Glengarry Glen Ross
LIE. CHEAT. STEAL. SELL. ALL IN A DAY’S WORK

In conversation with Gehan Blok – Director of ‘Glengarry Glen Ross’.

1. Tell us about your play 'Glengarry Glen Ross' and what it deals with.

Glengarry Glen Ross is a Tony Award winning play by David Mamet that won the Pulitzer Prize in 1984. The play shows parts of two days in the lives of four desperate Chicago real estate agents who are prepared to engage in any number of unethical, illegal acts—from lies and flattery to bribery, threats, intimidation and burglary—to sell undesirable real estate to unwitting prospective buyers.

Times are tough in this Chicago real-estate office; the salesmen (Shelley Levene, Ricky Roma, Dave Moss, and George Aaronow) are given a strong incentive by Blake to succeed in a sales contest. The prizes? First prize is a Cadillac El Dorado, second prize is a set of steak knives, third prize is you're fired! There is no room for losers in this dramatically masculine world; only "closers" will get the good sales leads. There is a lot of pressure to succeed, so a robbery is committed which has unforeseen consequences for all the characters in the play.

2. Why did you pick this type of genre?

Well it's a genre that contains an entire mix bag of emotions & situations faced by anyone who works for a living, which is something the working crowd of Colombo can relate to - it has the right balance between dark serious elements and comedy which is hopefully something i feel the audience will appreciate by the end of this 90 minute Mamet masterpiece. Also the play is an acting oriented play with less or no gimmicks which has always been the type of genre i have a soft spot for.

3. How has it been directing “Glengarry Glen Ross” and what were the challenges did you face?

Directing has been an amazing experience. I have enjoyed every moment with the cast & everyone else behind the scenes who has so far done an amazing job in supporting me throughout my first directorial debut. The biggest challenges i faced as a director was to firstly get a censor board approval for the script and avoid being influenced by many different versions of this play that has been done over the years the world over - like the movie for example. We have made a constant effort to make this production our own from characterization to simple things like even promotions of the play.

4. What sets this play apart from others?

It's one of the few plays in the world to win all 3 coveted awards in theatre - the pulitzer, tony and olivier. A brief snapshot of the corporate world and it's demons is delivered to the audience in it's true raw form with probably one of the best modern day scripts the world has ever seen packed in with some strong acting performances & not forgetting the Beautiful & eloquent coarse language it contains.

‘Glengarry Glen Ross’ is a proud production by the Identities Inc with special arrangements with the Samuel French Inc, directed by Gehan Blok to be performed at the Punchi theatre Borella from July 17th – 20th 2014.

Date: 17th to 20th July
Time: 7.30pm
Venue: Punchi Theatre Borella

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By Hasna Saleem
Pic by Pasan Ranaweera