Clever *****
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/reviews/story/0,,1781703,00.html
Hampstead, London
Michael Billington
Wednesday May 24, 2006
The Guardian
A fetching blonde explains the theory of nuclear fission to a famous
physicist in an American hotel room. To say that Crispin Whittell's new
play, in which this scene occurs, has echoes of Terry Johnson's
Insignificance would be a polite understatement. But, for all its
familiarity, the play confirms the gift for antic comedy that Whittell
displayed in Darwin in Malibu.
Whittell's hero is Richard Feynman, the eccentric physicist who worked
on the Manhattan project. And, a month before the first nuclear test in
July 1945, we see Feynman turning up at a New Mexico hotel in a state
of suicidal desperation. His anxieties are increased when his space is
serially invaded. First the hotel receptionist, Matilda, creeps into
his bed, mistaking him for her marine boyfriend. Then a
counter-intelligence agent, believing Feynman to be a commie spy,
arrives in hot pursuit. And Matilda's lover and a gymnastic nun add to
the room's frantic occupancy.
Richard Feynman
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.atheism/msg/71b229ecd6633873
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