PRETENDING

PRETENDING is the story of six actors and a director convinced that theatre will change the world. Based at a converted chapel in rural Devon, the theatre company struggles with a lack of funding and local prejudice. Invited to tour a new play about global warming to small town America, they succeed in upsetting their benefactors and audiences. They return to Devon and an uncertain future, where they are forced to confront reality and their own relationships, including inconvenient pregnancies, gender issues and fraud. In this parallel universe of fantasy and truth, the actors search for a way to compromise, without losing the thrill of pretending. Life, they discover, can be as ephemeral as theatre, unless they accept responsibility for their actions. Humorous, with a serious undertone, the book takes a sideways look at how these theatre practitioners think, behave and interact with each other and the community, on and off stage. Events change everyone, though strangely, pretending prevails...