In the Next Room (or the vibrator play)

Sarah Ruhl

• Publisher: Theatre Communications Group
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN: 9781559363600
• eBook ISBN: 9781559366618
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: American Drama
• Index: Literature

“A fascinating, funny and evocative play. . . . Ruhl develops the story with the enticing blend of irreverent humor and skewed realism. . . . It’s beautiful.” –San Francisco Chronicle

“[This] breathtakingly inventive addition to Ruhl’s singular body of work . . . has the potential to be a modern masterpiece.”–Los Angeles Times

Sarah Ruhl made her Broadway debut this fall with her latest effervescent comedy: a play about sex, intimacy, and equality, set in the 1880s, when enthusiasm for the electric light bulb gave rise to a handy new instrument to treat female hysteria. The story revolves around the medical office and home of Dr. Givings, who regularly induces “paroxysm” in his once high-strung patient Sabrina, allowing her to happily return to playing piano. Soon, Sabrina falls in love with the doctor’s assistant Annie, and also befriends his wife Catherine, who is dealing with her own neurotic misgivings about not being able to breast-feed her baby. With this new work, Ruhl once again uses playful symbolism and lyrical language as she makes seemingly effortless thematic leaps—crafting a play with tremendous critical and audience appeal, in her singular theatrical voice.

Sarah Ruhl’s plays include Dead Man’s Cell Phone, The Clean House (a Pulitzer Prize finalist), Passion Play, and Eurydice, all of which have been widely produced throughout the United States and internationally. She is a recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship.

In The Next Room- “Bird House” Song (Act 1, Sc. 2)

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In The Next Room- “Sad” Piece (Act 1, Sc. 2)

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In The Next Room- “Kiss” Piece (Act 2, Sc. 2)

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank New Dramatists and some wonderful actors who helped me in the workshop phase of this play: Eisa Davis, Carla Harting, Reed Birney, Mary Catherine Garrison, Michael Esper, Amy Warren, Marin Ireland, and the whole cast of Eurydice . Thanks to Kathleen Chalfant for loaning us her living room when we read the very first draft of this play. Thank you to André Bishop and Bernie Gersten for believing the play could survive on Broadway. Thanks to all the designers: Annie, David, Russell, Bray and Jonanthan for being genius collaborators. Thank you to Paula Vogel, Anne Cattaneo, Madeleine Oldham and Denise Bilbao for reading early drafts; and to Tina Howe, Kathleen Tolan, Andy Bragen, Crystal Finn, Kate Pines, Sarah Rasmussen, Roy Harris, Denise Yaney, Vanessa Poggioli and David Adjmi for helping me get through previews. And many many thanks to Les Waters, without whom this play would never have been written, and to the original cast in Berkeley—Paul (also for your generosity revisiting the play), Hannah, Joaquín, Maria, Stacy, John and Melle—for so bravely finding the play’s voice. And to the cast at the Lyceum—Laura, Michael, Maria, Chandler, Tom, Quincy, Wendy—some of my favorite moments of theater were simply watching you all rehearse.

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SARAH RUHL’s plays include In the Next Room or the vibrator play (Glickman Prize, finalist for the 2010 Pulitzer Prize, nominee for the Tony Award for Best Play), The Clean House (The Susan Smith Blackburn Award, 2004; finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, 2005), Dead Man’s Cell Phone (Helen Hayes Award for Best New Play), Demeter in the City (nominated for nine NAACP awards), Eurydice, Melancholy Play, Orlando, Late: a cowboy song and Passion Play (Kennedy Center’s The Fourth Freedom Forum Playwriting Award). Her plays have premiered on Broadway at the Lyceum Theater (produced by Lincoln Center Theater); Off-Broadway at Lincoln Center Theater, Playwrights Horizons, Second Stage Theatre; and regionally at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Yale Repertory Theatre, the Goodman Theatre, Cornerstone Theater Company, Arena Stage, Woolly Mammoth Theatre, the Piven Theatre; as well as being produced at many other theaters across the country. Her plays have also been performed in England, Poland, Germany, Israel, New Zealand and Australia, and have been translated into Spanish, Polish, Russian, Korean and Arabic. Sarah received her MFA from Brown University, where she studied with Paula Vogel, and is originally from Chicago. In 2003, she was the recipient of a Helen Merrill Emerging Playwrights Award, a Whiting Writers’ Award, and a PEN/Laura Pels Award; in 2006 she was the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship. Her work is published by TCG and Samuel French, and she is a member of New Dramatists and 13P. She lives in New York City with her family.

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In the Next Room or the vibrator play is copyright © 2010 by Sarah Ruhl

 

In the Next Room or the vibrator play is published by Theatre Communications Group, Inc., 520 Eighth Avenue, 24th Floor, New York, NY 10018-4156

 

All Rights Reserved. Except for brief passages quoted in newspaper, magazine, radio or television reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by an information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Professionals and amateurs are hereby warned that this material, being fully protected under the Copyright Laws of the United States of America and all other countries of the Berne and Universal Copyright Conventions, is subject to a royalty. All rights, including but not limited to, professional, amateur, recording, motion picture, recitation, lecturing, public reading, radio and television broadcasting, and the rights of translation into foreign languages are expressly reserved. Particular emphasis is placed on the question of readings and all uses of this book by educational institutions, permission for which must be secured from the author’s representative: Bruce Ostler, Bret Adams Ltd., 448 West 44th Street, New York, NY 10036, [phone].

 

This publication is made possible in part with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a State Agency.

 

TCG books are exclusively distributed to the book trade by Consortium Book Sales and Distribution.

 

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Ruhl, Sarah.

eISBN : 978-1-559-36661-8

1. Married women—Sexual behavior—Drama. 2. Desire—Drama. 3. Sex—Drama.
I. Title. II. Title: In the next room. III. Title: Vibrator play.
PS3618.U48I6 2010
812’.6—dc22 2010038900

 

 

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Table of contents

• Title Page
• BOOKS BY SARAH RUHL AVAILABLE FROM TCG
• Dedication
• PRODUCTION HISTORY
• ON THE STAGE
• PLAYWRIGHT’S NOTES
• Act I
• Act II
• Music
• In The Next Room- “Bird House” Song (Act 1, Sc. 2)
• Acknowledgments
• Copyright Page