By John Patrick Shanley
KATHY BOURNE AND DANIEL EVANS PHOTOGRAPH BY SEAMUS RYAN
WELCOME
Welcome to Chichester Festival Theatre and a brand new production to herald 2022. It is somewhat unusual to be welcoming you to a new production originated by CFT outside the Festival season, so it is with especial pleasure that we bring you Doubt: A Parable. We are thrilled that Lia Williams is directing John Patrick Shanley’s Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning play. Shakespeare may have said that ‘a sad tale’s best for winter’ but we believe a thoroughly compelling drama is just what we all need: particularly one which is so pertinent to our times. As Lia says in this programme, the play proposes ‘that we should live comfortably with uncertainty and that should be our strength.’ An outstanding actor herself, as well as a BAFTA-nominated director, Lia has assembled a superb cast. We’re delighted that Monica Dolan – whose BAFTA and Olivier Award-winning work includes
TV’s W1A, Appropriate Adult and A Very English Scandal and on stage, Talking Heads and All About Eve – and Sam Spruell, whose work ranges from Doctor Who, The North Water and Small Axe on screen to Iago in Othello at Shakespeare’s Globe, are appearing on the Festival Theatre stage. The quartet is completed by Jessica Rhodes and Rebecca Scroggs, and we warmly welcome all four of them, alongside Lia’s distinguished creative team. There are two more plays to come in our Spring season – West End comedy The Play What I Wrote and Michael Morpurgo’s moving Private Peaceful – before we greet the opening of Festival 2022 and the start of our 60th anniversary celebrations. Don’t miss Kate Mosse’s thrilling Gothic mystery The Taxidermist’s Daughter and our co-production with the National Theatre, Our Generation, an extraordinary portrait of 12 teenagers written by Alecky Blythe. Thank you for joining us today, and we hope you enjoy this performance.
Executive Director Kathy Bourne
cft.org.uk
Artistic Director Daniel Evans
F E S T I VA L 2 0 2 2
THE TAXIDERMIST’S DAUGHTER Adapted for the stage by Kate Mosse based on her internationally best-selling novel, this thrilling Gothic mystery – a story of retribution and justice – is set in and around historic Chichester. Directed by Róisin McBrinn.
FESTIVAL THEATRE 8 – 30 April #TaxidermistsDaughter
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F E S T I VA L 2 0 2 2
ON SALE NOW
60th Anniversary season opening productions
OUR GENERATION Alecky Blythe’s engrossing new verbatim play tells the stories of a generation. Often too extraordinary to be fiction, Daniel Evans directs this funny and moving play in a co-production with the National Theatre.
MINERVA THEATRE 22 April – 14 May #OurGeneration
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FOOD AND DRINK Enjoy delicious food and drink at our welcoming café and restaurant. Whether you’re having a meal before the show, simply relaxing with a coffee or powering up using our free Wi-Fi, we can’t wait to welcome you.
DINE BEFORE THE SHOW
GREAT COFFEE IN A GREAT LOCATION
Enjoy a contemporary British menu featuring local and seasonal ingredients, a selection of excellent wines and top-notch service in our stylish and award-winning restaurant The Brasserie – the closest restaurant to the Theatre.
A great spot for barista coffee, freshly made sandwiches, delicious cakes and a range of drinks. Our revamped Café on the Park offers extra indoor and outdoor seating overlooking Oaklands Park and new family friendly areas in our spacious foyer.
Open for Festival Theatre performances: matinees from 12pm and evening shows from 5pm. Also available for private hires and functions.
Open Monday to Friday from 10am and from 9am on Saturday so ParkRunners can stop by for much needed refreshment.
Visit cft.org.uk/eat for opening times, reservations, menus and more.
By John Patrick Shanley
WHAT IS DOUBT? John Patrick Shanley introduces his play What’s under a play? What holds it up? You might as well ask what’s under me? On what am I built? There’s something silent under every person and under every play. There is something unsaid under any given society as well. There’s a symptom apparent in America right now. It’s evident in political talk shows, in entertainment coverage, in artistic criticism of every kind, in religious discussion. We are living in a courtroom culture. We were living in a celebrity culture, but that’s dead. Now we’re only interested in celebrities if they’re in court. We are living in a culture of extreme advocacy, of confrontation, of judgment, and of verdict. Discussion has given way to debate. Communication has become a contest of wills. Public talking has become obnoxious and insincere. Why? Maybe it’s because deep down under the chatter we have come to a place where we know that we don’t know... anything. But nobody’s willing to say that.
It is Doubt (so often experienced initially as weakness) that changes things. Let me ask you. Have you ever held a position in an argument past the point of comfort? Have you ever defended a way of life you were on the verge of exhausting? Have you ever given service to a creed you no longer utterly believed? Have you ever told a girl you loved her and felt the faint nausea of eroding conviction? I have. That’s an interesting moment. For a playwright, it’s the beginning of an idea. I saw a piece of real estate on THE BRONX, NEW YORK, 1960s
which I might build a play, a play that sat on something silent in my life and in my time. I started with a title: Doubt. What is Doubt? Each of us is like a planet. There’s the crust, which seems eternal. We are confident about who we are. If you ask, we can readily describe our current state. I know my answers to so many questions, as do you. What was your father like? Do you believe in God? Who’s your best friend? What do you want? Your answers are your current topography, seemingly permanent, but deceptively so. Because under that face of easy response, there is another You. And this wordless Being moves just as the instant moves; it presses upward without explanation, fluid and wordless, until the resisting consciousness has no choice but to give way. It is Doubt (so often experienced initially as weakness) that changes things. When a man feels unsteady, when he falters, when hard-won knowledge evaporates before his eyes, he’s on the verge of growth. The subtle or violent reconciliation of the outer person and the inner core often seems at first like a mistake, like you’ve gone the wrong way and you’re lost. But this is just emotion longing for the familiar. Life happens when the tectonic power of your speechless soul breaks through the dead habits of the mind. Doubt is nothing less than an opportunity to re-enter the Present. The play. I’ve set my story in 1964, when not just me but the whole world seemed to be going through some kind of vast puberty. The old ways were still dominant in behaviour, dress, morality, world view, but what had been organic expression had become a dead mask. I was in a Catholic church school in the Bronx, run by the Sisters of Charity. These women dressed in black, believed in Hell, obeyed their male counterparts, and educated us. The faith, which held us together, went beyond the