The+Pillowman

=The Pillowman=

toc The Pillowman, written by critically acclaimed playwrite, Martin Mcdonagh, is a play, set in a totalitarian society, that follows the story of Katurian. Katurian the writer of a series of controversial short stories in which,children end up dead. He is brought in by two cops: Tupolski, a cop who only follows the rules, and Ariel, who follows the morals of Justice. Katurian is questioned, and tortured, about his short stories. When his mentally disabled brother, Michal, is brought into the story, however, Katurian starts to change his perspective about everything. Through this, we learn about Katurian's troubled life and how he became the writer he is today. As well as learn about how art can effect humans and how humans can effect art.

=Synopsis=

ACT ONE
__SCENE 1 __
 * We start in a totalitarian society, inside a police station's questioning room.
 * Katurian explains that the job of a writer is to tell stories and that’s it.
 * They ask Katurian simple questions about his life
 * o He has a brother, Michal, and Katurian works for “The Kamenice Abattoir”, a Chop shop where he cleans up.
 * They start talking about one of Katurian’s short stories, The little Apple Men.
 * They ask Katurian if he spends time in the Jewish Quarter. Katurian explains that he walks through the quarter to pick up his brother but does not spend time there, nor does he have anything against Jewish people.
 * Ariel and Tupolski are holding Michal in another room. Ariel exists to “talk” with him. Katurian fears for Michal’s safety.
 * Tupolski discusses The Gibbet crossroads.
 * Tupolski than forces Katurian to recite “The Tale of the Town on the River”.
 * Tupolski brings out a small metal box.
 * Michal screams from another room. Ariel enters with a bloodied cloth around his hand.
 * Tupolski reveals that there have been child murders, all from the Jewish district, that resemble the ends of Katurian’s stories.
 * They also reveal that the box was found in Katurian’s house and contains a child’s toes.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Ariel tries to force Katurian to eat the toes until Tupolski yells at him and he leaves.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Tuposki admits to planning on executing Michal, now that he’s confessed enough, and wants Katurian to confess to the murders as well.

[[image:http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2005/04/11/arts/11pillL.jpg width="467" height="271" align="left" caption="Krulwich, Sarah. N.d. The New York Times. Web. 5 May 2015. "]]
__<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">SCENE 2 __
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Scene 2 tells the story “The Writer and the Writer’s brother”
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">It’s explained that the father and the mother loved the boy very much and gave him everything he ever wanted.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">His writing was happy and full of life – An effect of the first part of his parents’ experiment.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">On the night of his seventh birthday, strange and disturbing noises started to take place in a closed and padlocked room next to him, night after night.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">His mother explained that only boys with extraordinary talent heard these noises in their head. Due to this his writing got darker.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">On the day of his fourteenth birthday, a note was slipped under the padlocked door.The note was written in blood and was from his brother.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">The boy broke down the door with an axe. His parents were on the other side faking the noises and told him he won the writing contest he had entered.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">They moved away after that. Years later, the boy returned to the house and to the room that was padlocked.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">He found the body of a fourteen year old boy under the mattress.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Next to it was a story written in blood that was better and more beautiful than anything the boy had ever written. He burned the story.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">That’s where Katurian’s story ends.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Katurian explains that in the true story, he found his brother still in their but brain damaged, and that night he killed both his parents by smothering them.

ACT TWO
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> __SCENE 1__ __<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">SCENE 2 __
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">We open to Michal trying to tell himself a story in a cell.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Katurian is tossed into the cell after being tortured.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Michal tells him he wasn’t tortured, he just told Ariel whatever Ariel told him to say.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Michal asks Katurian to tell him the story of “The little green pig” but instead Katurian tells him the story of The Pillowman.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">We then learn that Michal did kill those kids to find out if Katurian’s stories could really happen.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Michal confesses the hiding spot of the last child – In the well where Katurian buried his parent’s bodies.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Then Katurian tells Michal the story of “The little Green Pig”
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Michal falls asleep during it and when he does, Katurian smothers him with a pillow and kills him.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">He calls out to the police to make a confession.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Scene two tells the story of “The Little Jesus”.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">A little girl, who wasn't raised religiously, fully believed that she was the second coming of Jesus Christ.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> The girl's parents were killed in an accident. She was adopted by abusive foster parents after that.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">After getting arrested for rubbing dirt and spittle in an old man’s eyes, the parents started to treat her like Jesus.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">They pressed a crown of thorns, made out of barbed wire, on her head.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Then they whipped her with a cat-o-nine tails.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">After, they asked her if she still wanted to be like Jesus. She said yes.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">So they forced her to carry around a wooden cross until her shins broke.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">They asked her again and she replied the same way.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">They then nailed her to the cross and hung her up on the wall to die.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">She was still not dead when morning came around, and so they buried her with enough air to last her three days.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">She died there.

