''Sunsets and Glories'' is a play by noted playwright and

Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...

-nominated screenwriter Peter Barnes. The play is based on the brief reign of Pope

Celestine V Celestine is a given name and a surname. People Given name * Pope Celestine I (died 432) * Pope Celestine II (died 1144) * Pope Celestine III (c. 1106–1198) * Pope Celestine IV (died 1241) * Pope Celestine V (1215–1296) * Antipope Ce ...

. It incorporates grotesque humor and revisits motifs from Barnes' previous plays '' The Ruling Class'', ''Noonday Demons'', and ''The Bewitched''. Barnes originally wrote the play in 1985. It was first directed by Stuart Burge, who had directed Barnes' ''Ruling Class'' at the Nottingham Playhouse 22 years earlier. The production starred

Freddie Jones Frederick Charles Jones''Births, Marriages & Deaths Index of England & Wales, 1916-2005.''; at ancestry.com (12 September 1927 – 9 July 2019) was an English actor who had an extensive career in television, theatre and cinema productions for a ...

as Pope Celestine V and

Marius Goring Marius Re Goring, (23 May 191230 September 1998) was a British stage and screen actor. He is best remembered for the four films he made with Powell & Pressburger, particularly as Conductor 71 in '' A Matter of Life and Death'' and as Julian Cr ...

as Cardinal Latino Malabranca Orsini, Sunsets and Glories premiered at the 1990 opening of the new West Yorkshire Playhouse on the Quarry Hill site, Leeds.

References

1990 plays British plays Plays set in Italy Plays set in the 13th century Biographical plays about religious leaders Cultural depictions of religious leaders Popes in art {{1990s-play-stub