Realism & Naturalism (2) - "After the End"

• Play title:   After the End
• Playwright:   Dennis Kelly
• Premiered:   August 2005
• Setting:   Mark's 1980s nuclear fallout shelter
• Characters:   Mark and Louise
• Blurb:  "They were all in the pub when the explosion happened. Louise wakes up to find herself trapped with Mark, who has saved her life. Mark, who has always been prepared for the worst, has everything he thinks they will need to survive; tinned chilli, Dungeons and Dragons and a knife – now all they need to do is to wait until it's safe to go outside. Can they survive the attack? Can they survive each other?" - https://www.bushtheatre.co.uk/event/after-the-end/

The play is described as an "intense psychological drama", in which Mark longs to spend "his enforced captivity with the woman of his dreams by playing Dungeons and Dragons, so much so that when she resists, he begins restricting her food supply." - http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/20/theater/reviews/20afte.html

Brief synopsis:
An atomic bomb has gone off, and Louise comes to in Mark's 1980s nuclear fallout shelter (which he has always kept topped up with supplies!)... or that is what Louise thinks. Louise and Mark have worked together in London, and it is clear that Mark has strong feelings for Louise. The audience later learns that there was not an atomic bomb explosion and Mark had in fact kidnapped Louise, his teenage fantasy. At first she is appreciative of him for "saving" her, until he then insists on playing Dungeons and Dragons - when she resists he begins to deprive her of food. "Free of the social pecking order that defined him as the workplace misfit and her as the alpha female, he tries to strong-arm Louise into showing him respect" (https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2011/may/24/after-the-end-theatre-review). Mark uses the situation to exert his power and dominance and rapes her and snaps the key to the shelter. Eventually, she manages to escape and he gets sent to prison.