''Dirty Linen'' and ''New-Found-Land'' is a pair of two 1976

Tom Stoppard Sir Tom Stoppard (born , 3 July 1937) is a Czech born British playwright and screenwriter. He has written for film, radio, stage, and television, finding prominence with plays. His work covers the themes of human rights, censorship, and politi ...

plays that are always performed together. ''New-Found-Land'' interrupts the two parts of ''Dirty Linen''. It was first performed as an Ambiance Lunch-Hour Theatre Club presentation at Interaction's

Almost Free Theatre The Almost Free Theatre was an alternative and fringe theatre set up by American actor and social activist E. D. Berman in 1971 in Rupert Street, Soho, London. Audiences paid what they could afford, but at least one penny. It also pioneered the l ...

on April 6, 1976. Then, opening in June 1976, it played four years at the Arts.

Plot

A Select Committee of the

House of Commons of the United Kingdom The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. The House of Commons is an elected body consisting of 650 me ...

meets to discuss a ridiculous scandal on which the tabloid press has begun focusing. The papers allege that some mystery woman has accused 128 members of the House of sexual promiscuity. The six members of the Committee look into it so as to maintain the House's good name. Ironically, each member of the committee reminds the secretary, Miss. Madeleine Gotobed, not to bring up their most recent rendezvous. They do not want the press to get the wrong idea. It turns out that the secretary, who is not very adept at dictation, is the woman who has been spotted with all of these men. The curtain falls and then rises again for ''New-Found-Land'' in which an older and a younger man, two Home Office officials, briefly discuss the naturalization of an American into British citizenship (based on the real-life naturalization of the play's director, ED Berman MBE). They laud the American nation as a whole, including every American patriotic cliché they can remember. Eventually, the Select Committee returns and tries to reclaim its room. The play ends with Maddie and M.P. French passing a new report that clears all men of having done wrong.

Reception

Christopher Hahn unfavorably compared ''Dirty Linen'' with Stoppard's earlier short plays ''

The Real Inspector Hound ''The Real Inspector Hound'' is a short, one-act play by Tom Stoppard. The plot follows two theatre critics named Moon and Birdboot who are watching a ludicrous setup of a country house murder mystery, in the style of a whodunit. By chance, th ...

'' and ''

After Magritte ''After Magritte'' is a surreal comedy written by Tom Stoppard in 1970. It was first performed in the Green Banana Restaurant at the Ambiance Lunch-hour Theatre Club in London. History Tom Stoppard wrote ''After Magritte'' during the period of ...

'', writing that it "establishes no special relationship with the audience, nor does it make use of particular theatrical conventions, or even parody to any great extent the genre of the sex farce, surely fruitful ground for Stoppard's ironic talent. Instead, the play is a fairly straightforward duplication of a recognisable type, with the slight difference that assumptions about the dumb blonde usually prominent in this kind of play are overturned". However, Hahn praised ''New-Found-Land'' for its "clever manipulation of props" and its "conciseness and economy".

References

External links

''Dirty Linen and New-Found-Land'' at ''Playbill''

1976 plays Plays by Tom Stoppard {{1970s-play-stub

Plot

Reception

See also

References

External links