The Law of Remains
Encyclopedia
The Law of Remains is a 1991 play
by Los Angeles
-based Iran
ian playwright
, director and filmmaker Reza Abdoh
. The play, initially staged in a New York City
hotel, was described in A Companion to Twentieth-Century American Drama as "an apocalyptic fantasia". In its 1992 review, The New York Times
characterized it as "one of the angriest theater pieces ever hurled at a New York audience".
The seven-scene play focuses on violence and its social impacts, through the use of Andy Warhol’s aesthetics, incorporating police reports on the murders of Jeffrey Dahmer
in exploring the deeds of fictionalized killer "Jeffrey Snarling". It uses Dahmer's crime, particularly against an adolescent Laotian who almost escaped Dahmer until police presumed the conflict was a dispute between gay lovers, to create a metaphor for "governmental indifference to the AIDS crisis". Anita Durst, an actress and disciple of Abdoh who procured the location, summarized the play as "Andy Warhol and Jeffrey Dahmer meet in Heaven". The play is a non-linear multi-media presentation, adding to traditional dramatic structure a soundtrack of "death, sex and violence" and "raucous" imagery, both live and electronic.
Eugene Lang College The New School for Liberal Arts' undergraduate senior theatre thesis group staged a reinterpretation of The Law of Remains in May 2011 at La Mama E.T.C in New York City.
Play (theatre)
A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...
by Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
-based Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
ian playwright
Playwright
A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
, director and filmmaker Reza Abdoh
Reza Abdoh
Reza Abdoh Iranian-born American director and playwright known for large-scale, experimental theatrical productions, often staged in unusual spaces like warehouses and abandoned buildings....
. The play, initially staged in a New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
hotel, was described in A Companion to Twentieth-Century American Drama as "an apocalyptic fantasia". In its 1992 review, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
characterized it as "one of the angriest theater pieces ever hurled at a New York audience".
The seven-scene play focuses on violence and its social impacts, through the use of Andy Warhol’s aesthetics, incorporating police reports on the murders of Jeffrey Dahmer
Jeffrey Dahmer
Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer was an American serial killer and sex offender. Dahmer murdered 17 men and boys between 1978 and 1991, with the majority of the murders occurring between 1987 and 1991. His murders involved rape, dismemberment, necrophilia and cannibalism...
in exploring the deeds of fictionalized killer "Jeffrey Snarling". It uses Dahmer's crime, particularly against an adolescent Laotian who almost escaped Dahmer until police presumed the conflict was a dispute between gay lovers, to create a metaphor for "governmental indifference to the AIDS crisis". Anita Durst, an actress and disciple of Abdoh who procured the location, summarized the play as "Andy Warhol and Jeffrey Dahmer meet in Heaven". The play is a non-linear multi-media presentation, adding to traditional dramatic structure a soundtrack of "death, sex and violence" and "raucous" imagery, both live and electronic.
Eugene Lang College The New School for Liberal Arts' undergraduate senior theatre thesis group staged a reinterpretation of The Law of Remains in May 2011 at La Mama E.T.C in New York City.