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Dead Man's Cell Phone
An incessantly ringing cell phone in a quiet café. A stranger at the next table who has had enough. And a dead man—with a lot of loose ends. So begins Dead Man’s Cell Phone, a wildly imaginative new comedy by playwright Sarah Ruhl, recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Grant and Pulitzer Prize finalist for her play The Clean House. A work about how we memorialize the dead—and how that remembering changes us—it is the odyssey of a woman forced to confront her own assumptions about morality, redemption, and the need to connect in a technologically obsessed world.
96 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 2008
24 people are currently reading
860 people want to read
About the author
Sarah Ruhl
42 books577 followersSarah Ruhl (born 1974) is an American playwright. She is the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship and the PEN/Laura Pels International Foundation for Theater Award for a distinguished American playwright in mid-career.
Originally, she intended to be a poet. However, after she studied under Paula Vogel at Brown University (A.B., 1997; M.F.A., 2001), she was persuaded to switch to playwriting. Her first play was The Dog Play, written in 1995 for one of Vogel's classes. Her roots in poetry can be seen in the way she uses language in her plays. She also did graduate work at Pembroke College, Oxford.
In September 2006, she received a MacArthur Fellowship. The announcement of that award stated: "Sarah Ruhl, 32, playwright, New York City. Playwright creating vivid and adventurous theatrical works that poignantly juxtapose the mundane aspects of daily life with mythic themes of love and war."
Originally, she intended to be a poet. However, after she studied under Paula Vogel at Brown University (A.B., 1997; M.F.A., 2001), she was persuaded to switch to playwriting. Her first play was The Dog Play, written in 1995 for one of Vogel's classes. Her roots in poetry can be seen in the way she uses language in her plays. She also did graduate work at Pembroke College, Oxford.
In September 2006, she received a MacArthur Fellowship. The announcement of that award stated: "Sarah Ruhl, 32, playwright, New York City. Playwright creating vivid and adventurous theatrical works that poignantly juxtapose the mundane aspects of daily life with mythic themes of love and war."
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July 30, 2010The first play I ever didn't go back after interval. The funniest part of the play was when the phone of the person next to me went off and she couldn't find it in her handbag. When that is the funniest thing that happens in a play, that is a terribly sad thing.
Can you see how many stars I've given this? And even that is too many.
Can you see how many stars I've given this? And even that is too many.
June 28, 2025
Wacky, zany, surreal. The play begins with a woman named Jean in a lunch cafeteria. She sits alone hunched over her lobster bisque soup when a phone rings on the other side of the room. She looks over and sees a man slumped asleep on his chair. The phone rings again and he doesn't answer. She approaches and asks him if he will answer it. The phone continues ringing and the man doesn't move. She asks if he is deaf. Again no response. She reaches for the phone on the table and picks it up to answer. The man is still unresponsive. She places a spoon under his nose. No breath, he's dead. The phone rings again and Jean answers it—it's the man's mother and Jean decides to pretend to be a colleague. And so the whole drama unfolds: Jean keeps the phone and inserts herself into the dead man's family (his name, as she soon finds out, is Gordon). She pretends to have been a coworker (but as it turns out, Gordon was involved in the nefarious business of trafficking human organs). The family assumes she was his mistress (in fact, he did have a mistress). Gordon was a philanderer and a criminal, but Jean, receiving call after call from family members and colleagues, imagines a better man. Keeping the phone allows her, at least in her imagination, to keep this better version of him alive. When she meets his grieving mother, she invents a story about him trying to call her; she tells Gordon's wife that his last words were about their elusive love and rare moments of complete intimacy ("in those moments of climax, when the darkness descended, and our fantasies dissolved—then, then, we were in that room together"); she tells his mistress that she was the woman he loved most of all. Jean, as it turns out, works for the Holocaust museum. Remembering and commemorating the dead is her job—but for Gordon, she has gone to a different extreme: constructing an ideal man as a consolation for his mourning family, and perhaps a balm for her own loneliness.
