Yardsale Desk To Star in University Play

For years, this desk, bought for a pittance at a yardsale, lived a quiet life in my daughter's bedroom, covered with all manner of things, seldom actually used as a desk. Even when it was no longer of unuse in the bedroom and relegated to a garage filled with all manner of things and seldom used as a garage, it didn't give up hope. "Life is so strange", it said to its richly grained self. "Maybe it's preparing me to star in a dark comedy." There were days, though, as the dust grew thicker upon it, that it felt like it was fated only to take up space. It sent its photo to a used furniture store in town, but they weren´t interested. A pingpong table nearby told the desk, ¨Look, I only need slight repairs, and I´ve been in here two years. Sure, I was glad to be saved from the landfill, but when´s my second life going to start? I think we´re in here until they sell the house.¨

No one paid the desk´s wild dreams any mind, but desk dreams really do come true, for one day a young woman showed up to take the desk to Princeton University campus, where it now stands proudly on the Hamilton Murray Theater stage, ready to play a role as, surprise, a desk, in a student production of Speech and Debate. Other actors will get all the lines, but the desk will get more stage time.

I was glad to see the desk get the break it so richly deserves. As the desk's agent, I tried to stipulate that the desk have a spotlight pointed at it at all times, but the stage manager, my daughter, refused to compromise artistic integrity to serve a stage prop's ego. We're hoping this could boost the desk's flagging career. Otherwise, it's back to the garage.

Speech and Debate, at Princeton University´s Hamilton Murray Theater:

Three misfit high-schoolers form a Speech and Debate club in an attempt to reveal a sex scandal, unveiling their own vulnerabilities--at once hilarious and heartbreaking--along the way. Pulitzer-prize-finalist and Tony-award-winning playwright Stephen Karam presents a dark comedy with music about coming to terms with ourselves, others, and the terrifying hypocrisy of the adult world.

By Stephen Karam
Directed by Kyle Berlin '18

February 24 @ 8 PM
February 25 @ 8 PM
February 26 @ 2 PM
March 2 @ 8 PM
March 3 @ 8 PM
March 4 @ 2PM
March 4 @ 8 PM

$8 for students
$10 for faculty/seniors
$12 general public
Student Events Eligible