Moonlight (play)

Moonlight
1994 Grove Press edition
Written by	Harold Pinter
Characters	Andy, Bel, Bridget, Fred, Jake, Maria, Ralph
Date premiered	September 7, 1993 (1993-09-07)
Place premiered	Almeida Theatre, London
Original language	English
Subject	family, love, life, death, and dying
Genre	drama
Setting	house and flat
Official site
IOBDB profile

Moonlight is a play written by Harold Pinter, which premiered at the Almeida Theatre, in London, in September 1993.

Setting

THREE MAIN PLAYING AREAS:

1. Andy's bedroom — well furnished

2. Fred's bedroom — shabby

(These rooms are in different locations.)

3. An area in which Bridget appears, through which Andy moves at night and where Jake, Fred and Bridge play their scene. (Grove Press ed., n. pag.)

Synopsis

Andy, who is on his deathbed,

rehashes his youth, loves, lusts, and betrayals with his wife, [Bel], while simultaneously his two sons [Fred and Jake] — clinical, conspiratorial, the bloodless, intellectual offspring of a hearty anti-intellectual — sit in the shadows, speaking enigmatically and cyclically, stepping around and around the fact of their estrangement from their father, rationalizing their love-hate relations with him and the distance that they are unable to close even when their mother attempts to call them home. In counterpoint to their uncomprehending isolation between the extremes of the death before life and the death after is their younger sister, Bridget, who lightly bridges the gaps between youth and age, death and life. (Back cover of the Grove Press ed.)

Characters

• ANDY, a man in his fifties
• BEL, a woman of fifty
• JAKE, a man of twenty-eight
• FRED, a man of twenty-seven
• MARIA, a woman of fifty
• RALPH, a man in his fifties
• BRIDGET, a girl of sixteen (Grove Press ed., n. pag.)

Productions

Premiere

First performed at the Almeida Theatre, London, on 7 September 1993; transferred to the Comedy Theatre in November 1993

Cast

• Ian Holm (Andy)
• Anna Massey (Bel)
• Douglas Hodge (Jake)
• Michael Sheen (Fred)
• Jill Johnson (Maria)
• Edward de Souza (Ralph)
• Claire Skinner (Bridget)

Production team

• David Leveaux, Director
• Bob Crowley, Designer (HaroldPinter.org)

New York premiere

At the Laura Pels Theatre, Roundabout Theatre Company, 27 September – 17 December 1995

Opening Night Cast

• Melissa Chalsma (Bridget)
• Blythe Danner (Bel)
• Paul Hecht (Ralph)
• Barry McEvoy (Fred)
• Jason Robards (Andy)
• Liev Schreiber (Jake)
• Kathleen Widdoes (Maria)

Production team

• Karel Reisz, Director
• Tony Walton, Set Designer
• Mirena Rada, Costume Designer
• Richard Pilbrow, Lighting Designer
• Tom Clark, Sound Designer (IOBDB)

BBC Radio 3 programme

Part of Harold Pinter Double Bill (with Voices) originally broadcast to marking Pinter's 75th birthday, in October 2005; rebroadcast as part of the Harold Pinter Tribute on BBC Radio 3's Drama on 3, on 15 February 2009.

Cast

• Harold Pinter (Andy)
• Sara Kestelman (Bel)
• John Shrapnel(Ralph)
• Jill Johnson (Maria)
• Douglas Hodge (Jake)
• Harry Burton (Fred)
• Indira Varma (Bridget)

Production team

• Janet Whitaker, Director
• Elizabeth Parker, Music

Works cited

Main article: Bibliography for Harold Pinter

• Pinter, Harold. Moonlight, New York: Grove Press, 1994. ISBN 0802133932 (10). ISBN 9780802133939 (13). (Parenthetical references to this edition appear in the text.)
• –––. Moonlight. Harold Pinter Double Bill (with Voices). BBC Radio 3 Drama Programmes — Drama on 3. BBC, 15 Feb. 2009. Web. 15 Feb. 2009. [First broadcast Oct. 2005, as part of Pinter's 75th birthday celebration. Re-broadcast 15 Feb. 2009, as part of Harold Pinter Tribute. (Streaming audio accessible for 7 days after broadcasts).]

External links

• Moonlight – HaroldPinter.org: Official Website of the International Playwright Harold Pinter.