Penny Plain

By Ronnie Burkett

Humanity is facing extinction, and Penny Plain, elderly and blind, can only sit and wait for the end. After a heartbreaking farewell from her dog, Geoffrey, who leaves to live as a man, Penny faces the inevitable by herself. But she isn't alone for long as a cast of characters, including a serial killer, a cross-dressing banker, and talking dogs barge into her boarding house in pursuit of last chances and an escape from the hostile world outside. With this steady invasion, Penny bears witness to the funny and chilling consequences as mother earth cleans house and reclaims her ground.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Playwrights Canada Press
• Release date: Feb 15, 2012
• ISBN: 9781770910492

Ronnie Burkett

Ronnie Burkett has been captivated by puppetry since the age of seven and began touring his shows around Alberta at the age of fourteen. Ronnie Burkett Theatre of Marionettes was formed in 1986, continuously playing on Canada’s major stages and as a guest company on numerous tours abroad. Ronnie has received the 2009 Siminovitch Prize in Theatre, the Herbert Whittaker Drama Bench Award for Outstanding Contribution to Canadian Theatre, a Village Voice OBIE Award, and four Citations of Excellence from the American Center of the Union Internationale de la Marionnette. In 2019, Ronnie Burkett was appointed as an Officer of the Order of Canada. Forget Me Not is the fourteenth production from Ronnie Burkett Theatre of Marionettes, following the international successes Penny Plain, Billy Twinkle, 10 Days on Earth, Provenance, and the Memory Dress Trilogy of Tinka’s New Dress, Street of Blood, and Happy. The Daisy Theatre, Ronnie’s wildly popular and ever-changing marionette vaudeville show, and the Daisy Christmas show, Little Dickens, continue touring to great acclaim. Ronnie lives in Toronto, and from his studio (known in puppetry circles as Puppetland) he continues to imagine and create new work.

Book preview

"Full of wit, humour and humanity, Penny Plain is virtually flawless. At once funny and dark, Penny Plain is simply what we all look for as playgoers: a live stage experience that leaves us a little different at the end from the way we felt when we first took our seats. It’s great theatre."

—The Calgary Herald

It’s a profoundly eerie, strange and strangely beautiful, experience; theatre at its most startling, moment to moment.

—The Edmonton Journal

"Ronnie Burkett has done it again with the sensational, thought provoking Penny Plain. Burkett is a master of storytelling. Penny Plain is a must see."

—The Vancouverist

"Plain brilliance. Penny Plain, the latest work from puppet master Ronnie Burkett, packs plus-sized emotional punch into its diminutive scale."

—The Vancouver Sun

A wildly inventive gothic tale about the final days of the apocalypse that challenges the intellect even as it assaults the funny bone. Burkett is an unbridled genius.

—The Calgary Sun

"Ronnie Burkett’s Penny Plain is pure poetry."

—The Georgia Straight

"Ronnie Burkett is back with all guns blazing. The best of Burkett, Penny Plain will definitely be at the top of the canon."

—The Edmonton Sun

"Like the best of any kind of theatre, Penny Plain will be in your ears and in your eyes for a long, long time… it carries the kind of weight that follows you out the door of the theatre and into your own life."

—Avenue Magazine

PENNY PLAIN

Ronnie Burkett

PLAYWRIGHTS CANADA PRESS

TORONTO

Other books by Ronnie Burkett:

String Quartet

Tinka’s New Dress

Street of Blood

Happy

Provenance

10 Days on Earth

Billy Twinkle

For Nipper, Chito, Beau, Hoover, Charlie, Daisy and Robbie

who taught me to speak fluent dog and never spilled my secrets

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Title Page

Also by Ronnie Burkett

Dedication

Notes On Staging

Production Information

Characters

Penny Plain

About the Author

Copyright

NOTES ON STAGING

The main playing space of the set is the interior living room of a house, or rather, a suggestion of a house. Overall, the structure of the set itself is what is most prominent, with hints of interior. The stage is somewhat skeletal, and the elements of its workings are clearly in view. It is a somewhat dated industrial look, tarnished metal and wood and grimy factory windows; in fact, the entire upstage area is a wall of these factory windows, which act as the cyclorama of sorts. Throughout the play, the house transforms from primarily interior to essentially exterior. Vines, foliage, and fabric trees grow up rusted pipes and poles, flowers appear from miniature trap doors in the main playing area, and the rear windows will change colour throughout, indicating the outside world.

There are two chairs in the central playing area: one a distressed-leather club chair, the other upholstered in once-gay fabric but now dingy with age.

Above the main playing area is a bridge from which the long-strung marionettes are manipulated below. The support for this is a prominent metal and stained glass sculpture, slightly reminiscent of a Tiffany creation. The glass panels are textured like the factory windows upstage and, from lighting under the bridge, change colour throughout the entire play.

Two other small bridges flank this at the sides of the stage. The bridges are also used as higher playing areas for short-strung marionettes, primarily for monologues or isolated scenes. The bridges are held up by substantial pillars beneath them, which, in turn, become columns within the house. The side and rear bridges have bare bulbs hanging underneath them, conveying ambient depth and continuing the industrial/abandoned mood.

Whether visually obvious or not, for the purposes of the action, stage left is an entrance foyer, with an unseen kitchen stage right. Upstairs or outside is represented by the bridges.

When a number appears after a character name in the stage directions, such as PENNY (#1,ls), it indicates a character represented by duplicate marionettes. This is most usually for costume changes, which requires a separate figure for each. Additionally, "ls or ss" indicate whether the marionette is long strung for use in the main playing space, or short strung for scenes on the higher bridge level.

Stage directions herein are kept to a minimum. John Alcorn’s score and Kevin Humphrey’s lighting design are integral to the overall design and performance, although lighting and sound notes within this text are referred to only when necessary to the reading.

The play is performed without an interval, with a running time of approximately 1:40.

Penny Plain was commissioned by the Citadel Theatre, Edmonton, and co-commissioned by the National Arts Centre, Ottawa, with co-commissioning partners Alberta Theatre Projects, Calgary, and the Cultch, Vancouver East Cultural Centre, Vancouver. Ronnie Burkett Theatre of Marionettes would like to acknowledge the BMO Financial Group for their support of the development of Penny Plain.

The play premiered at the Citadel Theatre in Edmonton, Alberta, on September 22, 2011, with the following cast and crew:

Marionette, costume and set design by Ronnie Burkett

Music and sound design by John Alcorn

Lighting design by Kevin Humphrey