It's a morbid comedy with kitschy nicety and goofy cuteness. When Gordon's family invites Jean to dinner, she inadvertently makes a faux pas: she tells them that at the cafeteria, Gordon had bought them all gifts: salt for his wife—because she is salt of the earth; a cup for the brother—because he can hold everything; a spoon for the mother—because of her cooking. His mother, Mrs Gottlieb, is deeply offended. It must be a joke, she says, no one is allowed to talk about her cooking. She storms out of the room, and as Jean sits awkwardly at the table, she explains that she was vegetarian anyway. The brother asks why she didn't say anything, and quoting Emerson, she explains "A foolish consistency is a hobgoblin of minds". "I've always thought so," the brother replies, surveying the various roast meat laid out on the table. They decide to go to out to eat broccoli. At the shopping market, the brother braids her hair, and soon declares himself in love with her. It's a madcap series of zigzagging conversational turns and garish implausibilities. Soon Jean is in Johannesburg, South Africa, then she is in a laundromat in the afterlife. It is a play that rejects all "foolish consistency".
I actually liked it. It's obviously an absurd play, a seriocomic burlesque. In short, it's about cell-phones and death and the absurdity of "having a connection" with someone—whether over the phone, in person, alive or dead. Jean, as it happens, doesn't own a cell-phone because, as she always understood, it's not an authentic connection—she prefers to write letters.
It's a morbid comedy with kitschy nicety and goofy cuteness. When Gordon's family invites Jean to dinner, she inadvertently makes a faux pas: she tells them that at the cafeteria, Gordon had bought them all gifts: salt for his wife—because she is salt of the earth; a cup for the brother—because he can hold everything; a spoon for the mother—because of her cooking. His mother, Mrs Gottlieb, is deeply offended. It must be a joke, she says, no one is allowed to talk about her cooking. She storms out of the room, and as Jean sits awkwardly at the table, she explains that she was vegetarian anyway. The brother asks why she didn't say anything, and quoting Emerson, she explains "A foolish consistency is a hobgoblin of minds". "I've always thought so," the brother replies, surveying the various roast meat laid out on the table. They decide to go to out to eat broccoli. At the shopping market, the brother braids her hair, and soon declares himself in love with her. It's a madcap series of zigzagging conversational turns and garish implausibilities. Soon Jean is in Johannesburg, South Africa, then she is in a laundromat in the afterlife. It is a play that rejects all "foolish consistency".
I actually liked it. It's obviously an absurd play, a seriocomic burlesque. In short, it's about cell-phones and death and the absurdity of "having a connection" with someone—whether over the phone, in person, alive or dead. Jean, as it happens, doesn't own a cell-phone because, as she always understood, it's not an authentic connection—she prefers to write letters.
November 8, 2020
The last thing you do when you die is crap your pants. Yeah, when you die, your jowls release and crap comes flying* out of your ass.
- Cartman, South Park
-
Did this happen to Gordon in the café? Would a guy sitting around with a steaming dump in his pants be more obnoxious that the same guy letting his phone ring without answering it? A steaming load in the pants and a ringing cell phone probably justifie homicide in most states.
It used to be you saw someone wearing black and you knew their beloved had died. Now everyone wears black all the time. We are in a state of perpetual mourning. But for what?
Answer: Because black makes you look like you aren’t quite the ginormous tub of guts that you really are. Granted, black clothes won’t make you look skinny, or even remotely not fat, but they can help a bit, like a sort of optical illusion. What we are mourning in perpetuity is the loss of thinness.
I didn't enjoy reading this at all, but I'm sure that I'd like to see it performed.
*Cartman wasn’t kidding about the flying part. Later in that episode, a dead dude craps so intensely that one of the shards knocks over a bar stool!
- Cartman, South Park
-
Did this happen to Gordon in the café? Would a guy sitting around with a steaming dump in his pants be more obnoxious that the same guy letting his phone ring without answering it? A steaming load in the pants and a ringing cell phone probably justifie homicide in most states.
