Bedroom Farce: Synopsis
Cast: 4 male / 4 femaleRunning time (approximate): 2 hours - not including the interval.
Availability: Bedroom Farce is available for both professional and amateur production.
Acting edition: Published by Samuel French.
Bedroom Farce takes place over the course of one night in three bedrooms, all present on stage. The play is set during the mid to late 1970s and should be produced within this period.
Characters
○ Ernest○ Delia (His wife)
○ Nick
○ Jan (His wife; once had an affair with Trevor)
○ Malcolm
○ Kate (His wife)
○ Trevor
○ Susannah (His partner)
At Jan and Nick’s house, Nick is lying incapacitated in bed and Jan is about to go to Malcolm and Kate’s house-warming party, although Nick suspects Trevor’s presence is also a factor for her going. She leaves and Nick subsequently falls out of bed. Unable to move, he spends the first act in varying states of distress on his bedroom floor.
At the party, where the bedroom is acting as a cloakroom, Trevor arrives – without Susannah - and reveals he and Susannah are not getting on; she promptly arrives in a distraught state. She and Kate chat about their relationships and the paranoid Susannah tells her she believes she revolts Trevor. He comes to see her; they end up fighting and ruin the party. Trevor and Jan have a heart to heart in which he is revealed to be a rather spoilt, immature and temperamental man who can’t see how badly he treats people. They kiss, just as Susannah enters the room; she leaves greatly upset and Kate, much to Malcolm’s annoyance, says Trevor can sleep over. Trevor decides he has to put things right with Jan and Nick first.
Jan returns home to find Nick stranded. She eventually gets him onto the bed and tells him about the kiss – their relationship too is hardly at its best. Trevor arrives and confesses all to Nick, before falling asleep on the bed.
In frustration, Malcolm has decided to assemble the dressing table he bought as a present for Kate. As they wait for Trevor to return, the pair discuss their relationship, Kate revealing how unsatisfied she is.
Meanwhile, Susannah has fled to Ernest and Delia and tells all to Delia. Delia dishes out words of wisdom, Ernest is consigned to the spare room leaving Susannah to sleep with Delia. Early the next morning, Susannah determines to call Trevor. She discovers he’s slept at Jan’s. In a state, she manages to contact him, they make peace but not before Trevor’s been to Malcolm and Kate to apologise. There, he manages to destroy the dressing table but is reconciled with Susannah. But will anything change?
Article by Simon Murgatroyd. Copyright: Haydonning Ltd. Please do not reproduce without permission of the copyright holder.