THE STORY: Four lives intertwine over the course of four and a half years in this densely plotted, stinging look at modern love and betrayal. Dan, an obituary writer, meets Alice, a stripper, after an accident in the street. Eighteen months later, they are a couple, and Dan has written a novel inspired by Alice. While posing for his book jacket cover, Dan meets Anna, a photographer. He pursues her, but she rejects his advances despite their mutual attraction. Larry, a dermatologist, “meets” Dan in an internet chat room. Dan, obsessing over Anna, pretends to be her and has cybersex with Larry. They arrange to meet the next day at an aquarium. Larry arrives and so too, coincidentally, does the real Anna. This sets up a series of pass-the-lover scenes in which this quartet struggle to find intimacy but can’t seem to get closer.
Winner of the 1998 Olivier Award for Best Play and the 1999 New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best Foreign Play.
“CLOSER is a sad, savvy, often funny play that casts a steely, unblinking gaze at the world of relationships and lets you come to your own conclusions…CLOSER does not merely hold your attention; it burrows into you.” —New York Magazine.
“…a brilliant and bracingly adult new play from London…bruising and beautiful, shatteringly funny and devastatingly sad. The play’s dialogue has a raw emotionality rarely heard in art or life. It cuts like broken glass…full of bitter, intelligent, unvarnished truth. —Variety.
“A powerful, darkly funny play about the cosmic collision between the sun of love and the comet of desire.” —Newsweek.
“In its cutting contemporary picture of sexual desire and emotional failure, CLOSER is a brilliantly unusual virtual reality that rings true. The best new play on Broadway.” —New York Observer.