It used to be you saw someone wearing black and you knew their beloved had died. Now everyone wears black all the time. We are in a state of perpetual mourning. But for what?
Answer: Because black makes you look like you aren’t quite the ginormous tub of guts that you really are. Granted, black clothes won’t make you look skinny, or even remotely not fat, but they can help a bit, like a sort of optical illusion. What we are mourning in perpetuity is the loss of thinness.
I didn't enjoy reading this at all, but I'm sure that I'd like to see it performed.
*Cartman wasn’t kidding about the flying part. Later in that episode, a dead dude craps so intensely that one of the shards knocks over a bar stool!
January 24, 2015
Humor is uniquely idiosyncratic. What I find funny, you might find moronic. What makes you laugh may leave me simply nonplussed.
Dead Man's Cell Phone is by no means a great play. It reads like a ginned up first draft. The lead character's motivation is undeveloped and suspect. The second act starts with a monologue which is little more than a gassy information dump. Had the writer had pushed harder, this slapstick effort could have provided some profound insights into the fetishization of electronic devices and connection. It didn't get there.
I give the play four stars, though.
It made me laugh.
Dead Man's Cell Phone is by no means a great play. It reads like a ginned up first draft. The lead character's motivation is undeveloped and suspect. The second act starts with a monologue which is little more than a gassy information dump. Had the writer had pushed harder, this slapstick effort could have provided some profound insights into the fetishization of electronic devices and connection. It didn't get there.
I give the play four stars, though.
It made me laugh.
November 1, 2023
کتاب با اسم تلفن مرد مرده چاپ شده.
با اینکه قبلا نمایشنامه خانه پاکیزه رو از سارا رول خونده بودم و خیلی دوسش داشتم، پلات این نمایشنامه رو دوست نداشتم.
کتاب دربارهی مردی هست که توی یک کافه میمیره و جین گوشی این مرد رو نگه میداره و با زن و خانوادهش ارتباط برقرار میکنه.
به نظرم کارای شخصیت اصلی و (گاها سکانسهای دیگه) منطقی نبود. البته کلا نوشتههای رول همینطوری هستن. یه مقدار عجیبن و یه سری وقتها اتفاقای غیر منتظرهای میوفته که هینتی داده نشده قبلش.
۲ ستاره رو به خاطر یه سری دیالوگها که دوست داشتم دادم.
شروع: شنبه 02.08.06
پایان: سهشنبه 02.08.09
با اینکه قبلا نمایشنامه خانه پاکیزه رو از سارا رول خونده بودم و خیلی دوسش داشتم، پلات این نمایشنامه رو دوست نداشتم.
کتاب دربارهی مردی هست که توی یک کافه میمیره و جین گوشی این مرد رو نگه میداره و با زن و خانوادهش ارتباط برقرار میکنه.
به نظرم کارای شخصیت اصلی و (گاها سکانسهای دیگه) منطقی نبود. البته کلا نوشتههای رول همینطوری هستن. یه مقدار عجیبن و یه سری وقتها اتفاقای غیر منتظرهای میوفته که هینتی داده نشده قبلش.
۲ ستاره رو به خاطر یه سری دیالوگها که دوست داشتم دادم.
شروع: شنبه 02.08.06
پایان: سهشنبه 02.08.09
January 25, 2013
Abysmal. The worst sort of self-serving, artsy dreck...
April 25, 2015
Mrs. Ruhl has some very interesting ideas - about the power of love after death, about perception vs. reality, about the desire to right wrongs - but the play feels oddly incomplete. "Dead Man's Cell Phone" embraces some very large and fun theatrical absurdities (not all of which gel cohesively, admittedly), but it feels like the ending leaps from no where, as though she were on a deadline and had to find a speedy way to wrap up what could have been a fuller investigation into the ripples we leave after we pass on.
