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Acknowledgements

It is difficult to articulate the debt of gratitude I owe my inspired collaborators, director Blake Brooker and dramaturg Vicki Stroich. They recognized this play before I did, and they offered their beautiful ideas openhandedly. They saw it through with skill and patience, and helped me to be brave. The play would not have come to be without either or both of them.

The process of bringing any new play to stage is taxing. The script of Drama went through enormous changes during its rehearsal and right up to its first performances. The cast of this production are my heroes. Their contributions have been invaluable and their grace under pressure astounding. Our stage managers have created a rare and warm atmosphere – also vigilant, they have been our treasured wingmen. The designers incited us all when we stepped from the hall to the stage; they reminded us that theatre is magic. The stagecraft has been extensive and beautifully, skilfully accomplished by the production team. The company of the inaugural production is everywhere in these pages and I can never thank them enough.

I wrote the play largely while I was playwright in residence at Alberta Theatre Projects and might not have done so without their support and protection from the elements. May the gods of drama bless them for their continuing commitment to new work.

Development assistance from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Alberta Foundation for the Arts has been essential.

I am profoundly grateful to the brilliant Alana Wilcox for choosing to make this book back when it was in pieces. Her faith has been a driver.

I acknowledge the following writers and thinkers, whose words and ideas have influenced me in the making of this play: Elisabeth Badinter, Eric Bentley, Blake Brooker, Charles Darwin, Philippe Gaulier, Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, Jane Kramer, Lao Tzu, Jeannine Locke, Larissa MacFarquhar, David Mamet, Derek Parfit, Richard Pochinko, Janet Radcliffe Richards, Anne Sexton. Their bold inquiries into everything from biological destiny to the eleven o’clock song have been my signal lamps.