Dr Karpinski's Circus Phenomena

by Jane Duncan

The Play:

Dr Karpinski's Circus Phenomena was one of the ten winners of the Woolwich Young Radio Playwrights' Competition in 1996/7. Jane's mysterious introduction to the play is 'The play takes place at a hotel in contemporary Scotland.......or does it?' Three young people on their way to a Hogmanay* celebration in a 'quaint wee farmhouse about ten miles north of Lochgilphead' stumble across a hotel in the middle of nowhere. Sinister events follow.....

This was our Internet Play of the Month for June 1998. You can find out about our current Play of the Month by clicking here.

(* Hogmanay is a Scottish word for New Year)

Anne Karpf, writing in The Guardian, said: "The Internet Play of the Month for June, Dr Karpinski's Circus Phenomena, is an enjoyable piece of hokum about three young Scots stranded in a spooky rural hotel at Hogmanay. Jane Duncan's drama telegraphs its plot-twists, but its feel for the Scottish way of joshing is convincing, as are the performances, especially Natalie Robb's"

The Cast:

Charlotte Donachie - Natalie Robb

Ewan Donachie - Sam Cotton

Andy Gilbert (known as 'Gib' to his friends) - Gary Bakewell

MacNair - Sean Scanlon

Direction by Richard Shannon

The Playwright:

Jane Duncan has been a winner in the Woolwich Young Radio Playwrights' Competition on six occasions (more often than anyone else - the competition has only been running for eight years!). In the first Woolwich competition back in 1990, Jane's play Never Say Noir achieved third place and also won the Bronze Medal for Best Writing at the International Radio Festival of New York in 1991. Her other winning plays are A Certain Way Wi' Women, Someone Else's Kid, Dreaded Bliss, and most recently Cold Lasagne which was one of the winners in this year's competition. Jane has also had success in theatre and television: her stage plays Comin' Up a Treat / Changing Scenes-1966, Tickets Only, The King is Dead and Bedlam have been performed in theatres around Scotland, and Full Board, a short film which was produced by Independent Image and broadcast throughout Britain on Channel Four Television as part of the She-Play series in 1992, has also been shown in Finland. She is currently working on several other scripts for film and television and has recently completed screen adaptations of some of her stage and radio plays.

Previous plays of the month:

The Sons of Catholic Gentlemen by Francis Beckett

Still Stationery by Andy Smith

Feathers by Crysse Morrison

To Sleep by Ken Armstrong

Modern Echoes for Easter

Shiver Breathing by James Payne

You can also read what the newspapers said about our first Play of the Month

IRDP website by Marja Giejgo