July 27, 2022
How is this sad sackery supposed to be a comedy? I guess I couldnt turn my brain off. I was putoff by how pathetic and invasive women are portrayed. A woman goes from annoyed into being helpful to full on obsessed over a cell phone. This is a straight up nightmare! She is able to completely ingratiate herself in this grieving family. Its disturbed. Practically speaking, she would have had to buy at least a charger to keep answering the phone. Phone service aint free. All to lie and try to rose tint some philandering organ harvester. But somehow her obsession is supposed to be an act of love. I didnt get it.
October 31, 2017
Sarah Ruhl is absolutely brilliant and while this isn't my favorite of her plays, her signature style holds steady. Whimsical yet blunt, fantastic but incredibly real, and revealing of human nature.
October 29, 2022
Strange, sometimes in really good ways, sometimes in ineffective ways.
August 4, 2025
First time reading a play!
October 5, 2021
Coming right after Abramovic’s memoir this play was terrific to read. Jean, the woman who gets the cell phone is compelled to make people think the best of the dead man. What a pickle she gets into.
November 6, 2025
بدجور رندومه. متن پست مدرنی داره و خب مفاهیمی که طرح میکنه جالبن ولی بعید میدونم دلم بخواد اون شیفتهای رندوم مکانی رو روی صحنه ببینم. ژوهانسبورگ، فرودگاه، لوازم تحریر، لوله ماشین لباسشویی... نمایشیه که راجع بهش مطمعن نیستم ولی خب قصد اون هم مطمعن کردن من نبوده. میدونم سلیقه من نیست به هر حال.
June 27, 2018
* بریده ای از کتاب *
.
ایـن روزا تــوی دنــیــا یــکــی دو تــا مــکــان مــقــدس هــســت کــه بـایـد صــدای تــلــفــن تــوی اونــا خــفــه بــشــه.
1- تــئــاتــر.
2- کـــلــیــســا و تـــوالــت!
.
ایـن روزا تــوی دنــیــا یــکــی دو تــا مــکــان مــقــدس هــســت کــه بـایـد صــدای تــلــفــن تــوی اونــا خــفــه بــشــه.
1- تــئــاتــر.
2- کـــلــیــســا و تـــوالــت!
November 12, 2016
Huh.
Dead Man's Cell Phone is a play about a girl at a cafe who finds an annoying cell phone ringing in the pocket of a man sitting across the room from her. As she tries to get his attention, she realizes that this man is dead and the only thing left of him that's still buzzing and making noise is his cell phone. Our hero decides to take his cell phone and right all of his wrongs that he committed while he was alive, to discover some very interesting developments on who he was to the people around him while he was alive.
The play is very much a surreal, postmodern, dramady but it doesn't lose its feel from start to finish. The odd dialogue, over-the-top characters, and even more over-the-top story do a great job of making you feel out of place and yet establish an excellent through-line in the protagonist to ground the actual drama and message of the play in order to keep you invested.
However, the biggest problem with the play is that Ruhl makes the mistake of changing the word "interesting" with "different", because the characters in the play are more defined by their quirks than anything actually deep within them. They're still entertaining and the dialogue is snappy enough to entertain but they just aren't that deep of characters.
The message is also a bit heavy-handed. There are several moments the play takes a break to tell the audience directly, "CELL PHONES ARE DISCONNECTING US FROM EVERYONE!" (Well, there is a bit more subtlety than how I put it, but it does come across like a hammer hitting a nail on the head to really get that point out).
Overall, I think Dead Man's Cell Phone is worth a read. Or a watch. I had the benefit of also seeing this staged and while the directing wasn't wonderful, the acting and set design were absolutely brilliant. I'd love to see this production or even read this play on my own again.
Dead Man's Cell Phone is a play about a girl at a cafe who finds an annoying cell phone ringing in the pocket of a man sitting across the room from her. As she tries to get his attention, she realizes that this man is dead and the only thing left of him that's still buzzing and making noise is his cell phone. Our hero decides to take his cell phone and right all of his wrongs that he committed while he was alive, to discover some very interesting developments on who he was to the people around him while he was alive.