ACT THREE[[image:http://images.playbill.com/photo/p/i/pillowclose2.jpg width="490" height="332" align="right" caption="Marcus, Joan. N.d. Playbill. Playbill.com. Web. 5 May 2015."]]

 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">We start with Tupolski writing out Katurian’s confession.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Ariel and Katurian talk. Ariel tells him how much he hates people who touch children. He wants to protect them at all costs.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">We learn that Ariel was abused/sexually assaulted by his father as a child. Ariel also killed his father by smothering him.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Tupolski questions Katurian about the little girl and they find out that she may still be alive, so Ariel goes to find her.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Tupolski than tells a story about a little boy who is saved from being squashed by a train by an old man in a tower, who threw a paper airplane that distracted the boy from playing on the tracks.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Tupolski threatens to burn Katurian’s stories after he tries to give Tupolski advice.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Tupolski admits to liking Katurian’s story, “The Pillowman” because he lost his son in a fishing accident.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Ariel re-enters the room with a mute girl covered in paint and holding three piglets. She was never part of a re-enactment of “The Little Jesus”, she was part of “The Little green Pig”.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">They take the girl away and Ariel questions Katurian about how he didn’t see or kill any of those children. He agrees and says he only killed his parents and Michal.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Tupolski then explains to Katurian that his stories won’t be saved because the deal was he would tell the truth, which he didn’t.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">They shoot Katurian and Tupolski leaves Ariel to burn the stories.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">The dead Katurian get’s up. He starts to tell the audience about a new ending to “The Writer and The Writer’s brother”
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Ariel than seals Katurian’s stories away for fifty years and the play ends.

**SHORT STORIES**

Throughout the play, a number of Katurian’s short stories are read or shorthanded. These are descriptions of each of them. "The Little Jesus" and "The Writer and the Writer's brother" are explained in the Play description. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> __The Little Apple Men__ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> The Little Apple Men is a story about a little girl who was abused by her father. To amend this, she created little men out of apples and told her father to never eat them. He does anyway, and chokes on the razor blades she placed in the apple bits. That night, the little girl is visited by more little apple men who jump down her throat and kill her. (McDonagh pg 10-13) <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> __The Tale of the Three Gibbet Crossroads__ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> The tale of the Three Gibbet crossroads is about three condemned men in Gibbets at a crossroad. There’s a skeleton in the Gibbet that reads Rapist and an old man in the Gibbet that reads Murderer. We don’t know what the third man reads. He asks an old man what his crime is. The old man reads his Gibbet and then spits in his face. A Nun prays for the Rapist, feeds to Murder and then runs from the third man. And a Highway man pays little attention to the rapist, frees the Murderer, and kills the third man. While he dies, he begs the highway man to tell him his crime, but he doesn’t. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 16px;">(McDonagh pg 17-18)

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> __The Tale of the Town on the River__

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> A young peasant boy is visited by a robed figure on a horse and carriage. He shares his lunch with the figure and they sit on the riverbank together and talk. Eventually, the figure has to leave. He thanks the little boy for his kindness and for sharing his food. Before he goes, he cuts off the little boy’s toes, telling him that it’s more of a blessing than he realizes. He then continues into the town of Hamelin. We now know that he was the Pied Piper who leads children off to die. However, the boy, now crippled, can’t keep up with the piper and ends up living. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 16px;">(McDonagh pg 21-22)

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> __The Pillowman__ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> The Pillowman is a story about how a round, pillow-faced man, finds children who grow up to live terrible lives. He then finds them as children and talks to them and tries to convince them to commit suicide so they don’t spend their lives horribly. Sometimes they do as he say. Other times, they live the horrible lives the Pillow man foresees. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 16px;">(McDonagh pg 44-45)

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> __The Little Green Pig__ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> This tale is about a Little green pig who is bullied by the other pink pigs for being green. The Green pig, however, likes being a little different. But the farmers find it annoying and paint him in a special pink paint that can never be washed off or painted over, that way he was just like everyone else. All the other pigs laughed at him until the next night when a special green rain made all the other pigs an un-washable green. And the little green pig was a little more special than everyone else, once more. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 16px;">(McDonagh pg 65-67)

=PRODUCTION HISTORY= <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">The first production was held at the Cottesloe Theatre in London, England. The cast included Jim Broadbent as Tupolski, David Tennant as Katurian, Nigel Lindsay as Ariel, Adam Godley as Michal, Victoria Pembroke as Mother, and Mike Sherman as Father (McDonagh). This production was directed by John Crowley and opened on November 13, 2003(McDonagh). <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> The first production of The Pillowman in America was at the Booth Theater in New York. The cast included Jeff Goldblum as Tupolski, Billy Crudup as Katurian, Zeljko Ivanek as Ariel, Michael Stuhlberg as Michal, Virgina Smith as Mother, and Ted Koch as Father(McDonagh). This production was also directed by John Crowley and produced by the National Theatre, Robert Boyett Theatricals LLC, and RMJfine inc(McDonagh). It opened April 10, 2005(McDonagh).

