MEDIA RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
11/01/08
What would Hedda Gabbler say if she could text Antigone?
Downstage Bar, 18-20 Feb 2008, 9:30pm
1st gear productions present
2 b or nt 2 b?
It’s true - the more things change the more they stay the same! Take six characters from classic plays, give them each a
mobile and a laptop and let them loose on today’s modern world.
2 b or nt 2 b takes characters from Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Midsummer Night’s Dream , Chekhov’s Three Sisters and The
Seagull, Sophocles’ Antigone and Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler. But has anything really changed for today’s modern teens? Hamlet
and Antigone have disyfunctional families, Helena and Masha moon over unattainable boys and Irina and Hedda feel trapped
in their boring lives. As present day teenagers they all end up on whatsthepoint?.com a website for those searching for
meaning in life – and the play follows their plans to meet up.
The script combines modern language from the text and internet realm, with poetic and lyrical language from the original
plays. This creates a quirky story that illustrates how great tragedy and comedy are as alive and well today as they
were when written about hundreds of years ago.
This production 2 b or nt 2 b will utilise the wild enthusiasm of six seventeen year old actors with experienced writer
and director Sarah Delahunty. Sarah has been working with young people in the theatre for the past thirty years, “They
are my favourite age group to teach and direct” says Delahunty, “ so open and ready to try anything, with a freshness
and energy that is a good balance to my possibly wiser and definitely more world weary take on life”.
Sarah has written and directed plays for the 2005 and 2006 Wellington Fringe Festivals – Superbeast and Eating the Wolf
(a feminist take on the Red Riding Hood story which John Smythe called “the find of the Fringe” in 2005). She even
joined the five young female actors on stage in her role as the narrator. In the last three years, two of her plays have
toured New Zealand secondary schools - Driving U Crazy, about driving safety for teenagers and - Another Planet -
covering issues around healthy and unhealthy relationships.
2 b or nt 2 b?
18-20 Feb 2008, 9:30pm, Downstage Theatre Bar, 12 Cambridge Terrace, Wellington
Cost: Full $12 / Concessions $10 / Fringe addict $9 Door Sales Only
ENDS