Robert Flanagan

VOLLEYS: A CRUEL AND UNUSUAL COMEDY

A humorous, yet compelling look at the future of capital punishment in which potential executioners are selected by lottery to carry out justice. Like jurors gathered in a courtroom, five law-abiding citizens (unknown to one another except by nick-names: Coach, Dude, Fox, Happy Face and Solomon)are summoned to duty at a prison, issued rifles and ordered to shoot a condemned prisoner. Will they do it? Should they do it? Can they hit anything?

This two act black comedy finds uncomfortable laughs and hard truths in the interplay of the five dutiful citizens, their profane offstage target, CONVICT, and the cool electronic voice of COMMAND.

VOLLEYS has been produced professionally at NYC's American Theatre of Actors, and has had productions or staged readings at Ensemble Theatre of Cincinnati, Cleveland Public Theatre, Ohio Wesleyan University, the University of Toledo and Firelands College.

Performed by a small cast on a nearly bare stage and in real time -- audience intermission comes as a bathroom break for the inept executioners, VOLLEYS packs a dramatic punch.

In Volleys "the writer is at his strongest in monologues. And he wisely gives his characters opportunity to philosophize individually, as they retire into corners of the (prison's) the threatening gray enclosure."
- The Cincinnati Enquirer

"Through his Waiting For Godot-style dialogue, Flanagan appears to be flirting with the pros and cons of capital punishment. Yet, VOLLEYS is really Flanagan's occasionally comic mediations on a deeper theme: taking responsibility for one's actions."
- The Columbus Dispatch