The play is very much a surreal, postmodern, dramady but it doesn't lose its feel from start to finish. The odd dialogue, over-the-top characters, and even more over-the-top story do a great job of making you feel out of place and yet establish an excellent through-line in the protagonist to ground the actual drama and message of the play in order to keep you invested.
However, the biggest problem with the play is that Ruhl makes the mistake of changing the word "interesting" with "different", because the characters in the play are more defined by their quirks than anything actually deep within them. They're still entertaining and the dialogue is snappy enough to entertain but they just aren't that deep of characters.
The message is also a bit heavy-handed. There are several moments the play takes a break to tell the audience directly, "CELL PHONES ARE DISCONNECTING US FROM EVERYONE!" (Well, there is a bit more subtlety than how I put it, but it does come across like a hammer hitting a nail on the head to really get that point out).
Overall, I think Dead Man's Cell Phone is worth a read. Or a watch. I had the benefit of also seeing this staged and while the directing wasn't wonderful, the acting and set design were absolutely brilliant. I'd love to see this production or even read this play on my own again.
August 12, 2008
I'm fascinated by Sarah Ruhl's stage directions. For example, when the main character is on the phone, all the dialogue of the person she is talking to is very specific, but inaudible to the audience. So I'm not sure if I'm gaining or losing something by reading it. I'm sort of enamored with her writing style, and the play just felt good to read. Unfortunately, I had read the entire plot already in New Yorker article, but it still managed to be surprising. By the end, though, I felt as though maybe it was a little fluffy (like the clouds on the cover). I would jump at the chance to see it, though.
August 27, 2021
thank you to my friend grace for gifting this to me!!
this book was very reflective and funny. it is a play, so know that before you pick it up!! it was one of the first plays I've read in years, but I enjoyed it a lot!
this book was very reflective and funny. it is a play, so know that before you pick it up!! it was one of the first plays I've read in years, but I enjoyed it a lot!
February 20, 2010
I'm not a fan of Sarah Ruhl, in spite of her acclaim and popularity. Her plays never seem particularly well crafted or insightful. I don't find her characters particularly compelling or genuine. They are contrived and shallow. Am I missing something?
February 20, 2009
I'm not sure there's ultimately much to think about in this play -- but Sarah Ruhl's writing is so delectably strange that it's continuously eyebrow-raising.
March 18, 2022
3.5
This wasn’t my new favorite Sarah Ruhl or anything but I still love her writing.
This wasn’t my new favorite Sarah Ruhl or anything but I still love her writing.
July 17, 2023
Funny at some points but wasn't particularly special
December 21, 2022
A woman--middle-aged, distinguished, monied--enters a church to speak at the funeral of her elder son. She says:
I had actually figured that out in Scene One, in which only two characters are present, Gordon, a dead man seated at a table at a cafe, and Jean, a young woman seated nearby. Gordon's cell phone rings....and rings...and rings...and Jean, annoyed, finally comes over to investigate why this man is letting his phone ring and ring and ring. Pretty quickly she determines that he's dead. And so she does what anybody would do...she finds the manager; calls the police; tries to figure out who his relatives are.
Oh no...she doesn't do any of those things. No, Jean just answers Gordon's phone. Several times. And then inserts herself into this stranger's life, deceiving his loved ones into believing that she knew and cared for Gordon when in fact she never spoke a word to him in his life.
Ruhl never supplies back story for Jean that might explain why she'd do something so preposterous and monstrous. Indeed, Ruhl doesn't let on that Jean's behavior is bad at all. I wondered, throughout Dead Man's Cell Phone, when we'd arrive at the subject of the sanctity of life. We never do. This playwright, as far as I can tell, thinks life and death are matters for frivolity, for trivializing, for jokey banter. I cannot think that: I hope that should I die alone in a coffee shop that whoever found me would respect me and my family and friends sufficiently to NOT answer my cell phone.
But this is Ruhl's play, and Jean does answer the phone, and soon she finds herself among strangers like Mrs. Gottlieb, a person who muses on architecture when she ought to be talking about her son. Among these people, Jean gets herself into the thick of an adventure that would not be out of place in a Hitchcock film. She also finds love, or so we are to believe; indeed, the "moral" of Dead Man's Cell Phone is apparently something like, love is the answer.
