60 likes | 207 Views
Ruben Guthrie. "No one wants you to be an alcoholic but when you announce you're not drinking, it becomes something of a moral issue. People start to feel uncomfortable around you because they think you are judging them and their drinking.”. Storyline.
E N D
Ruben Guthrie "No one wants you to be an alcoholic but when you announce you're not drinking, it becomes something of a moral issue. People start to feel uncomfortable around you because they think you are judging them and their drinking.”
Storyline • Ruben Guthrie lives a lifestyle that could be ripped from the pages of an upmarket glossy magazine. He's 29, creative director of the hottest advertising agency in town and lives in a fashionable apartment with a Czech supermodel several years his junior. He also likes a drink - or 20. • Winning awards, getting the girls and generally living the life, Ruben is rapidly coming to believe his own press. Feeling invincible, he leaps off a hotel roof one night and lands in a whole lot of trouble when he drunkenly mistakes the baby pool for a full-size one. • Exit the girlfriend and welcome a plaster cast on the broken arm, bruises and various abrasions and a visit to Alcoholics Anonymous. • Ruben thinks he can win back the girl if he swears off the sauce for a month or two and attends a few meetings but gradually he starts to realise maybe his life is as shallow as the baby pool he landed in.
Cast and Crew Crew Direction: SHANE BOSHER Written by: BRENDAN COWELL Set design: JOHN VERRYT Costume design: PETRA VERWEIJ Lighting design: JANE HAKARAIA Production management: JOSH HYMAN Sage management: JOSH HYMAN, LAURYN WATI Properties management: BECS EHLERS Technical operation: STUART PHILLIPS Set construction: 2 CONSTRUCT Production assistance: SEAN LYNCH Cast: Ruben Guthrie: OLIVER DRIVER Zoya: CHELSIE PRESTON CRAYFORD Ray: ANDREW GRAINGER Peter Guthrie: PETER ELLIOTT Virginia: TONI POTTER Susan Guthrie: ELLIE SMITH Damian: DEAN O'GORMAN
Themes/Issues • Resisting temptations, - misusing alcohol, Drugs, • Relationships, • Peer Pressure, • Trust,
How does it relate to us? • The play and characters relate the most to us (teenagers) because most of us are facing the troubles of getting ‘into’ the right crowd, partying, and through partying, drinking. In Ruben Guthrie, the character of Ruben is constantly drunk by both his boss, his father, his best friend and himself, so that he can get goods idea’s for his job, be more fun, bond better with his father. • Peer pressure is another idea in which most of the characters pressure Rubin to drink again even though they know he is in AA. Ruben's father drinks all the time and he wants his son to drink with him , his mother is the same and wants her son to be normal and drink socially with her, not realising he has a problem. She pressures him to just have one thinking it won't hurt him. His friend comes back from another city and stays with him, bringing with him alot of juty free alcohol in which he pressures Rubin into drinking. So they can have more fun. Virginia also pressures Rubin into kicking out his mate as she says he is a bad influence. Rubens Boss also pressures him to drink as he has good ideas for the company when he is drunk.
Conventions • Monologue- The play Ruben Guthrie opens with Ruben speaking to the audience, expressing his thoughts and feelings as if he is in an AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) meeting. This sets the scene for his addiction of Alcohol and drugs that we soon become aware of. This convention is used at the beginning of every scene and gives us the situation that Ruben is in. • Conscience Alley- This convention is used to show how bad and messed up Ruben has become due to his addiction. He has just taken some drugs and is hallucinating; he witnesses his Mother, Father, ex girlfriend Zoya, Rubens current girlfriend, his boss and his best friend who is very persuading. They are all expressing their feelings towards his addiction and stand around Ruben as he is ‘Buzzing’ out because he high. They begin speaking to him one by one then soon start speaking all together giving their own advice. • Freeze Frame- Freeze frame is used at the end of every scene. This gives the audience a chance to capture the moment and take in the surroundings and imagery. It also gives you a chance to think what is about to happen next. One case of freeze frame is used when Rubens best friend who is gay tries his smooth moves on him. Ruben has promised never to go there and the scene stopped with his pants leaving the audience in anticipation and got them thinking “No Ruben Don’t DO IT!!!”