After Ashley

by Gina Gionfriddo

AFTER ASHLEY is a blisteringly funny and deeply affecting story about a teenage boy navigating the joys and terrors of life all through the distorting prism of a media firestorm. When a family tragedy deals the Hammond family a dose of dubious celebrity, Justin finds himself paralyzed, unable to fully grieve or grow up. The only bright spot is a girl, only Justin can t decide if she s a saving angel or a self-interested groupie. In a world as weird as this one, she might just be both.

Genres: Plays, Drama, Theatre

76 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

Reviews

[Miranda Marquez · Rating 4 out of 5]

WTF? Okay maybe I never did finish it because what was that ending? Not that it was bad just unexpected with the sex tape and everything 😭 Many good questions to deep dive about in this script, especially with modern day culture obsessed with violence and sex crimes. And the rap song? Holy moly I don’t even know what I’d do if I was in that situation. I do with Julie has a bit more to her as a character aside from her major and such, but definitely need to re-read this for a deeper understanding of the themes and such.

[Nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

A really strong opening scene and an interesting premise let down by a wishy washy second half. But strong dialogue throughout means I’ll definitely be giving Gionfriddo’s other plays a go.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

I mean, this had some cool thematic stuff going on, for sure. The dialogue wasn't as spectacular as U.S. Drag's, but it did suffer from the same overtness toward the end. I'd love to read a play where Gionfriddo works with the same material she uses in both U.S. Drag and After Ashley, and just trusts the reader to make his own conclusions, rather than spelling them out for us. The skills are all there, and this was enjoyable to read, probably delightful to see performed, but some more subtlety would have served it, for sure.

[Martin Denton · Rating 2 out of 5]

After Ashley begins while Ashley is still there. She's a very immature 35-year-old mom, very loving but also very needy, at home on a hot day with her 14-year-old son Justin, who has mono. They're watching TV together, a self-help guru whom Justin proclaims, in his self-assured precocious way, a "moron." But Ashley is looking for guidance somewhere, anywhere; she tells Justin far too much about what's troubling her about her marriage (to his dad, a latent hippie, an education reporter for the Washington Post who is apparently more interested in championing liberal causes than giving his wife what she needs), about her sex life, about her loneliness and boredom. It's an inappropriate conversation that we're eavesdropping on, but its sweetness and naturalness help us buy into the situation and begin to care about both mother and son.

Maybe 15 minutes into the play, Justin's father Alden comes in. Though he and Justin seem to have a decent relationship, we can instantly see why Ashley has been so down on him (she has just explained to Justin that they would divorce, except Alden doesn't think he can afford it). Alden and Ashley snipe about anything and everything during the few minutes they're together. The last thing they argue about--and this turns out to be vitally important--is Alden's idea to hire a homeless stranger whom he met in a Starbucks that afternoon to do their yard work. Ashley is skeptical about having a man with bipolar disorder work in their home, but Alden is unyielding on the point.

What happens next is that, in the darkness following the end of Scene One, we hear sounds of a frantic phone call to 911. It's Justin; he's fighting back hysteria as he tells a preternaturally insensitive operator that there's a man in the house and that something terrible is happening to his mother in the basement. The operator advises Justin to leave the house if the man's still there, and Justin replies that he can't leave his mother.

Playwright Gina Gionfriddo sacrifices internal logic and consistent characterization for the sake of her larger goals. Much of the rest of After Ashley amounts to an attack on ambulance chasers and institutionalized victimhood: Gionfriddo seems angered by the new patterns of public grieving that seem to give license for, well, anything. She has Justin cite, in a pointed monologue in Act Two that summarizes virtually everything she has to say in this play in under five minutes, the case of the 9/11 victim's widow who parlayed her status into lucrative book and TV deals; she wants us to restore proper perspective--and dignity--to survivorhood; she bemoans the communal displays of candles and ribbons that have somehow replaced genuine personal emotion in our culture. I think she's entirely right about this, by the way. But unfortunately the play she's written is at once so far-fetched and so mean that it only undermines her cause.

[Michael Anderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Turning tragedies into gifts. A central idea for After Ashley. Justin is appalled by his dad’s crusade to use his mother’s murder to gain clout. Alden (Justin’s father) already has a book published about the subject and a television show in the works as well. Justin sulks in a bar when he is approached by Julie (a groupie for Justin from his fame after his mother’s murder and his viral 911 call from the murder scene). Julie and Justin make plans to stop a shelter for battered women and their children named after Ashley(Justin’s mother). The plan involves a tape of Ashley in a group activity you would not want shown in public. This play cleverly plays with how people consume crime for entertainment, how some romanticize it, and how it is hard to move on after for others.

[Lauri · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent character study of what happens in the aftermath of a tragedy.

[Julia D’Aprile]

And now: it is easy to forget
what I came for
among so many who have always
lived here
swaying their crenellated fans
between the reefs
and besides
you breathe differently down here.

[Emma Bucknam · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting thematically. Didn’t love the ending or how Julie’s entire character revolves around Justin. Would have been more okay with that if she had more complexity as a character.

[Ash · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you're the kind of person who likes reading plays, this is a great read. It's a family drama with dark humor and a very nuanced, interesting take on true crime.

[Syd · Rating 5 out of 5]

i'm so fucked up right now bro u don't even understand. it's like hamlet meets black mirror.

[Adelaide Felx · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed it, and I loved how non-two dimensional the characters were. Like Justin was a jerk but you like him anyways, or Alden does horrible things but you can see the reasoning
🎬 first scene

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fantastic writing. I'll be reading more of her material, no doubt. I was sucked in to the story, for sure, but was a little thrown with how it all came together at the end. Not my favorite, but this is an early work from Gina Gionfriddo. Not a bad way to pass an afternoon!

[Tanya · Rating 5 out of 5]

A play about media culture and its obsession with death and tragedy.

[Anna Fitzgerald · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't read this as an affront on media, but as a whole vortex of adult self-absorption imposing on the naiveté of youth with an intensely destructive effect.

[Claire · Rating 2 out of 5]

I... did not like this play, but I can see why people would. Lots of male monologues but no female. Just, kinda, eh.