The play frequently seems to veer into the fantastical, but it always feels anchored in, or near, reality; the absurdities in the piece merely feel absurd, rather than fanciful and beautiful or satirical and pointed.
I'm not sure what to say. There is, thank God, a vaulted ceiling here. I am relieved to find that there is stained glass and the sensation of height. Even though I am not a religious woman I am glad there are still churches....Could some one please turn their fucking cell phone off. There are only one or two sacred places left in the world today. Where there is no ringing. The theater, the church, and the toilet. But some people actually answer their phones in the shitter these days....If you believe that a middle-aged, distinguished, monied woman talks like this at her elder son's funeral, than perhaps Sarah Ruhl's new play Dead Man's Cell Phone is for you. I do not. And this play is unquestionably not for me.
I had actually figured that out in Scene One, in which only two characters are present, Gordon, a dead man seated at a table at a cafe, and Jean, a young woman seated nearby. Gordon's cell phone rings....and rings...and rings...and Jean, annoyed, finally comes over to investigate why this man is letting his phone ring and ring and ring. Pretty quickly she determines that he's dead. And so she does what anybody would do...she finds the manager; calls the police; tries to figure out who his relatives are.
Oh no...she doesn't do any of those things. No, Jean just answers Gordon's phone. Several times. And then inserts herself into this stranger's life, deceiving his loved ones into believing that she knew and cared for Gordon when in fact she never spoke a word to him in his life.
Ruhl never supplies back story for Jean that might explain why she'd do something so preposterous and monstrous. Indeed, Ruhl doesn't let on that Jean's behavior is bad at all. I wondered, throughout Dead Man's Cell Phone, when we'd arrive at the subject of the sanctity of life. We never do. This playwright, as far as I can tell, thinks life and death are matters for frivolity, for trivializing, for jokey banter. I cannot think that: I hope that should I die alone in a coffee shop that whoever found me would respect me and my family and friends sufficiently to NOT answer my cell phone.
But this is Ruhl's play, and Jean does answer the phone, and soon she finds herself among strangers like Mrs. Gottlieb, a person who muses on architecture when she ought to be talking about her son. Among these people, Jean gets herself into the thick of an adventure that would not be out of place in a Hitchcock film. She also finds love, or so we are to believe; indeed, the "moral" of Dead Man's Cell Phone is apparently something like, love is the answer.
The play frequently seems to veer into the fantastical, but it always feels anchored in, or near, reality; the absurdities in the piece merely feel absurd, rather than fanciful and beautiful or satirical and pointed.
September 19, 2019
Reading a play is always tricky, because I am limited by my own mind, and in the theatre the play happens in time, which is not what reading is like -- by which I mean that I read much faster than the language and action would occur on stage, and also my reading is inevitably broken into chunks, interrupted, left to sit and then resumed -- whereas the play occurs and either one attends or one does not.
All those limitations being stated, I liked this all right, and I saw from time to time how good it might be performed, and it felt very of a piece with the little I know of Ruhl from having started with her 100 Essays I Don't Have Time to Write: On Umbrellas and Sword Fights, Parades and Dogs, Fire Alarms, Children, and Theater -- the willingness to use the space of the stage for things that are not mimetic, to show the poetry instead of attempting to just copy life. I hope I can see this performed one day.
All those limitations being stated, I liked this all right, and I saw from time to time how good it might be performed, and it felt very of a piece with the little I know of Ruhl from having started with her 100 Essays I Don't Have Time to Write: On Umbrellas and Sword Fights, Parades and Dogs, Fire Alarms, Children, and Theater -- the willingness to use the space of the stage for things that are not mimetic, to show the poetry instead of attempting to just copy life. I hope I can see this performed one day.
July 5, 2020
Jean is in a restaurant when Gordon the man sitting near her dies. She calls 911 and stays with the body until they arrive. So far her behavior is normal. What I could not understand was why she felt such love for a man she never met.
