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The Bottle Tree
Full-Length Play | A heartfelt, humorous, and heartbreaking exploration of American gun culture. | “A sincere, non-condescending and compassionate piece of writing.” –Chris Jones, Chicago Tribune | Five years after a school shooting, Alley, the struggling, smart-mouthed teenage sister of the shooter, wrestles with forgiveness, moving forward, and the lingering questions left in the wake of her brother’s crime. Another decade later, as an adult, finding satisfying answers proves no easier. Will she ever find an opportunity for hope and healing, or will the ghosts of her past forever haunt her? ( 5F, 3M, Flexible)
- GenresPlays
60 pages, Paperback
Published June 21, 2017
About the author
Beth Kander
19 books125 followersBeth Kander is a USA Today bestselling writer with tangled roots in the Midwest and Deep South. The granddaughter of immigrants, her work often explores how worlds old and new intertwine—or collide. Beth earned an MSW from the University of Michigan and an MFA in Creative Writing from Mississippi University for Women, where she has also served as a visiting professor. She calls Chicago home these days, and is lucky to live there with her very favorite characters: her heroic husband, their two brave, hilarious kids, and a giant rescue dog named Oz.
For more: www.bethkander.com
For more: www.bethkander.com
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 29, 2020
(As a director, I have probably read this play 40 times and watched my cast perform it another 40.)
Its publicity claims the subject of Beth Kander's play to be "gun culture"—a summary akin to declaring To Kill A Mockingbird a study of Alabama law practice. However titillating it is to speculate on a killer's motives, or emotionally satisfying to weep for slain victims, these options are open only to survivors like those at the center of Kander's contemplative narrative.
What this means is that the day, 10 years earlier, when Doug Mason died from a policeman's bullet after arriving at East Maple High School armed with his great-grandfather's civil war musket and proceeding to open fire on his fellow students, is less important as his half-sister's struggle to endure the hostility of their rural Mississippi townfolk. Assisting Allison in her recovery are a genial therapist, a classmate with a personal connection to the fatal event and a long-deceased family ghost whose wisdom continues to influence her kinswomen, chiefly through the presence in the front yard of a "bottle tree"—a protective talisman against menacing spirits hearkening to slave beliefs often found in Southern regions.
Strict adherence to individual experience—outside editorializing is supplied by the framing device of a documentary filmmaker conducting interviews with the characters a decade later—frees Kander from agenda-fueled restrictions to instead introduce audiences to a wide spectrum of ballistic imagery: weapons serving as memorials to ancestral heroes in distant wars, as deterrents to unwelcome predators, as acknowledgment of entry into adulthood and, yes, as a deadly adjunct to an irrational mind. By the time Allison affirms her advocacy of firearms regulation, the instruments under scrutiny have been divested of their mythical aura to be exposed as once-ubiquitous utilitarian objects.
Don't expect any shiny automatic weapons or stealth cannons. While the lessons of great-aunt Myrna may reflect attitudes outdated today, there is no denying their validity as a response to their times. Whether you regard firearms as evil destroyers of innocents ( sometimes true ) or noble guardians of the meek and oppressed ( also sometimes true ), whether you shudder at the thought of teenagers operating shooting irons—while making exception for combat soldiers and Ralphie Parker's Daisy rifle—if you wear your opinions like body armor, you do well to leave them at the door.
I couldn't have said it better. From a review by Mary Shen Barnidge
Its publicity claims the subject of Beth Kander's play to be "gun culture"—a summary akin to declaring To Kill A Mockingbird a study of Alabama law practice. However titillating it is to speculate on a killer's motives, or emotionally satisfying to weep for slain victims, these options are open only to survivors like those at the center of Kander's contemplative narrative.
What this means is that the day, 10 years earlier, when Doug Mason died from a policeman's bullet after arriving at East Maple High School armed with his great-grandfather's civil war musket and proceeding to open fire on his fellow students, is less important as his half-sister's struggle to endure the hostility of their rural Mississippi townfolk. Assisting Allison in her recovery are a genial therapist, a classmate with a personal connection to the fatal event and a long-deceased family ghost whose wisdom continues to influence her kinswomen, chiefly through the presence in the front yard of a "bottle tree"—a protective talisman against menacing spirits hearkening to slave beliefs often found in Southern regions.
Strict adherence to individual experience—outside editorializing is supplied by the framing device of a documentary filmmaker conducting interviews with the characters a decade later—frees Kander from agenda-fueled restrictions to instead introduce audiences to a wide spectrum of ballistic imagery: weapons serving as memorials to ancestral heroes in distant wars, as deterrents to unwelcome predators, as acknowledgment of entry into adulthood and, yes, as a deadly adjunct to an irrational mind. By the time Allison affirms her advocacy of firearms regulation, the instruments under scrutiny have been divested of their mythical aura to be exposed as once-ubiquitous utilitarian objects.
Don't expect any shiny automatic weapons or stealth cannons. While the lessons of great-aunt Myrna may reflect attitudes outdated today, there is no denying their validity as a response to their times. Whether you regard firearms as evil destroyers of innocents ( sometimes true ) or noble guardians of the meek and oppressed ( also sometimes true ), whether you shudder at the thought of teenagers operating shooting irons—while making exception for combat soldiers and Ralphie Parker's Daisy rifle—if you wear your opinions like body armor, you do well to leave them at the door.
I couldn't have said it better. From a review by Mary Shen Barnidge
July 11, 2018
I have read the play, and also seen it in production. Timely, intelligent, with gentle humor and great compassion. I highly recommend this not only for reading, but also for staging.!
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews