here |
| 1st Produced: | 1993 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1993 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Play/Drama | Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: a steady drip of monosyllabic questions and fudged answers create a hell of indecision as the duelling protagonist endlessly circle | ||||
Jamie On A Flying Visit |
| 1st Produced: | BBC 1 | 1968 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1990 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | TV Play | - | Parts: | Male | 13 | Female | 9 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: Modern | ||||
Liberty Hall |
| 1st Produced: | 1980 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1987 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Farce | Parts: | Male | 6 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: revised version of Balmoral | ||||
Synopsis: It is 1937. Twenty years earlier the Revolution took place in Britain instead of Russia and the Soviet Republic of Great Britain is at the height of the purges. The royal residence of Balmoral is now a State Writer's Home with Godfrey Winn, Warwick Deeping, Enid Blyton and Hugh Walpole among its current inmates. | ||||
Listen To This |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1990 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | Sketches and Monologues | Sketch | Parts: | Male | - | Female | - |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: Listen To This; Confession; At The Sign Of The Rupture Belt; A Little Peace And Quiet; Blots; Through The Wilderness; Never Mind The Weather; Black And Silver; The New Quixote; Mr Foot; Chinamen; | ||||
Synopsis: | ||||
Look Look |
| 1st Produced: | 1990 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1990 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Play/Drama | Parts: | Male | 2 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: aka Spettori (Rome 1989) | ||||
Synopsis: the theory that the audience may be more interesting than what its watching | ||||
Make And Break |
| 1st Produced: | 1980 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Eyre Methuen, London | 1980 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Play/Drama | Parts: | Male | 11 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: a compulsive businessman whose self absorption is complete even during the climatic events of a trade fair in Germany | ||||
Mr Foot |
| 1st Produced: | London | 1970 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Fontana, London | 1970 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | One Act | Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: in The Two Of Us | ||||
Synopsis: Discussion by couple on how to handle a job investigator | ||||
New Quixote, The |
| 1st Produced: | London | 1970 | ||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | Fontana, London | 1970 | ||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | One Act | Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: in "The Two Of Us" | ||||
Synopsis: Older professional woman eventually accepts young man's presence. | ||||
Noises Off |
| 1st Produced: | 1982 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1982 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Comedy | Parts: | Male | 6 | Female | 4 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||
Notes: - | ||||
Synopsis: A farce about a farce | ||||
Now You Know |
| 1st Produced: | 1995 | |||
| Company: | - | |||
| 1st Published: | 1995 | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||
| Genre: | - | Play/Drama | Parts: | Male | 4 | Female | 4 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||