Stunning
by David Adjmi

Name: Stunning
Brand: David Adjmi
SKU: 9780573697814
Rating: 3.61 (55 reviews)

Highlights

Female

Male

120 minsPresent DayRole(s) for Teen(s)Unit Set/Multiple SettingsContemporary Costumes/Street ClothesLGBTQ

Synopsis

Sixteen-year-old Lily knows nothing beyond the Syrian-Jewish community in Brooklyn where she lives a cloistered life with her much older husband.

Soon an unlikely relationship with her enigmatic African-American maid opens Lily's world to new possibilities – but at a huge price.

David Adjmi's daring new work shifts from caustic satire to violent drama as it exposes the ways we invent and defend our identities in the melting-pot of America.

Press Reviews

"A deft touch for both comedy and drama...Richly defined characters tackle sensitive topics insightfully and often to incendiary effect. David Adjmi is quickly building a reputation for unvarnished presentations of offbeat and disturbing themes."
— Variety

Characters

Character	Gender	Age	Description
Blanche Nesbitt (forties) Lily’s new housekeeper, African American, an extremely intelligent, voluble, and terribly sensitive autodidact. Damaged, but maintains a great sense of irony and dry humor. She adapts to survive - she’s performative, and the performance wears her down eventually. An outsider.	female	—	(forties) Lily’s new housekeeper, African American, an extremely intelligent, voluble, and terribly sensitive autodidact. Damaged, but maintains a great sense of irony and dry humor. She adapts to survive - she’s performative, and the performance wears her down eventually. An outsider.
Ikey Schwecky (forty-five) Lily’s new husband: controlling, brute, bumptious, but there’s something fragile in him, broken – he’s more transparent than he thinks.	male	—	(forty-five) Lily’s new husband: controlling, brute, bumptious, but there’s something fragile in him, broken – he’s more transparent than he thinks.
Shelly (early-twenties) Lily’s big sister; a leader; she’s got a stentorian quality, but naturalizes this by cultivating “girly” preoccupations. The laziness of her "r’s and a’s" feels calculated and somehow hostile.	female	—	(early-twenties) Lily’s big sister; a leader; she’s got a stentorian quality, but naturalizes this by cultivating “girly” preoccupations. The laziness of her "r’s and a’s" feels calculated and somehow hostile.
Jojo (thirties, early forties) Shelly’s uxorious husband; basically a good guy but limited; rather put upon, has trouble sticking to his guns.	male	—	(thirties, early forties) Shelly’s uxorious husband; basically a good guy but limited; rather put upon, has trouble sticking to his guns.
Claudine (nineteen) a bit hysterical; unselfconscious – even brute – in her bids for approval. She has a desperate conformity.	female	—	(nineteen) a bit hysterical; unselfconscious – even brute – in her bids for approval. She has a desperate conformity.
Lily Schwecky (sixteen) Truly “cute”, slight, naifish, something of an oddball. The “baby” – she’s sixteen going on about 11; she’s a bit regressed. Her mind works quickly but her thoughts are incredibly scattered. A follower, but it’s more out of a need for connectedness than an innate passivity.	female	—	(sixteen) Truly “cute”, slight, naifish, something of an oddball. The “baby” – she’s sixteen going on about 11; she’s a bit regressed. Her mind works quickly but her thoughts are incredibly scattered. A follower, but it’s more out of a need for connectedness than an innate passivity.