Visiting his mistress and telling her that Gordon thought of her last. She then meets his mother at the funeral and goes to the house to dine.
Enjoyed the romance between Jean and Dwight, Gordon's brother.
I understand she was being nice telling each person lies so they could have a good memory of Gordon. That is understandable but rushing to the airport to make sure his last illegal organ was received was weird. This was a man who transported illegal organs and she thinks she will just step in at the end.
I guess my main problem with this play was how stupid Jean appears. I must admit it was a funny play and definitely had great moments. It was just the reactions by the main protagonist that made no sense. I may be over-analyzing the play. It was definitely fun with engaging characters.
I liked the character Gordon being brought in to explain himself. I also loved the ending.
Visiting his mistress and telling her that Gordon thought of her last. She then meets his mother at the funeral and goes to the house to dine.
Enjoyed the romance between Jean and Dwight, Gordon's brother.
I understand she was being nice telling each person lies so they could have a good memory of Gordon. That is understandable but rushing to the airport to make sure his last illegal organ was received was weird. This was a man who transported illegal organs and she thinks she will just step in at the end.
I guess my main problem with this play was how stupid Jean appears. I must admit it was a funny play and definitely had great moments. It was just the reactions by the main protagonist that made no sense. I may be over-analyzing the play. It was definitely fun with engaging characters.
I liked the character Gordon being brought in to explain himself. I also loved the ending.
November 16, 2018
I have mixed feelings on this play.
I enjoyed it, but I'm not a fan of the first third or so - when the plot properly starts. I read this as a part of the production process as a part of my school's theatre season, and I have to say: one-sided phone conversations are not a particularly strong way to introduce and entice readers and audiences alike. I felt Jean as a character was weak and lacked any real personality or agency throughout the majority of the first act.
That said, once the second act starts (and I do have to warn of spoilers here), the opening monologue is very strong, but the interactions between the character giving the monologue and Jean later on in the act leaves much to be desired. Further, the denouement comes out of nowhere, and I'm really not a fan.
Overall, it's a fine play with some excellent character moments, but the characters themselves feel flat and underdeveloped.
I enjoyed it, but I'm not a fan of the first third or so - when the plot properly starts. I read this as a part of the production process as a part of my school's theatre season, and I have to say: one-sided phone conversations are not a particularly strong way to introduce and entice readers and audiences alike. I felt Jean as a character was weak and lacked any real personality or agency throughout the majority of the first act.
That said, once the second act starts (and I do have to warn of spoilers here), the opening monologue is very strong, but the interactions between the character giving the monologue and Jean later on in the act leaves much to be desired. Further, the denouement comes out of nowhere, and I'm really not a fan.
Overall, it's a fine play with some excellent character moments, but the characters themselves feel flat and underdeveloped.
June 14, 2017
This is kind of a darker satirical “While you were Sleeping” in that our main character is a quiet mousy girl who falls in love with a dead man and answers his cell phone. She is then roped into his life, meeting is mother, widow, brother, and even his mistress.
The absurdity of the situation and especially the climax is purposeful and intriguing. The concept of the afterlife and everyone having a single outfit that they must wash once a week in the nude was a relatively small detail but a great example of the understated humor.
The unfolding of the true character of the dead man, Gordon is masterful.
I even enjoyed the writer’s director notes at the end as they too were laced with subtle humor and offered insight into the writer.
Overall, a nice dark comedy that has something to say about love stories.
The absurdity of the situation and especially the climax is purposeful and intriguing. The concept of the afterlife and everyone having a single outfit that they must wash once a week in the nude was a relatively small detail but a great example of the understated humor.
The unfolding of the true character of the dead man, Gordon is masterful.
I even enjoyed the writer’s director notes at the end as they too were laced with subtle humor and offered insight into the writer.
Overall, a nice dark comedy that has something to say about love stories.
December 16, 2018
Many plays suffer from the reality that plays are meant to be staged, not read. Not so with Ruhl. Ruhl's works wring as much emotion out of a reader as they do a viewer and Dead Man's Cell Phone is in this same vein. Dripping with ennui, loneliness, and love.
