ENGLISH THEATRE OF XIX AND XX
CENTURIES GROUP A
SURNAME: Giarratana NAME: Melania
HAROLD
PINTER
PARTY
TIME
Almeida Theatre, 31 October 1991, London, UK
There are nine characters in this play: Terry, a man of forty years of
age; Gavin, a man in his fifties; Dusty, a woman in her twenties; Melissa, a
woman in her seventies; Liz, a woman in her thirties; Charlotte, a woman in her
thirties; Fred, a man in his forties; Douglas, a man of fifty years of age;
Jimmy, a young man.
The story is developed during a party in Gavin’s flat, there is a
large room full of people standing, sitting and drinking. There are two doors
and one of them is half open and the author tells us
that it is never used. We see a waiter and music is present throughout the
play.
The plot is as simple as emblematic: an upper class party where upper
class people talk about a new club and superficial things and don’t care
about what is going on outside, in the “common life”. At the beginning,
Melissa arrives telling them that the town seems like the “Black
Death”, no people on the streets but some soldiers who made her driver
stop and let them pass just because she told them “WHO” she is. Then
Dusty starts asking about her brother Jimmy, who was supposed to be at the
party but he is not. None of them wants to talk about what happened to Jimmy,
this issue would be too uncomfortable. At the end of the play Jimmy appears
from the half- open door and talks, as he was not there, as he was not able to
see, hear or breathe. The author let us believe that he could be dead or sick.
Jimmy and the event reported by Melissa are the metaphors used by Pinter
to denounce the indifference of the Mighty about the problems of the whole
world and of society. They would be able to find good solution to these
problems but they are more interested in making more money than what they have
already.
Jimmy represents the uncomfortable truth, which is behind the false
world that the Powerful wants us to see.
The language used is correct and colloquial. There are no reference
points about the time of the story; probably because
this story could be adapted to almost every period post-war. We also do not
know the city where the story takes place, because it could take place
everywhere: Indifferences are all over the world.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Harold Pinter “Party Time”
Auto-evaluation: Notable
Academic year 2005/2006
© a.r.e.a./Dr.Vicente Forés
López
© Melania Giarratana
megia@alumni.uv.es
Universitat de Valčncia
Press