Publisher's Synopsis
Introducing Beyond the Red Curtain and Other Plays, a compelling collection of four full-length plays which deal with individuals forced to confront unexpected and challenging situations with which they cannot cope.
Beyond the Red Curtain, set in the near future after the enaction of a law permitting physician-assisted suicide, explores the dilemmas faced by an elderly and terminally ill couple who have elected to die together - and the effects on other family members with whom they share a farewell meal.
In The Woman Below, set in the early1950s, an impoverished and childless young couple are forced to confront their own failings when visitors linked to their distant past unexpectedly seek refuge in their very basic west London attic flat.
Melusina Ballerina charts the demise of a disturbed young woman whose obsession with the construction of a robotic ballerina, coupled with disturbing childhood memories, has tragic consequences.
The year 1290, which saw the first major expulsion of Jews from England, provides an authentic background for the last play - Shadow of a Queen - which centres upon the demise of individuals within the circle of Queen Eleanor - the wife of King Edward I - at the royal hunting lodge at Geddington during the weeks before her death and shortly after when her funeral cortège stops there on its way to Westminster.
