The Norwegians

by C. Denby Swanson

Jan 18, 2020
1:00PM - 3:00PM

Play Reading
Directed by Alison Larkin

"C. Denby Swanson's extremely odd and delightful comedy, is something of a guilty pleasure." —NY Times.

A strong, bitter comedy about women scorned in Minnesota and the really, really nice gangsters—Norwegian hit men—they hire to whack their ex-boyfriends. Olive is a transplant from Texas and Betty is a transplant from Kentucky, but neither of them was prepared for the Norwegian men they would fall in love with there: the practical, warm, thoughtful, destructive, evil, jilting kind. If you're a hit man in Minnesota, 83% of your clients want to take out their ex (oofda!). Betty has referred Olive to Gus and Tor, a partnership in the whacking business. But things get complicated when secrets are uncovered and plans go astray.

Cast: David Bertoldi, Chris Brophy, Tamara Hickey, Kristen Moriatry

This reading is part of the Winter Play Reading Festival

General Admission: $25/Adult; $10/Student
Winter Play Reading Festival Pass: See all 5 plays: $75/Adult Pass; $30 Student Pass

About the playwright

C. Denby Swanson graduated from Smith College, the National Theatre Institute, and the University of Texas Michener Center for Writers, where she was a fellow in playwriting and screenwriting. She has been a Jerome Fellow, a William Inge Playwright in Residence, and a McKnight Advancement Grant recipient. Her work has been commissioned by the Guthrie Theater, 15 Head a Theatre Lab, Macalester College, and The Drilling Company, and featured in the Southern Playwrights Festival, the Women Playwrights Project, the Lark Theater's Playwrights Week, PlayLabs, the WPA Festival at Salvage Vanguard, JAW: A Playwrights Festival at Portland Center Stage, and multiple residencies at New York Stage & Film. Her full length adaptation, Atomic Farmgirl, was developed by the Drilling Company, at the Culture Project's Impact Festival and at the Icicle Creek Theatre Festival, and won a prize in the 2009 Earth Matters on Stage Festival at the University of Oregon. She won a 2008 Susan Smith Blackburn Special Prize for her short play The Potato Feast, which was also nominated for a 2008 New York Innovative Theater Award, [and is the recipient of a Sloan Commission through Ensemble Studio Theatre for her science play NUTSHELL]. Her blues play Blue Monday was developed at ZACH Theatre Center as part of the NEA/TCG National Theater Residency Program for Playwrights. She is a former Artistic Director of Austin Script Works and on the faculty at [Texas State University]. Her work is published by Dramatists Play Service, Smith & Kraus, Heinemann, and Playscripts, Inc.