Happy Now

Plot

After a conversation with Michael, a middle aged businessman, at a conference hotel, Kitty begins to wonder what life is really all about as she desperately tries to balance family life with personal freedom and fidelity with a trying job in marketing for a cancer charity. Meanwhile, at home, Johnny (her husband) makes out she's got it easy compared to his hectic schedule as a newly trained teacher - a job he ironically took on in order to lead a more laid-back lifestyle. Kitty's parents are drifting further and further apart as her mother, June, tries to keep Kitty on her side of the feud. Miles and Bea - Kitty and Johnny's friends - are also struggling to hold it together as Miles is slowly becoming more and more gripped by alcoholism whilst Carl, another friend, seems to have the ideal lifestyle with his new lifeguard boyfriend Antonio.

Original production

The original production was staged at the Cottesloe Theatre, National Theatre, London on 24 January 2008 and played until 10 May 2008. The production was directed by Thea Sharrock and featured the following cast:

The technical crew were as follows:

Subsequent productions

Yale Repertory Theater

Cast:

Creative Team:

Primary Stages Theater

Cast:

Creative Team:

Reception

Happy Now? won the Writer's Guild Best New Play Award and the Susan Smith Blackburn Special Commendation Award. In New York, it was nominated for the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play.

The play was very well-received, with The Independent, Mail on Sunday and Whatsonstage.com each awarding it four stars and the Daily Telegraph calling it "a richly rewarding gem... the best new play to have arrived on a British stage for at least a year'.

The New York premiere saw the play hailed as a "tart, entertaining and ultimately haunting comedy".