A word from the director

Spring, 1993: I was sitting in my Introduction to Acting class, ready to watch my peers perform their end-of-year scene performances. Now, I can’t remember what scene I did – but I distinctly remember Chris and Emma performing scene 5 from Betrayal. It was melodramatic, borderline cringeworthy (we were beginners, after all), but I was fascinated. Who ARE these people?! How could they be so blasé about hurting one another? 
What was their story? I immediately went to the library (pre-Google, you see) and read the play cover-to-cover. Thus began my love affair with Pinter. He once said that speech is “a constant stratagem to cover nakedness.” Therefore, he created these characters, these ‘Pinter People’, who are so immensely compelling. They have stories they don’t tell; they hide behind words, smiles, gestures; and they have no issue with holding a mirror up to the audience and showing us the worst of ourselves. Now here I am, twenty-three years later. Still fascinated by Emma, Jerry 
and Robert. Still learning about them. Still drawn in to their stories. I have fully enjoyed directing this play and the journey it has taken the five of us on. I hope you enjoy the stories too.

“I tend to think that cricket is the greatest thing that God created on earth – certainly greater than sex, although sex isn’t too bad either.”     Harold Pinter

Dolleen Howlett