Cast

Synopsis

Barbara, a fastidious, frosty spinster, inhabits the ground floor flat. Gilbert, a postman and handyman, inhabits the basement and is painting a lurid nude study of Barbara. Nikki and Hamish are in the flat above. Hamish and Barbara hate each other. All fairly innocuous until you add in passion, affairs, accidents, make-ups and break-ups.

This is one of Alan Ayckbourn’s newer plays and combines a hilarious text with an interesting set.

Directors Notes

Alan Aykbourn, playwright extraordinaire. What is there left to say about the author of tonight’s play. He has been an ever present force in the theatre for decades. His first play was performed in 1959 and he has now written a staggering total of 76 full length plays: all this while being an acclaimed director in the West End, running his own company at the National Theatre and Artistic Director of the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough.

Within the theatre world his plays can induce seasoned set designers to turn a sickening shade of pale as they struggle to find ways of fulfilling Aykbourn’s settings. Tonight’s play set on three different floor levels is no exception. On stage actors have to meet the challenge of switching an audience’s response from laughter to tears and back again often in a matter of seconds.

Things we do for Love, first performed in 1997, has the usual mixture of comedy tinged with a darker side. It is based on the eternal triangle. On second thoughts that should be eternal quadrangle. Ingredients include: love, marriage, passion, animal lust, euphoria, despair, betrayal and sorrow served with a