The Surface of the World - Synopsis

"You are my family, my country. Wherever you are, my only allegiance, the only thing in my life worth a damn, is you."

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Synopsis

While sorting through his childhood home after his father’s death, Nicholas Draper receives a surprise visit from his lover, Seth Lundy, a Marine stationed overseas. Seth has returned to Terre Haute, Indiana, not only to comfort Nicholas, but to inform him he’s thinking of reenlisting.

Emma Draper, Nicholas’ older sister who left home six years ago in the wake of their mother’s death, has also returned to Terre Haute. Now an AIDS widow and herself H.I.V. positive, Emma is trying to find the courage to show up at the front door and mend relations with the brother she left behind - the only family she has left.

When these people converge on the Draper home by the Wabash River one autumn evening, no one gets much sleep.

"Leave (The Surface of the World)" is a play about shifting allegiances - romantic love, familial love, and love of country. A play about the families and homes we grow up in, and the ones we choose.

“Oh, that I could shrink the surface of the world
So that suddenly I might find you standing at my side.”
-- Wang Chien