PERSONAL ENEMY

17 June - 11 July 2010

★ ★ ★ ★

"a gripping piece"

"an extraordinary play"

"one hears the unmistakably excoriating voice of the later Osborne"

"David Aula's excellent production"

"impeccable performances"

"this is a sensational revival that deserves wider exposure"

Michael Billington in the Guardian. Read the review in full.

WELCOME

FallOut Theatre is a dynamic company committed to the drama of aftermath, the beauty of chance, and the overwhelming energy of conflict: we like to see What Falls Out.

Formed in 2007 in Cambridge we are making the move to London this year with a season of work at The White Bear Theatre, Kennington. In January we presented the first full production of Torben Betts’ brutal critique of consumerist culture, Mummies and Daddies. In June, we are producing Personal Enemy by John Osborne and Antony Creighton – lost for over half a century by the Lord Chamberlain’s office who had censored its contents of all reference to homosexuality. It is a play about freedom curtailed by protective mothers and overbearing governments and it is our privilege to produce it for the first time in its full, uncensored form. FallOut is also developing the work of its very own writer – Jimmy Osborne – who will premiere his new play Meat later this year. Meat is a play about the nature of justice in the 21st Century, told through the eyes of Vincent: a traditionalist, a family man and a killer.

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FallOut Theatre is a registered charity (no. 1124476) and all donations to FallOut can be made with giftaid.

LAST PRODUCTION

Personal Enemy
by John Osborne

17 June - 11 July 2010

FallOut Theatre presents the World Premiere of John Osborne and Anthony Creighton's lost play, Personal Enemy. A vivid depiction of the political and sexual paranoia that gripped America in the 1950s, the play explores a time when the public enemy suddenly became a lot more personal.

Personal Enemy tells the story of the Constant family during the uncertainties of the Cold War and the witch-hunts of McCarthyism. Mrs Constant, a mother and pillar of the community, finds that even in the leafy suburbs of Langley Springs politics is never far away as her loyalty to her sons is tested by her allegiance to God and Country. This is a story of a family torn apart by a country's fear of itself.

Lost after a heavily censored performance in 1955, and only rediscovered last year, Personal Enemy has never before been performed in its entirety. Written several years before Look Back in Anger, Personal Enemy is a sharp interrogation of small-town thinking and the tyranny of familial love from the original angry young man. FallOut Theatre is proud to be bringing to life a work so significant to the Osborne story and an important chapter in post-war theatre.

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