Fuel > Mark Murphy > Mr Costello

MARK MURPHY

Overview
Credits
Reviews and audience feedback
Future Plans
Show History
The team

Mr Costello

Two men, both called Mr. Costello, disembark from the same long haul plane. They arrive separately in the departure hall and spot their name on boards held up by cab drivers. They get into the cars and are whisked away from the non-world of twenty two hours in an aluminium tube back into their lives. The only problem is they have chosen the wrong name board and have gone with the wrong driver and will arrive shortly smack back in the middle of each other’s lives.

The similarity between the two men ends abruptly with their names. One of the men is returning after a self imposed exile. Ten years ago he callously faked his own death in order to escape his life and new wife. Now through a mixture of guilt and curiosity he returns like a ghost wanting his clothes back. The other Mr. Costello is driven home with a heavy heart. He intends to walk in, say his piece and then leave. Forever. What neither expect is to be greeted as if they are Mr. Costello. To be taken back and swallowed up into the bosom of a familiar, yet utterly strange and angular set of relationships. The familiar rules of engagement are played out, almost as a rehearsal for what could become their new lives. Sometimes there is a strange acceptance of this new person, from all sides and at other times, a violently allergic reaction. But always a dream like quality hangs in the air as, what was and is real, becomes as allusive as the cigarette smoke they exhale.

It could be about finding out who you are by becoming someone else. It could be about how we shape shift in order to survive. It could also be about how we are more like our enemies than we care to admit. It could be about how, at some point in our lives, we certainly all long to be someone else. And it’s ultimately about how, given a chance collection of extraordinary circumstances, we can all be moved to fill in that person shaped hole left by grief or the paralysing fear of future loss.

Future Plans

For further information email kate@fueltheatre.com

The Team
For details of Mark Murphy see biog page.