Hippies and Bolsheviks and Other Plays collects three works by Amiel Gladstone, introducing a wide range of fascinating characters and a formidable new voice in Canadian drama.

In The Wedding Pool, three single friends in unsatisfactory jobs decide to place a bet on who will marry first. The friends – waitress and wannabe dancer Sylvia, rock critic Miles and inventory manager Dave – open a joint account to which they each contribute $50 a month, the final sum to be collected by the first to tie the knot. But when Miles starts dating the bank teller who opens their account, the friends realize much more is at stake and are forced to consider their individual fears and failings.

In Lena’s Car, a woman whose marriage has stalled reflects on how it got to that point, harkening back to her youth, when she was just a Young Girl in a Small Town Looking for Trouble. Picking over the memories of her adolescence, she attempts to figure out why she ended up in a disintegrating relationship and just when her life became like everyone else’s.

Hippies and Bolsheviks set in 1970s British Columbia, a hotbed of hippie idealism, is a comedy based on the big ideas of the long-haired revolution. Star stumbles home from a Led Zeppelin concert with a draft dodger. A bizarre love triangle develops the next morning as Allan (Green Tree), a defector from the same commune Star fled, shows up on her doorstep. As The Establishment gains more ground, three dropouts struggle to hold on to their ideals.

‘The Wedding Pool is a particularly smart and entertaining example of the thirtysomething angst genre.’

– The Globe and Mail

‘If Hippies and Bolsheviks is any indication of the quality of work at this year’s play Rites Festival, Calgary theatregoers are in for a phenomenal month.’

– Calgary Sun