Freefall

Published as a programme text to coincide with The Corn Exchange's international 2010 tour: playing at the Traverse, Edinburgh 6-29 Aug, the Cervantino Festival, Mexico 14-16 Oct and the Abbey Theatre, Dublin 22 Nov-4 Dec. Freefall won the Irish Times Irish Drama Award for Best New Play 2010 and has received excellent reviews. Written by award-winning, leading Irish writer Michael West, here reunited with Dublin-based company The Corn Exchange.

A programme text edition of Michael West's award-winning drama, exploring the disintegrating history of one man's life through a series flashbacks.There are things I haven't said. Things I want to say again. I need to think. I need more time. A sudden shock, and a man's life flashes before his eyes. He experiences an intense rush of extraordinary images and tangled memories, revelations and lost connections. People time and places swirl around him. As he valiantly attempts to stitch it all back together, will his luck hold out? The play's conceit follows a man who has suffered a stroke experiencing a series of flashbacks. Trapped within his own head, the audience are taken with him through a whistlestop tour of his life: a series of vivid, often painful episodes from childhood tragedy to crumbling marriage. In a beguiling portrait of mortality and humanity, Freefall explores memory, family and loss. From the author of Dublin by Lamplight and Foley, Freefall reunites award-winning Irish playwright Michael West with The Corn Exchange: Dublin's innovative theatre company who explore the boundaries and possibilities of theatre with their trademark style of Commedia dell'Arte. Freefall is a sharp, humorous and exhilarating look at the fragility of a human life, blending impressionistic beauty, poignancy and comedy.