Cloud 9
by Caryl Churchill
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A landmark play about sexual politics in colonial Africa and modern-day Britain, in which all our assumptions about sex and gender are stunningly exploded. First staged by Joint Stock and premiered in London at the Royal Court Theatre in 1979, it has since been staged all over the world. Set in both colonial Africa and modern-day Britain, Cloud Nine is about relationships - between women and men, men and men, women and women. It is about sex, work, mothers, Africa, power, children, show more grandmothers, politics, and money. 'Sharp comedy and a serious purpose are splendidly combined... It unlocks show lessTags
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Member Reviews
Another Ardgour readthrough. I want to say 'I liked this a lot', but I'm not sure 'like' is a word I can associate with this weird ikky tale of colonialism, incest, adultery, paedophilia and orgies. It ought to be trying too hard - everything is shock factor turned up to 11. But the language is so slick, and makes you flinch and laugh and cry all at the same time, with wry dark humour and deep insight. It's a play of two halves, which while they have parallels and echos are mostly disjoint. The first half is colonial Africa, a man trying to keep the white beacon of God, Queen, Family and Respectability burning through a mess of lust, unrequited love, fights with the natives, and Christmas. The second half is the 1970s, and a sprawling show more mess of people bringing up children, having sex, and trying to work out who they are and what they like in the world. show less
I'm not the biggest fan of Caryl Churchill but this is far and away her best work! Seeing a top-notch professional production might account for my positive reaction to it - without seeing it onstage, I had a very difficult time envisioning the play when I read it the first time.
interesting exploration of sexual politics, but didn't feel like much more than just that-- an exploration
Poignant play, both comedy and tragedy, through the British Music Hall tradition, examining gender and roles (and stereotypes of all sorts).
That was...odd. Can't wait to write 20,000 words about it!
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Carl Churchill, also spelled as Caryl Churchill, was born in London, England, on September 3, 1938. Growing up, Churchill lived in both England and Canada and earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University, in 1960. While at Oxford, Churchill became interested in theatre and went on to write three plays show more while she was there. After graduation, Churchill spent the next ten years writing plays, including "Lovesick" and "Schreber's Nervous Illness," which were broadcast on the BBC. In 1974, Churchill began working for the Royal Court Theatre as a resident playwright and two years later she joined the Joint Stock Theatre Group, an organization that uses collective collaboration between actors, writers, and directors when creating theatrical works. Churchill has also written dozens of books over the years, among them Blue Heart, Cloud Nine, and Hotel: In a Room Anything Can Happen. Looked upon as a voice of post-modernism, Churchill is well known for her use of dramatic structure. (Bowker Author Biography) In the early 1980s, Churchill suddenly became one of the contemporary British dramatists best represented on New York stages, as three of her plays were produced in succession. Cloud Nine (1978), directed by Tommy Tune, held the stage for two years and won an Obie (as did Top Girls, 1982). In England Churchill's career has been less abrupt, a long migration among the characteristic outlets of the new drama. From 1961 to 1972, she wrote radio plays. Owners (1972) was her first stage work commissioned by the Royal Court, where she became resident dramatist in 1974, and which staged Objections to Sex and Violence in 1975. The following year Churchill began working with two of the important fringe theater companies. One company was Joint Stock for which she wrote Light Shining in Buckinghamshire, (1976), Cloud Nine, and Fen (1982). The other was a feminist group named Monstrous Regiment for which she wrote Vinegar Tom (1976), and contributions to the revue Floorshow. The Lucille Lortel Theatre (New York) production of Cloud Nine in 1981 ushered in the most recent, transatlantic phase of Churchill's career. New York's Public Theater, as well as London's Royal Court, staged versions of Top Girls in 1982. Churchill writes many different kinds of plays. Examples are Ortonesque, about the grotesques of Owners, historical as in versions of the seventeenth century in Light Shining, about the English Civil War, and Vinegar Tom, about witchcraft. She also writes expressionist (the cross-sexual casting and doubling in Cloud Nine), and formally experimental (the permutations of situation in her dramatic Mobius strip, Traps). She is increasingly feminist in outlook. But, if her demonstrations of sexual liberation are sometimes pat (as in the second half of Cloud Nine), her theatrical adventurousness is always invigorating. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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- Members
- 707
- Popularity
- 40,358
- Reviews
- 5
- Rating
- (3.45)
- Languages
- English, French
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 12
- ASINs
- 7
