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The Ice-Breaker

Two things I’d never written: a love story and a science play. So I wrote THE ICE-BREAKER.

Following the success of Randall Arney’s production of GOD’S MAN IN TEXAS at the Geffen Playhouse, I was offered a commission from the Geffen and A.S.K. Theatre Projects. We kicked some ideas around, but nothing stuck – until I read a New Yorker article by the marvelous writer Elizabeth Kolbert about discovering the history of climate over millennia through drilling into the Greenland ice cap. I gave Randall the article with a note, “I think there’s a metaphor here I can’t resist.”

Thus began a year of research about climate science. I sought out geologists and climate specialists, read everything I could find on the Arctic and the logistics of ice core drilling. My initial sense was that the play should be intimate, about people more than science.

To let all the research settle in my mind, I gave myself a retreat: a drive through the southwest in the summer. My route was chased by wildfires, the desert sky turned purple and threatening with hailstorms, I went for days without having to speak to another human – it was an extraordinary couple of weeks.

The play took shape. I loved it, but the Geffen didn’t. Happily, The Magic Theatre in San Francisco did. Director Art Manke introduced it to them and we got a Sloan Foundation grant to help mount a premiere, along with the National New Plays Network. Art later staged it at The Laguna Playhouse, which was about as perfect a realization of the play as I could have hoped for.

THE ICE-BREAKER isn’t produced as much as it should be; maybe some theatres feel climate science is too controversial. That’s a shame; it’s a lovely, heartbreaking, thought-provoking visit with to people as strong and as vulnerable as the planet.

Monette McGrath and Andrew Barnicle on the set at the Laguna Playhouse
Ashleigh Sumner and Robert Mackenzie at Theatre 40
Andrew Barnicle at the Laguna Playhouse
CSI cast and producers at opening night of The Ice-Breaker at the Laguna Playhouse: David Berman, Carol Mendelsohn, Marc Vann, Robert David Hall, Eric Szmanda, Archie Kao, David Rambo, Jon Wellner
Sarah Bethany Baird as Sonia Milan in The Ice Breaker at Cyrano's Off Center Playhouse
Sarah Bethany Baird and Mark Robokoff in The Ice-Breaker at Cyrano's Cyrano's Off Center Playhouse
Sarah Bethany Baird and Mark Robokoff in The Ice-Breaker at Cyrano's Off Center Playhouse
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NOW PLAYING

A Good Guy - Cast and premiere

David’s play A GOOD GUY, about an armed teacher who stops a school shooting, receives a world premiere at Rogue Machine Theatre in Hollywood. Previews begin September 10, opening on September 14 and running through October 20. Tickets and information at roguemanchinetheatre.org

L.A. Theatre Works audio versions of many of David’s plays are now available for streaming on Spotify, including GOD’S MAN IN TEXAS, ADAM’S RIB, THE TUG OF WAR, and THE CONFESSION OF HENRY JEKYLL, M.D.

SUPPORT

David is on the committee raising funds for The Hollywood Arts Collective, 151 units of affordable housing for artists in the heart of Hollywood. Learn more and donate at https://entertainmentcommunity.org/HAC