Philadelphia, Here I Come!
Philadelphia, Here I Come! Author: Brian Friel
First Performance: 1964, Dublin
Published: 1965
Genre: Com. in 3 acts
Setting: Gar's home, imaginary town of Ballybeg, County Donegal, Ireland, 1950s
Cast: 11m, 3f
Twenty-five-year-old Gareth (‘Gar’) O'Donnell works in his widowed father's grocery and is frustrated by his father's taciturn coldness and the constrictions of his home town, dominated by the Church. He is now excited at the prospect of freedom, because a childless aunt, Lizzy Sweeney, has invited him to join her in Philadelphia. On the eve of his departure, his two personae, ‘Public Gar’ and ‘Private Gar’, reminisce about his life, mixing happiness at the prospect of a new life with nostalgia for the old. While Private Gar passes cynical comments, Public Gar re-enacts moments from his past:...
[The entire page is 333 words long]
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