My Name is Rachel Corrie

Description

"Extraordinary power... Funny, passionate, bristling with idealism and luminously intelligent." -TimeOut London "You feel you have not just had a night at the theatre: you have encountered an extraordinary woman [in this] stunning account of one woman's passionate response... Theatre can't change the world. But what it can do, when it's as good as this, is to send us out enriched by other people's passionate concern." -Guardian (London) "An impassioned eulogy... It's hard not to be impressed - and also somewhat frightened - by the description of her as a two-year-old looking across Capital Lake in Washington State and announcing, 'This is the wide world, and I'm coming to it.'" -New York Times On March 16, 2003, Rachel Corrie, a twenty-three-year-old American, was crushed to death by an Israeli Army bulldozer in Gaza as she was trying to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian home. My Name is Rachel Corrie is a one-woman play composed from Rachel's own journals, letters and emails - creating a portrait of a messy, articulate, Salvador Dali-loving chain-smoker (with a passion for the music of Pat Benatar), who left her home and school in Olympia, Washington, to work as an activist in the heart of Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Since its Royal Court premiere (London), the piece has been surrounded by both controversy and impassioned proponents, and has raised an unprecedented call to support political work and the difficult discourse it creates. ALAN RICKMAN is a British actor and director, who directed the London and New York productions of the play. KATHERINE VINER is an award-winning journalist and editor of the Guardian's Weekend Magazine.

Rachel Corrie was born in 1979 into a middle-class family in Olympia, Washington. She became politically active on what she called 'anti-war/global justice issues', which homed in on US support for Israel against the Palestinians.

"Extraordinary power... Funny, passionate, bristling with idealism and luminously intelligent." - TimeOut London "Deeply moving... The directness, the humor, the poetry, the capcious-yet-never-morbid conscience: all of these are beautifully captured." - Indepndent (London) "You feel you have not just had a night at the theatre: you have encountered an extraordinary woman [in this] stunning account of one woman's passionate response... Theatre can't change the world. But what it can do, when it's as good as this, is to send us out enriched by other people's passionate concern." - Michael Billington, Guardian (London) "An impassioned eulogy... It's hard not to be impressed - and also somewhat frightened - by the description of her as a two-year-old looking across Capital Lake in Washington State and announcing, `This is the wide world, and I'm coming to it.'" - Matt Wolf, New York Times FOUR STARS: "Cerebral or emotional, however, you cannot come away without plenty to think about." - Raymond Whitakar, Independent "Alan Rickman and Katharine Viner, who have edited Corrie's writings, offer a fully rounded picture of this passionate, idealistic and at times infuriating young woman... quarrelling with Corrie's occasionally glib convictions, even as you admire her courage, lends the show dramatic tension, and forces you to try to tidy up your own muddled thinking on this vexed subject. And there is no doubt that Corrie was a natural writer, who described life in Gaza with rare power and precision. One leaves the theatre mourning not only Rachel Corrie's death but also one's own loss of the idealism and reckless courage of youth." - Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph FOUR STARS: "My Name is Rachel Corrie is a true and profoundly moving story. As a piece of theatre, it belongs to verbatim genre, pieced together by Alan Rickman and the journalist Katherine Viner from the diaries, e-mails and lists of extremely articulate, committed, courageous idealist Rachel Corrie. This drama is many things. It's a piece about growing up in America today, it's a piece about the nature of heroism; it's a beautifully written and structured chronicle of a death of a foretold." - Georgina Brown, Mail on Sunday "Extraordinary power Funny, passionate, bristling with idealism and luminously intelligent." TimeOut London "Deeply moving The directness, the humor, the poetry, the capcious-yet-never-morbid conscience: all of these are beautifully captured." Indepndent (London) "You feel you have not just had a night at the theatre: you have encountered an extraordinary woman [in this] stunning account of one woman's passionate response Theatre can't change the world. But what it can do, when it's as good as this, is to send us out enriched by other people's passionate concern." Michael Billington, Guardian (London) "An impassioned eulogy It's hard not to be impressed and also somewhat frightened by the description of her as a two-year-old looking across Capital Lake in Washington State and announcing, 'This is the wide world, and I'm coming to it.'" Matt Wolf, New York Times FOUR STARS: "Cerebral or emotional, however, you cannot come away without plenty to think about." Raymond Whitakar, Independent "Alan Rickman and Katharine Viner, who have edited Corrie's writings, offer a fully rounded picture of this passionate, idealistic and at times infuriating young woman quarrelling with Corrie's occasionally glib convictions, even as you admire her courage, lends the show dramatic tension, and forces you to try to tidy up your own muddled thinking on this vexed subject. And there is no doubt that Corrie was a natural writer, who described life in Gaza with rare power and precision. One leaves the theatre mourning not only Rachel Corrie's death but also one's own loss of the idealism and reckless courage of youth." Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph FOUR STARS: "My Name is Rachel Corrie is a true and profoundly moving story. As a piece of theatre, it belongs to verbatim genre, pieced together by Alan Rickman and the journalist Katherine Viner from the diaries, e-mails and lists of extremely articulate, committed, courageous idealist Rachel Corrie. This drama is many things. It's a piece about growing up in America today, it's a piece about the nature of heroism; it's a beautifully written and structured chronicle of a death of a foretold." Georgina Brown, Mail on Sunday