TOM ZIEGLER

The Last Resort proves that love not only can germinate but can grow and flourish even in the most deathly environments.

 

Marjorie Kendrick, a widow half paralyzed by a stroke, is dumped into a posh Long Island nursing home by her son. Most of the other elderly patients she meets in the home’s recreation room are kept docile and cooperative by the use of drugs. The only exception is Henry Downs, who, as Marjorie soon learns, avoids the diet of pills by collaborating with the nursing home’s management.

 

Like most women her age, Marjorie has lived her life doing as she was told. But following her brush with death that changes, and as she fights her own paralysis, she strives to shake off the paralysis of the others. Little by little the group comes to life until finally Marjorie galvanizes them into an all-out revolt. Even the sedentary Henry discovers that yes, there certainly can be not only life, but romance after 70.

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“In The Last Resort six people make life at a Long Island nursing home more lively than their keepers or relatives can stand. This place may be the last resort of the families that sent their elders to it, but to its inmates the last resort is escape, and even if the plotting of their breakout is hilariously inept, you keep hoping they will make it. … Ziegler is not afraid to put a little bite into his comedy.”  -D.J.R. Bruckner The New York Times

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Full-Length Play, Comedy

5f, 3m

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Contact Tom Ziegler for rights to stage a production of this play.

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