The Boys Club
by Marjorie Bicknell
Is a billionaire philanthropist a serial killer? Or a saint? Attorney Jill Bennet must decide because Randy Clooney, founder of the city’s largest Boys Club, only wants her to defend him if she is completely certain he is innocent. The only things riding on her decision? His life and her future.
Questions with the Artists series: Marjorie Bicknell
What do you hope the audience feels after seeing the reading? The play is both a legal mystery and a play about morality. In it I explore how an individual who thinks she has a strong, unflagging sense of right and wrong discovers that she can be manipulated into doing something that undermines it. I hope audiences are a bit surprised and shaken by this and that really have something serious to think about once they leave the theater. I hope they feel a sense of shock, not just at what Randy has done, but how Jill is become willingly complicit.
What technical parts of your work interested you in making this piece and you'd like the viewer to look out for? (so for a painter it may be a certain brushstroke, a writer a certain characters voice, a musician a certain musical phrase, etc) This is a two character, one-set play. So the action of the play is conveyed through dialogue. I would like them to look at that dialogue and see how it works to create two complicated, three-dimensional people. Without that the play doesn’t work, so I’m hoping they’ll put their attention on that.
What do you hope it inspires the viewer to do after the reading? I hope this play inspires people to look really look at themselves and explore biases that they largely don’t think about. I believe all good people have weaknesses that others can use to their own advantage. If this play gets people to think, “Could this happen to me? Could I really be used in this way? Or am I strong enough to resist,” that would make me very happy.
The Media Arts Council Play Reading Series was created by playwrights Julie Zaffarano, Dave Ebersole, and Keenya Jackson, in partnership with MAC to create a space for local playwrights to hear their work read by talented actors and receive feedback from a public audience. The only regular new play reading series in the area, it brings exciting new stories from exciting writers to Delaware County.
Playwrights, actors, and directors who are interested in being involved in the series should contact Julie Zaffarano, juliezaffarano@gmail.com. Due to the limited budget for this project, we are unable to offer actors or directors a stipend through the MAC.