The Pears of Heaven
A Passion Play Commemorating the Spring Equinox And the Season of Easter
by D.D. Delaney

About the Play:
In April, 1979, following the Three Mile Island accident that nearly destroyed a nuclear power plant, D.D. Delaney, living in nearby Lancaster, founded a street theater troupe dramatizing the abuses of the nuclear power industry. A theme emerged in the skits promoting solar power and a return to a simple lifestyle. In the process, the skits became pro-solar rather than anti-nuclear. Delaney wrote a series of plays, each marking one of eight annual solar festivals going back to ancient times. This solar project collection, entitled In the Pastures of the Sun, consists of three one-act and four full-length plays. “The Pears of Heaven” is the third dramatization in the solar project. It explores the themes of the spring equinox, which governs Easter—the demand placed upon the solar hero to commit with passionate conviction to his/her true life's purpose. In this 30-minute play, four contemporary college students on the eve of their spring vacation advise the protagonist, Job Candidate, how to deal with an important interview s/he faces in the morning. With attitudes ranging from cynicism to anxiety, they do little to allay Job Candidate’s misgivings about their career.

The Characters:
Pre-Med
Job Candidate
Pre-Theo
Sophomore
A Tree
The Boss

(Actors may be any mix of college-age males or females, as desired. Although not absolutely required, it is recommended that those who play Sophomore and Pre-Theo double as Tree and Boss, respectively.)

From the play:
(Job Candidate, Sophomore, Pre-Med, and Pre-Theo sit at a card table in Job Candidate’s dormitory room, having just finished a game of cribbage.)
Pre-med: Hey, listen, it's getting tougher and tougher out there in the real world. I kid you not. The competition's fierce. You can't really do what you want to do, Soph. You've got to get yourself a game plan.
Sophomore: I've already got one.
Pre-Theo: A viable one, Soph.
Sophomore: Hey, who won this cribbage game tonight? Sophisticated Pre-Theo and brainy Pre-Med with their long-range game plans? No. In fact, it was witless Sophomore and uninspiring Job Candidate who crossed that line first. Eh?
Pre-theo: (to Pre-Med) He still thinks life is a cribbage game.
Pre-med: The trouble with you underclass-persons is you aren't aware of how bad things really are. You owe it to yourself to start becoming informed, Soph. Before you know it, you're going to have to go out there and get a job, and the economy is becoming worse and worse every day. Not everyone's going to have a ticket to ride, Soph.
Sophomore: I can't see selling out, like the editors of Rolling Stone.
Pre-med: Selling out? What are you talking about? What does that mean?
Sophomore: You know what it means. Selling out is when you give up your ideas and ideals so you can be comfortable and safe.
Pre-theo: Society forces you to sell out.
Pre-med: You've got to survive. If you can stick to your beliefs and at the same time survive, you're in good shape. But survival comes first.
Pre-theo: And it's going to get worse. Things are getting worse.
Pre-Med: They sure are. Worse and worse. Even if you get that job, there's no guarantee any more you can be better off than your parents.
Pre-theo: The opposite. We're probably going to work harder and be worse off.
Pre-med: I'm afraid that's right, PT.

About the Playwright:
D.D. Delaney is an Equity Association actor who began his career in theater in 1979 as the principal writer of street theater skits protesting the abuses of the nuclear power industry following the nuclear accident at Three-Mile Island near Harrisburg, PA. His street theater troupe evolved into a performance company in Lancaster, PA, where he wrote, acted in, and helped produce a growing body of plays. He worked as an actor, writer, designer, director, and administrator with numerous companies in the Lancaster area, earning his Equity card in 1989 in the role of Dylan Thomas in A Child's Christmas in Wales, produced by Theater of the Seventh Sister, which he co-founded. He continued with Seventh Sister playing a variety of roles. In 1994 he moved to Norfolk, VA, where, he wrote and performed two one-man shows, The Lunar Project and The Holy Fool, at Second Story Theatre. He created four touring programs for Young Audiences of Virginia, including Shakespeare After School and Shakespeare: Playing for Laughs, both of which he performed with his wife, Jala Magik, in secondary schools throughout eastern Virginia. To date, his 33 produced scripts include eleven full-length plays, six one-acts, six plays for young audiences, three collaborations, and numerous skits for special occasions. Currently, Delaney lives by the Chesapeake Bay in the Ocean View subdivision of Norfolk with Jala and animal companions Myrrha the hound and cats Demi-Tasse, Chi, Luna, and Yin. No longer exclusively a theater drudge, he also works as a free-lance journalist for Port Folio Weekly.