Operation Elvis
Operation Elvis | |
---|---|
Written by | CP Taylor |
Characters | Malcolm; Alex / Mr Green / Jackie; Mam / Sister / Lynn; Michael |
Date premiered | 1978 |
Place premiered | Newcastle upon Tyne, England |
Original language | English |
Genre | Drama, Children’s theatre |
Setting | Northgate Hospital, Morpeth |
Operation Elvis by
The original cast included
Tim Healy described Malcolm as his favourite stage role: “We did 90 performances in eight weeks. We’d go to a school, unload the van, put the set up, do the play, knock it down and onto the next school... and they were the happiest days of my life.”[6]
Plot overview
Ten-year-old schoolboy Malcolm is convinced that he is the reincarnation of Elvis Presley and loves to sing his greatest hits and dress like the King. His mother, her boyfriend, and his teacher Mr Green are becoming increasingly exasperated with his odd behaviour, and only Jackie, a local pigeon-fancier, seems to understand him. Malcolm decides to run away from home, hoping to find his way to Elvis’ home in Memphis, Tennessee. He ends up 15 miles away in Morpeth in Northumberland, where he meets Michael, a boy with severe brain damage who cannot speak, and his carer, Lynn. Despite their differences, Malcolm and Michael strike up a friendship. Malcolm realises that Michael wants to go sailing on a local lake, but they cannot work out how to get his wheelchair into a boat, and the Sister at Michael’s hospital refuses to allow it. Secretly, Jackie and Lynn help the boys build a special harness to lift Michael from the dock into a boat. Malcolm realises that he no longer needs to pretend to be Elvis and they set off across the water.
References
- ^ Taylor, C.P. (1983). Live Theatre: Four Plays for Young People. London: Methuen London Ltd.
- ^ Friesner, S. (1993). Travails of a Naked Typist: The Plays of CP Taylor. New Theatre Quarterly, 9(33), p.48.
- ^ Plater, A. (2004). No frills, The Guardian, 6 November.
- ^ Taylor, P. (1992). Secret encounters of the intimate kind: Paul Taylor on The Black and White Minstrels and Operation Elvis at the Edinburgh Festival, The Independent, 25 August.
- ^ Taylor, A. (2002). Breaking free from ‘A Scottish Shtetl’: The life, times and Jewishness of CP Taylor. Immigrants & Minorities: Historical Studies in Ethnicity, Migration and Diaspora, 21(1-2), p.151.
- ^ Interview in Rochdale Style, December 2012, p.7.