The play concerns the silence which has prevailed over a traumatic incident from their childhood, which for years they have been unwilling to talk about and come to terms with.

It is the second entry in Ridley's unofficially titled "Brothers Trilogy", having been preceded by Mercury Fur and followed by Piranha Heights. [5] [6] [2] Story [ edit ]

Raw and unflinching, LEAVES OF GLASS is a masterpiece of storytelling, dealing with love, hate, memory and loss.

How does it feel to revive such a gripping and disorienting narrative, especially for an audience of today? Leaves of Glass is the sixth adult stage play by Philip Ridley. It premiered at the Soho Theatre in London, England, on 3 May 2007. [1]

the initial draft perhaps was sort of more real-time, one location. [...] I love doing that, I mean, I think that's what theatre does best and... It always amazes me that people are surprised that I should be drawn to that kind of form of telling a play because that's one of the things that theatre does so well, is real-time. Where else can you experience that? Certainly not in film now. But then what happened was that I really got into this idea of — which is what the play has ended up doing — of sort of like coming into scenes at very jagged angles. [In the play] you get kind of like layers of these scenes, like kind of little pieces of broken glass that come in. The scenes begin when they are already up and moving; the action is already happening and they don't kind of finish on a kind of particular comforting way; there is no kind of dying fall at the end. You're just in and out of these scenes almost like cinematic cuts. [...] And I quite liked that kind of oblique way of telling of what is, in a way, a very oblique story. I thought that was part of the theatrical experience for me of this kind of [...] circular descent that [the character of] Steve is on of memory and morality." [7] Notable productions [ edit ]When the family aren’t staying silent, they are gaslighting each other, carefully remembering only certain details of events and trying to convince each other that their version is what really happened. It’s mostly a tense and dramatic evening, though there are lighter moments, often from Katie Bucholz’s Debbie. The play was commissioned and directed by Lisa Goldman after being greatly impressed by Ridley's previous adult stage play Mercury Fur. [2] The production was Lisa Goldman's first in her tenure as artistic director of the Soho Theatre. [3] Like Mercury Fur the play starred Ben Whishaw in its premiere production. [4] After this and the tour, what other projects are you currently involved in that you can share with us? Produced by Zoe Weldon / Lidless Theatre, the revival is directed by Max Harrison with set & costume by Kit Kinchcliff and sound design by Sam Glossop. Casting consultant is Nadine rennie CDG. Unsettling, opening up topics audiences prefer to shy away from, that’s a function of theatre too. Ridley does it supremely well. He writes plays that delight in keeping the audience unbalanced, and this play is a fine example of that, juggling truth in a succession of sharp, focussed scenes that leave us with fewer certainties than we started with. It doesn’t make for a comfortable evening’s entertainment, but it is arguably more important because of it. And this production gives a superb platform for all that squiggly doubt.