Cinzano & Smirnova's Birthday

Two linked plays from the Russian playwright dubbed the 'female Chekhov', depicting the grim reality of domestic life in Soviet Russia, in English translations by Stephen Mulrine. In Cinzano, three young men drink themselves into a stupor to escape their drab lives and family responsibilities. Ludmila Petrushevskaya's play Cinzano was first staged in this translation at the Tron Theatre, Glasgow, in November 1989. In the companion piece, Smirnova's Birthday, the men's girlfriends meet up at a birthday celebration.