Play's End

Synopsis: John Doe, a gun salesman just shy of middle-age, arrives home to find his son Johnny, ten, already back from school and playing on the living room floor. As they talk, Johnny slowly comes to the realization that something "sad" has happened, but he can't remember what it is. Johnny tells John about Billy Fireman, a boy who was shot to death at school the week before. Throughout the telling of the story, Johnny continues to be bothered by his repressed memory. As he slowly reconstructs his day, and as John tells him the gun-happy family's own version of the "birds and the bees," Johnny remembers that his brother Jay has been shot, or "stung," as Johnny calls it.

Notes: ". . . in heightened dialogue reminiscent of Pinter, Dorf shows quite effectively how a parent's attitudes can influence a child without either of them knowing it." The Philadelphia Inquirer