After retiring, the physicist couple Hazel and Robin wanted to finally fulfill their dream of a little house by the sea: a few cows in a meadow that provide fresh milk, home-grown vegetables and fruit from the garden, a little yoga and plenty of peace and quiet; they could certainly enjoy their retirement together. But then disaster strikes. An earthquake and a tsunami cause a meltdown at a nearby nuclear power plant. As scientists, they had both designed the damaged reactor, helped build the power plant and worked there for decades. Now their future is indeed radiant, albeit with radioactivity, even though the limits on their piece of land are miraculously still acceptable. Now they are both trying to come to terms with electricity rationing, water and food shortages in their makeshift dwelling on the edge of the exclusion zone. Then a surprise visitor arrives: it's Rose, a former colleague who was also involved in an affair with Robin at the time, but has spent the last 38 years in America. Nevertheless, Hazel immediately senses danger, but Rose has not come to rehash old love affairs. She wants to face up to her responsibilities as a nuclear scientist and proposes a plan to Hazel and Robin, which is met with horror by both of them...

In her play, the young British author Lucy Kirkwood deals with big themes in light-footed dialogues with a good dose of black humor: Climate change, finite resources, love, old age, death and the question of the responsibility of the old towards the young. In her text, she combines the political with the private with virtuosity: feelings of guilt meet egoism, a sense of responsibility meets exhaustion, macabre humor meets existential fears. While opposing positions clash and the lies of life are exposed, the play also asks what obligation we have towards our children. What price will they have to pay in the future for our current prosperity? What do we owe our children?

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)