cover art by Judy Renacia
“Cross the wordplay of S J Perelman with the world-in-a-time-warp vision of Caryl Churchill
and you might approximate the special flavor of ON THE VERGE. In
Eric Overmyer's chimerical new comedy, three Victorian lady
explorers set out on an adventure that takes them to darkest
Africa, highest Himalaya and Terra Incognita....
Blending Tom Stoppard's limber linguistics with the historic overview of a
Thornton Wilder, Mr Overmyer takes his audience on
a mirthful safari...spinning into time travel.
Three `sister sojourners', each a prototypical Victorian lady
explorer, equipped with dialog as pithy as their helmets, thwack their machetes
through the wilderness while telling tales of past jaunts among the natives. As
intrepid trekkers, they put the lie to any charge that they are representatives
of a weaker sex. Mr Overmyer has written a play
that is joyfully feminist.
Heroines to their heart, the explorers can accommodate themselves
to any emergency (natural or man-made), although they are
momentarily disoriented as they approach modern times. In their
kaleidoscopic adventure, they journey through a rain forest of
hundreds of artifacts from the future—household utensils,
mechanical contrivances and a side-view automobile mirror that
reads `Objects in mirror may be closer than they appear'. How
does one deal with such a chimera?...
In the play there is wit within the palaver. As one traveler
says, `I have seen the future and it is slang'. The author
himself is an ecologist of language and a shrewd observer of our
quest to control our environment—and the environment of
others....
A frolicsome jaunt through a continuum of space, time, history,
geography, feminism and fashion, Mr Overmyer's cavalcade is on
the verge of becoming a thoroughly serendipitous journey.”
Mel Gussow, The New York
Times
“With a handful of
plays...Eric Overmyer has established himself as one of contemporary theater's
wittiest playwrights.”
Jan Stuart, Seven Days
“Eric Overmyer [is] one of this nation's most
accomplished and vividly imaginative playwrights.”
Wayne Johnson, The Seattle
Times
originally produced by Center Stage, Baltimore
1 M, 3 F
I S B N: 0-88145-046-4, $8.95
also available PLAYS BY ERIC OVERMYER