In Event of Moone Disaster (2017)
Three generations of women and their journey across the stars.
This is the script of a play that was produced by Theatre503 in 2017. I never saw it in person, but the script caught my eye when I was seeing a different production.
The story is split across three generations of women:
In 1969, a young Sylvia Moone watches the moon landing and wishes for adventure. When she becomes pregnant, she refuses to acknowledge the father Dennis, and wants something bigger than the quiet life he imagines.
In 2017, her memory has failed, and her son Neil and daughter-in-law Julie are struggling to conceive. Neil desperately wants a child, but Julie is worried about the impact it will have on her life – a burden that she will bear, not him.
In 2055, her granddaughter, also named Sylvia Moone, is preparing to become the first human to set foot on Mars. Her preparations are dogged by doctors who are keen to avoid any risk of pregnancy that might affect the mission.
The parallel storylines invite us to consider the impact of becoming a parent, the narratives we imagine for ourselves, and what we get from our families. Sylvia rejects her child’s father; her son wants to meet him; her granddaughter leaves her family behind. They each have different ideas about their family history and what has led them to this point.
I was particularly struck by a conversation between Julie and Sylvie after Neil has passed away. Julie didn’t invite Sylvie to be there for his final moments, wanting her to prioritise the mission, which upsets her (understandably so!). This reminded me of Atmosphere – when can the demands of our work affect our relationship with our loved ones, and who gets to make that decision? Julie asks Sylvie to be there and hold her hand when she dies, and Sylvie later scatters Julie’s ashes on the surface of Mars.
I struggled to imagine how this play was staged because it cuts so quickly between the three storylines, sometimes jumping back and forth every sentence. I’m glad to have read it, but I’d love to have seen how it was produced.