The play begins as Jean is annoyed by a ringing cell phone in a cafe. It continues to ring unabated and finally she goes to turn it off herself and finds its owner is dead. Jean then takes the cellphone and takes it upon herself to comfort the man's survivors. Jean lies in doing so and becomes entangled in the man's life.
The piece is ephemeral and one can almost see it as a ballet. The characters aren't pure and even though it has a nominally happy ending, the audience can't help but think of what legacy will actually be left?
The play begins as Jean is annoyed by a ringing cell phone in a cafe. It continues to ring unabated and finally she goes to turn it off herself and finds its owner is dead. Jean then takes the cellphone and takes it upon herself to comfort the man's survivors. Jean lies in doing so and becomes entangled in the man's life.
The piece is ephemeral and one can almost see it as a ballet. The characters aren't pure and even though it has a nominally happy ending, the audience can't help but think of what legacy will actually be left?
April 2, 2024
actually a 2.5/5. maybe it was more groundbreaking when it came out but by this point, 16 years after this was published, i’m exhausted of Technology Bad narratives. so exhausted.
yes, phones can be a horrible thing. they’ve been a horrible thing in my own life. but there are so many beautiful moments in this that are just weighed down by the need to throw in a heavy-handed nod to how awful the digital age is. the best parts of this piece are when it’s more focused on love and souls and how we can connect with one another in the most mundane moments. sarah ruhl is a great writer but her characters and comedy are less of a focus then they should be in this script. the focus is all too often on the very thing she hates- the mobile phone.
and i wrote this on my phone. how silly. speech over
yes, phones can be a horrible thing. they’ve been a horrible thing in my own life. but there are so many beautiful moments in this that are just weighed down by the need to throw in a heavy-handed nod to how awful the digital age is. the best parts of this piece are when it’s more focused on love and souls and how we can connect with one another in the most mundane moments. sarah ruhl is a great writer but her characters and comedy are less of a focus then they should be in this script. the focus is all too often on the very thing she hates- the mobile phone.
and i wrote this on my phone. how silly. speech over
June 24, 2021
"I listen to the music that make me think." - RHCP
Pretty interesting, not the type of book I usually read but was pleasantly surprised.
There are all kinds of shadowy underworlds I do not know much about: drug trade, prostitution/sex services, black market organ transplants.
I don't know much about these worlds on purpose - they make me feel quezzy. However, they are a part of life, and life is to be explored. This play explores the black market organ market and some of the characters within it. It creates sympathy for morally questionable people, which is something I appreciate in literature. Art has to be good to pull that off.
Morally questionable people + unexpected actions = this play
Good, interesting, though provoking.
Pretty interesting, not the type of book I usually read but was pleasantly surprised.
There are all kinds of shadowy underworlds I do not know much about: drug trade, prostitution/sex services, black market organ transplants.
I don't know much about these worlds on purpose - they make me feel quezzy. However, they are a part of life, and life is to be explored. This play explores the black market organ market and some of the characters within it. It creates sympathy for morally questionable people, which is something I appreciate in literature. Art has to be good to pull that off.
Morally questionable people + unexpected actions = this play
Good, interesting, though provoking.
August 17, 2021
Honestly the more I think about this play the more I dislike it. I really don’t like the message that technology is ‘evil’ and that you can only have meaningful relationships with people face-to-face. Because most of my family lives overseas I’m always talking to them via the phone and it’s something that I’m so grateful for. I think it’s patently ridiculous to suggest that life would be better/ easier/ more meaningful without phones. They’re so integral to many of our everyday activities (e.g. covid check-ins by scanning a QR code) and they save so much time. And ALSO, if you don’t want a phone don’t use one, don’t write a 100-page play about it.
I don’t know why I’m getting so heated about this… maybe I just resent writing an essay on it 🥲
I don’t know why I’m getting so heated about this… maybe I just resent writing an essay on it 🥲
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