The Rolling Stone - (Modern Plays) by Chris Urch (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

One day you're you. The next you're - I can't even say the word.

Dembe and Sam have been seeing each other for a while. They should be wondering where this is going and when to introduce each other to their families. But they're gay and this is Uganda. The consequences of their relationship being discovered will be violent and explosive. Especially for Dembe, whose brother goes into the pulpit each week to denounce the evils of one man loving another.

A Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting winner in 2013, The Rolling Stone received its world premiere at the Royal Exchange, Manchester, on 21 April 2015.

Review Quotes

"There's a character everyone can relate to . . . there's a character everyone will recognise and fall in love with. . . . A survival play at its heart, Land of Our Fathers is packed full of blistering comedy and a generation of lost voices." --Whatsonstage

"Chris Urch's impressive debut play . . . craftily constructed . . . Urch certainly knows how to use a cliffhanger, and the disintegrating relationships between the men, growing self-interest and looming mutiny are neatly drawn. . . . it's meaty stuff: sometimes gruelling, always watchable." --Guardian

"This is soul-searching, soul-scorching stuff. . . . Land of Our Fathers is a blisteringly good debut: witty, smart, brilliantly textured and paced. The dialogue is packed with dirty humour . . . but also punctuated with instinctive acts of kindness . . . The actors shine - but they'd be fools not to, given this gift of a script." --Time Out

About the Author

Chris Urch trained as an actor at Drama Centre. In 2011 he was longlisted for the Bruntwood Prize. In February 2012 he was selected from over 800 submissions as one of the 503Five, an 18-month playwriting residency with Theatre503. Since then, he has graduated from the Royal Court's Young Writers Programme. He has also participated in the Old Vic's 24-hour plays (2012) as one of six writers selected, and in 2011 Theatre503 staged Married to the Game, A Girl Like You and Vote of No Confidence. Other writing credits include You Get Me? (Bush) and G.L.O.R.Y (Canal Café Theatre). Chris Urch's play Vote of No Confidence was the first to be hand-picked by Howard Brenton to launch The Playwright Presents, an initiative at Theatre503 in which established playwrights help launch the career of a promising new writer. Land of our Fathers is Chris Urch's debut full-length play. His play The Rolling Stone won a Bruntwood Judges' Award in 2013.