THE STORY: The setting is a hotel in the tropics where a beleaguered desk clerk tries to placate, amuse and occasionally seduce the widely varied clientele who come and go during the course of the play’s quick flowing action, each acting out a brief but telling personal vignette. The guests, mostly neurotic in one way or another, represent a broad cross section of modern society and reflect the hang-ups and social shortcomings so prevalent in contemporary life. But despite its ironic approach—and characters—the play is ultimately a paean to the well-ordered and comfortably ordinary—qualities so elusive and rare, and yet so desirable, in our unsettled and unsettling times.
A lively theatrical tour de force, this offbeat rendering of Grand Hotel is comprised of a series of brief scenes, some bitingly satiric, some outlandishly bizarre. The play provides a humorous but telling assessment of modern foibles and obsessions.
“Shawn writes about contemporary life with a zest for detail and a flair for the fantastic that suggest the unlikely mating of Chekhov and Lewis Carroll; he can make the most trivial, fleeting comment sound unbearably sad and make the most bizarre grotesquerie not only believable but funny.” —Soho News.
“…he adroitly transforms a far-flung collection of blackout bits into a ceaseless flow of life.” —The New York Times.
“…one-third social satire, one-third surrealist nightmare, and one-third bittersweet romantic comedy.” —Village Voice.
