A virus has plagued the city and residents are quarantined. Curfews have been imposed and rumours of government corruption abound. Bureaucratic red tape is creating a food crisis. Laurel and her parents are imprisoned in the basement of their stately home, relying on the generosity of their former gardener, Cheater, for information and supplies. While Laurel and her family struggle just to survive, Cheater becomes intoxicated with his new-found power as a member of the Security and Surveillance police. Laurel must act as go-between if she is to liberate her family from their basement cell, and enters the dark and convoluted world of Cheater, discovering in the process startling revelations about herself, politics, art, violence, and the man they have become dependent upon.
Colleen Wagner was born in Alberta and studied at the Ontario College of Art and the University of Toronto. Her first play, Sand, was on the final shortlist for best international play at the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester, England, in 1989. She won the 1996 Governor General's Literary Award for Drama for The Monument, which continues to be produced internationally and is translated into half a dozen languages. She teaches at York University and divides her time between a farm in New Brunswick and Toronto.
"…there is rich text to feed on, a psychological thriller element, and some scathing observations about high culture and traditional religion." —Pat Donnelly, The Montreal Gazette
"…a magnificent play." —Anna Fuerstenberg, Montreal Arts Uncovered