Into the Darkest Places: Pursuing Politics in the Plays of Phyllis Nagy

Morgan McKean, K S

Abstract

In this article, I argue for the political relevance of the work of Phyllis Nagy not only to the 1990s – the decade in which the majority of her work premiered – but to current political, theoretical and theatrical debates. I consider the ways in which her plays were received by critics and how they sit outside popular characterisations of this period of new writing in British theatre. Through the hyperreal landscape Nagy creates in The Strip (1995), Nagy interrogates ideas of fate through an examination of gambling and greed. These ideas and images resonate with those surrounding the current economic crisis, and the inequalities apparent during the 2011 London Riots. Further, the transnational locations and identities in the play interrogate contemporary repositioning of self and place. Weldon Rising (1992), set in a city that is literally melting, resonates not only with the ‘melting pot’ ideas of migration and community but anticipates current staging of environmental disaster caused by failures of responsibility; a recurrent theme in Nagy’s work. The current European crisis similarly resonates with and is interrogated within, Never Land (1998), and I examine the politics of this and her most recent play, The One, The Other (2010).

Citation

Morgan McKean, K. S. (2014). Into the Darkest Places: Pursuing Politics in the Plays of Phyllis Nagy. Contemporary Theatre Review, 24(1), 66-81. https://doi.org/10.1080/10486801.2013.858328

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Oct 21, 2013
• Publication Date: Mar 5, 2014
• Deposit Date: May 8, 2019
• Journal: Contemporary Theatre Review
• Print ISSN: 1048-6801
• Publisher: Routledge
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 24
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 66-81
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/10486801.2013.858328
• Public URL: https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/1759615
• Publisher URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10486801.2013.858328