Articles by Alan Ayckbourn

This extract about Bedroom Farce was written by Alan Ayckbourn for the preface to Three Plays, published in 1977.

Preface to Three Plays (extract)

Following Absent Friends (with only the five short plays entitled Confusions between them) came the far more robust Bedroom Farce.

This play has, I think, elements of both Absurd Person Singular and Absent Friends in it. It has its moments of near farce and yet still contains elements of the claustrophobic - maybe because it's all in bedrooms.

It is also the first time I've made use, to quite such an extent, of the cross-cut device. Jumping the action from bedroom to bedroom gives the play an added rhythm over and above what the dialogue normally provides.

Again, I've allowed the characters to progress, develop and resolve very much in their own way. Perhaps, as in my other plays, none of them finds instant happiness or sudden great self-insight. But at least they retain the dignity of resolving their own destinies.

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