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Matara

The Elephant Play

by (author) Conni Massing

Publisher
NeWest Press
Initial publish date
Oct 2023
Subjects
Canadian, General, Women Authors

Compatibility tested:
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EPUB Accessibility Specification 1.0 AA

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http://newestpress.com/accessibility

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Accessibility summary:
This publication meets the EPUB Accessibility requirements and it also meets the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.0 Level AA). It is screen-reader friendly and is accessible to persons with disabilities. A simple book with lots of images, tables, list items and simple formatting, which are defined with accessible structural markup. This book contains various accessibility features such as alternative text for images, table of content, page-list, landmark, reading order,

Full alternative textual descriptions

Single logical reading order

No reading system accessibility options actively disabled (except)

  • eBook

    ISBN
    9781774390832
    Publish Date
    Oct 2023
    List Price
    $11.99

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Description

At a crumbling zoo, an elephant keeper, a security guard, and a newly hired media consultant have differing views over what should be done about the zoo’s main attraction, the aging Sri Lankan elephant Matara. Matara is deteriorating by the day following the loss of her companion elephant Cheerio and a petition is circulating to try to force the zoo’s management to move her to a sanctuary. Karen, Matara’s keeper, argues adamantly that the zoo is Matara’s home and family, and that she is not strong enough to travel. Romney, the enthusiastic but increasingly stressed media consultant, thinks more about donations and galas than Matara’s life, while Marcel the security guard and an international graduate student struggling in the last stages of his thesis, understands the perspective of the protestors even as he seeks to protect the zoo’s employees.

Weaving between the perspectives of public relations, zoos as unique spaces of human animal interaction, and the question of whether or not zoos should exist at all, Conni Massing’s latest play takes inspiration from real life debates that surround Lucy, the lone elephant at the Edmonton Valley Zoo, asking poignant questions about our relationships with animals, and the power dynamics and instability that surround them.

About the author

Conni Massing is an award-winning writer working in theatre, film, radio, and television. Recent stage credits include the hit comedy The Myth of Summer, which premiered at Alberta Theatre Projects in 2005; Homesick, which premiered at Edmontonâ??s Workshop West Theatre; and an adaptation of Bruce Allen Poweâ??s The Aberhart Summer (Alberta Theatre Projects/Citadel Theatre). Massing has worked as a television series story editor on The Beat, North of 60, The Adventures of Shirley Holmes, and as a story consultant on Anaid Productionsâ??s documentary series Taking it Off and Family Restaurant. Conniâ??s comedic short film Invisible was produced in the fall of 2007. She is currently adapting W.O. Mitchellâ??s Jake and the Kid for Theatre Calgary and writing a book about road trips.

Conni has been playwright-in-residence at Theatre Network, Playwrightsâ?? Workshop Montréal, and the National Theatre School of Canada. She now teaches both playwriting and screenwriting in the Department of Drama at the University of Alberta. A proud member of the Playwrights Guild of Canada, sheâ??s also a regional representative for the Writers Guild of Canada. Massingâ??s writing has been recognized by the Alberta Motion Pictures Industries Association (AMPIA), the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television, the Betty Mitchell Theatre Awards, and the Elizabeth Sterling Haynes Theatre Awards. A recipient of a Queenâ??s Jubilee Medal (for contributions to the arts), Massing was recently honoured as one of one hundred people who have made a contribution to Alberta theatre in the last one hundred years.

Conni Massing's profile page

Excerpt: Matara: The Elephant Play (by (author) Conni Massing)

PROLOGUE

 

Darkness. The sounds of a zoo coming to life. A whistling call. Silence. Some chattering which builds into a chorus, only to be superseded by the roar of a big cat. More birdcall. Hoots, chipchipcharoo. Call and response. Nickering and snorting. The bass rumble of an elephant.

 

KAREN enters, dressed in a zoo keeper’s uniform.

 

MATARA appears in the half-light, on the other side of the stage. She’s a 35-year-old Asian elephant represented on stage as an impressionistic video image and/or puppet. MATARA trumpets.

 

KAREN: Matara. . . “

 

A long moment. Retreating into the dream.

 

We’re on a walk — through the river valley — but it’s dark. . .

The trees are shining, shedding light on the path. Or is that the moon? (beat) I don’t know where we’re going but we’re in a hurry.

 

We hear an elephant trumpeting, layered on top of the sounds of the other zoo animals.

 

We walk and walk along the valley that was carved out during the ice ages for our. . . procession. Down to the water. To the river.

Editorial Reviews

“Massing sure knows how to tell a story. Through often quite poetic asides, lectures, dialogue, monologues and speeches, she gives us a commentary on how her characters feel at any given moment.” —Colin MacLean, Gigcity.ca

“The thorny idea of “home,” what it means, what it can legitimately claim to possess, what it plants in the heart, is everywhere in Conni Massing’s provocative, thoughtful, absorbing — and genuinely strange — new play Matara.” —Liz Nichollas, 12thnight.ca

“Massing weaves the tale with her customary finesse. She even manages to work the beleaguered Edmonton riverboat into the story.” —Liane Faulder, The Edmonton Journal