Night of the Assassins (NHB Modern Plays)

Three siblings plot to kill their parents in this controversial masterpiece. In the game-playing scenarios the siblings invent, they play the parts of the parents, policemen and judges. This play provides a dramatic allegory of the political situation in Cuba in the 1960s, with its call to revolution echoed in the children's need to overcome their fear and turn convention upside down. Taken from the collection, Latin American Plays, an essential introduction to the fascinating but largely unexplored theatre of Latin America, Night of the Assassins by José Triana is both controversial and compelling. The full collection features new translations of five contemporary plays written by some of the region's most exciting writers. Each play is accompanied by an illuminating interview with its author conducted by the theatre director, Sebastian Doggart, who has also selected and translated the plays and provided an introductory history of Latin American drama. The collection also includes: Rappaccini's Daughter by Octavio Paz A play by the Mexican Nobel laureate. Saying Yes by Griselda Gambaro A grotesque comedy from Argentina about man's inhumanity to man. Orchids in the Moonlight by Carlos Fuentes A dream play about two Mexican women exiled in Hollywood's maze of mirrors. Mistress of Desires by Mario Vargas Llosa Peru's most acclaimed writer interweaves reality and fantasy in an erotically charged tale.

José Triana was born in Hatuey, Cuba. He emigrated to Spain in 1954 and studied acting at the Círculo de Bellas Artes de Madrid. He began writing plays while he was living in Spain and continued to do so when he returned to Cuba after the revolution. Triana won the Casa de las Américas prize in 1966 for La Noche de Los Asesinos. The play won him great praise and fame as a playwright but caused him to fall out of favour with the Cuban Ministry for Culture as the play was received as a depiction the ineptitude of Castro's government. Triana has lived in Paris since 1980.