One Hand Clapping

Sometimes when I'm at work and waiting for customers I think about the two of us living like kings and not bothering about the future. Because there may not be any future to bother about, you know. Not for anybody, one of these days. And it's a wicked world.

Average couple Janet and Howard's lives begin to unravel when Howard's photographic memory helps win him a gameshow fortune.

Janet doesn't want their lives to change that much. She's quite happy working at the supermarket, cooking for her husband three times a day and watching quiz shows in the evening.

But once Howard unleashes his photographic brain on the world, the once modest used-car salesman can't seem to stop.

And what he sees as the logical conclusion to his success isn't something Janet can agree to.

Burgess's 1961 darkly comic satire of drab English consumerism is adapted for the stage by Lucia Cox. This edition was published to coincide with the US premiere at the Brits Off-Broadway Festival, at 59E59 Theatre, New York, in May 2015.

Anthony Burgess was born in Manchester in 1917. He was an author, poet, playwright, composer, linguist, translator and critic. Diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumour in 1959, Burgess became a full-time writer and went on to write a book a year up until his death in 1993. His many works include: The Complete Enderby,Tremor of Intent and The Kingdom of the Wicked, as well as works for the stage such asBlooms of Dublin: A Musical Play Based On James Joyce's Ulysses (1986), and an adaptation of his own novel, A Clockwork Orange, produced in 1987.

Lucia Cox has a BA (Hons) in Acting and a Masters in Creative Writing. She has performed in theatre, film and on TV. She has written short films and for the theatre and for BBC Learning for which she is a regular contributor. She has also taught Acting and Creative Writing workshops at MMU and Manchester College.