Intimate Exchanges
| Intimate Exchanges | |||
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| Written by | Alan Ayckbourn | ||
| Characters | Celia Teasdale Rowena Coombes Sylvie Bell Josephine Hamilton Irene Pridworthy Toby Teasdale Miles Coombes Lionel Hepplewick Joe Hepplewick Reg Schooner |
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| Date premiered | 3 June 1982 | ||
| Place premiered | Stephen Joseph Theatre (Westwood site), Scarborough | ||
| Original language | English | ||
| Subject | The consequences of seemingly trivial decisions. Marital discontent. | ||
| Genre | Comedy | ||
| Setting | An English country village | ||
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Intimate Exchanges is a play by Alan Ayckbourn. Written between 1982 and 1983 it consists of eight major stories all originating from a single opening scene. As the play progresses, the characters make choices each of which causes the story to go in one of two directions, leading to one of 16 possible endings. The play was nominated for the 1984 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Comedy, and a 2006 revival was nominated for the 2008 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play on its transfer to the Brits Off Broadway festival in New York.
In 1993, six of the eight major variations were made into the two films Smoking/No Smoking directed by Alain Resnais.
Ayckbourn wrote Intimate Exchanges between 1982 and 1983 to mark the 25th anniversary of his arrival in Scarborough. It may not have been written at all if most of his acting troupe had not decided to move on following a US tour. Ayckbourn was left with a summer season to fill and only two actors, Robin Herford and Lavinia Bertram. He decided to pursue a theory he had been mulling on for a few years: that the tiny, often careless choices we make in our lives can lead to vast consequences.
The idea was to write a multi-ended play in which choices lead to other choices in an increasing proliferation. Ayckbourn started writing in early 1982 with the intention of performing all of the plays over the summer months of that year. It proved to be a far greater challenge than he expected and only three of the possible variations actually opened that summer, starting with the variation called "A Cricket Match". The remaining plays came together during Autumn and Winter, finishing in February 1983 with "A Pageant".
In total, Intimate Exchanges includes 31 scenes, 16 hours of dialogue, and 10 characters, all performed by only two actors. Depending upon whether or not the character of Celia Teasdale decides to have a cigarette in the first five seconds of the play, several people might get divorced, married, start affairs, have children or die.
In Easter of 1983, Robin Herford and Lavinia Bertram, performed all of the sixteen possible variations over the course of twelve days. In 1984 it opened in London and was nominated for two Olivier Awards: Comedy of the Year and Comedy Performance of the Year for Lavinia Bertram. Four of the variants were also recorded for BBC radio.
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