David Hare's Stuff Happens to Get U.S. Premiere at the Mark Taper Forum

David Hare's controversial political play Stuff Happens will get its American premiere at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles. The play, which will run from May 25 through July 17, will be the last show directed by Gordon Davidson as part of his tenure as artistic director there.

The American Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's famous response to the looting of Baghdad at a press conference on April 11, 2003 provides the title for this new play, which was specially written for the National Theatre in London where it premiered last year. From events that have dominated international headlines for the last two years, Hare has fashioned both a historical narrative and a human drama about the frustrations of power and the limits of diplomacy.

The production at the National Theatre, which was directed by Nicholas Hytner, received mixed to positive reviews. Benedict Nightingale of The London Times wrote: "If you believe that far-sighted statesmen launched a just and prudent war in Iraq, deterring the world's terrorists as a happy by-product, David Hare's new play may anger you. The dramatist has had the gall to raise serious doubts about the wisdom and honesty of both the coalition's leaders. If you take a different view of recent events, you may appreciate a play, which strikes me as hard-hitting yet balanced enough to acknowledge, say, Tony Blair's desperate attempts to legitimize a dubiously legitimate war."

Stuff Happens has been read at different locations in the United States including at New York Theater Workshop, but the mounting at the Mark Taper Forum will be the first full-scale production of the play in this country.

Stuff Happens joins a season that also includes Luis Alfaro's Electridad running from March 27 through May 15 and August Wilson's Radio Golf running from July 31 through September 18.