Notable Awards:
=Reviews of the New York Production=
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">2004 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">2005 New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Foreign Play
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Two Tony Awards in 2005
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">2005 Drama Desk Award

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Talking Broadway - 10 April, 2005 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> “Yes, it keeps you at a safe distance, but it also draws you in: Yes, it’s intentionally unnerving, but it also provides occasional glimpses of heart and inspiration along the way… He [Martin McDonagh] chooses to warp fact and fiction until it’s impossible to differentiate the two… Scott Pask’s foreboding metal-wall set, Brian MacDevitt’s Peircing lights, and Paul Arditti’s spine tingling sound design make it difficult to escape from the world of the Pillowman.” (Murray)

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">The New York Times - 11 April, 2005 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> “Comedies don’t come any darker than “The Pillowman”… The laughs elicited by the “Pillowman” are the kind that trail into gulps and gasps… Mr. Goldblum and Mr. Ivanek turn the classic good cop/bad cop formula into a coruscating vaudeville routine.” (Brantley)

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">USA Today - 10 April, 2005 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;"> “Pillowman is the most brutal work yet… McDonah reflects not only on the value of art but also it’s potential price… Pillowman’s presence on Broadway is reason to cheer, however unsettling its subject matter.” (Gardner)

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">New York Magazine - 2005 <span style="color: #232323; font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">“The acting could not be better. As Tupolski, Jeff Goldblum gives what may be the performance of his career, squeezing every ounce of humor out of the horror, and vice versa. Billy Crudup is able to draw on an inexhaustible trove of histrionic devices to make the basically unlikable Katurian as sympathetic as humanly possible. Zeljko Ivanek finds all sorts of arresting nuances in the largely monochromatic Ariel, and Michael Stuhlbarg, as Michal, should finally win over even those who, unlike some of us, have consistently underappreciated his many-sided talent.” ( <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Simon)

=Themes=

The Pillowman talks a lot about how parental abuse can shape a person. There are multiple accounts of parental abuse and the ways it shaped it’s characters. Michal was probably the most damaged, seeing as he was tortured and ended up brain-damaged after the fact. An argument could be made to suggest that he thought hurting kids for strange reasons was alright because it happened to him at a young age. So, hurting and killing those kids seemed okay to him. For Katurian, he was mentally abused. Tortured through the sounds of torture and forced to be molded into something he might not have wanted. Instead of making his own choices, he was influenced by the abuse of his parents to make the choices they wanted him to make. It turned out okay for him, to a certain degree, but he his abuse was still apparent in his future. And for Ariel, his was sexual and incestuous. Instead of writing about his problems or carrying out the same acts. He took a nobler path and vowed to never let it happen to anyone else. Although, he lets his anger out through excessive violence and obviously has anger issues, he choose to take his painful past and use it to try and shape a better future. The Pillowman talks about how the government dislikes the influence that artists have on society because it forces the masses to think. In a totalitarian society, the masses aren't meant to think, they're meant to follow whatever the government tells them and that's that.(Encyclopedia Britannica) In this sense, the government claims that the artist is shaping society. However, some people disagree and argue that the society shapes the artist. In the case of The Pillowman, the clearer of the two arguments is that society shapes the artist. Because the only way Katurian became the writer that he was, was because he was shaped into it by the influence of his parents. And his parents can be represented as Society because often society tries to force people to fit into a certain mold, and that’s just what Katurian’s parents did to him. Other people might find it's just the opposite. In an effort to try to shape an artist, society has to conform to the thinking and creativity of an artist simply to make one. Perhaps the argument goes both ways. Perhaps they influence each other. In today's day and age, I believe society generally shapes the artist. Most artists tend to create their pieces based on the events that happen in the world or in their personal lives. However, it then comes back to the idea that they influence each other. It goes in a circle, the artist is influenced by what is happening in society, and then influences the society to think a certain way about the event. So, if we think about it, who is influencing who?
 * __Parental Abuse:__**
 * __Society and Art:__**