If There Is I Haven't Found It Yet
A Play
ISBN10: 0865477701
ISBN13: 9780865477704
Trade Paperback
80 Pages
$15.00
CA$20.50
Fifteen-year-old Anna is bullied by her classmates for being overweight. Her mother, Fiona, decides to transfer her to the school where she teaches, but that only makes things worse. Anna's father, George, is no help—he's too obsessed with saving the world. Just as Anna gets suspended for head-butting one of her tormenters, her uncle Terry arrives for an unannounced visit. A heartbroken, filthy-mouthed slacker, Terry reaches out to Anna in a way that no one ever has. Their unexpected friendship sends her parents' rocky marriage into a tailspin as the whole family wonders what—or who—really needs saving.
Nick Payne's If There Is I Haven't Found It Yet is a brilliantly sad, humorous, and empathetic look at a family stuck somewhere between knowing what the problem is and doing something about it.
Reviews
Praise for If There Is I Haven't Found It Yet
"Payne is a new and exceptionally bright star . . . celebrated for casting a fresh, fragmented light on the complexities of contemporary life."—Ben Brantley, The New York Times
"Enter Nick Payne, a stripling British playwright at the beginning of a great career . . . His plays aspire to intellectual and visual astonishment, combining curiosity and compassion into satisfying puzzles, which bring together public concerns and private griefs in order to explore the irony between the realms . . . [If There Is I Haven't Found It Yet] uses the front-page issues of climate change, obesity, and school bullying as paths to a deeper inquiry into Homo sapiens' self-destructiveness." —John Lahr, The New Yorker
"The despair of being bullied is one theme of Nick Payne's clever, edgy domestic drama about a British family that knows it's falling apart but can't seem to take action to stop it . . . Engaging, layered and thoughtfully observed."—Jennifer Farrar, Associated Press
"Brutally honest and tender . . . George is a man who stands to gain the world, but could lose his family. The ending of this stirring, humane, insightful work suggests that perhaps we shouldn't have to choose."—David Cote, Time Out New York
Reviews from Goodreads
BOOK EXCERPTS
Read an Excerpt
If There Is I Haven't Found It Yet had its U.S. premiere in New York City on September 20, 2012, at the Laura Pels Theatre of the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre.
Cast
GEORGE Brían F. O'Byrne
FIONA Michelle...