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The Fastest Clock in the Universe
It's Cougar's birthday. He's having a party. And the gift he'd kill for is youth...
In a strange room in East London the party preparations are under way. Everything has been planned to the last detail. Surely nothing can go wrong? After all, there's the specially made birthday cake, the specially written cards, the specially chosen guest of honour... and a very, very sharp knife.
Philip Ridley's edgy and provocative drama caused a sensation when it premiered at Hampstead Theatre in 1992, winning the Evening Standard Award for Most Promising Newcomer to the Stage and the Meyer Whitworth Prize. It is now regarded as a contemporary classic.
'A bit like a ride on a ghost train... you find yourself shuddering with shock and laughing uproariously... horror has rarely been so much fun' Daily Telegraph
'Scorchingly nasty... fingers an age and its icons with terrifying accuracy' Guardian
In a strange room in East London the party preparations are under way. Everything has been planned to the last detail. Surely nothing can go wrong? After all, there's the specially made birthday cake, the specially written cards, the specially chosen guest of honour... and a very, very sharp knife.
Philip Ridley's edgy and provocative drama caused a sensation when it premiered at Hampstead Theatre in 1992, winning the Evening Standard Award for Most Promising Newcomer to the Stage and the Meyer Whitworth Prize. It is now regarded as a contemporary classic.
'A bit like a ride on a ghost train... you find yourself shuddering with shock and laughing uproariously... horror has rarely been so much fun' Daily Telegraph
'Scorchingly nasty... fingers an age and its icons with terrifying accuracy' Guardian
96 pages, Paperback
First published July 20, 1992
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
June 19, 2016
Written in 1992, this is the most apt cultural portrait ever created of the modern monster of gay male vanity. Eerily dead-on in its prediction of obsessions with youth, beauty, and sex. The main character is a monster made worse by the way his evil is reflected in those who love him (his endlessly infatuated partner in crime, Captain Tock) and those who are intrigued by his over-the-top persona. An attempt to seduce an underaged boy at his birthday party goes terribly awry and all the guests expose their worst hidden selves. Ridley is like God to me and this is my favorite of all his plays.
October 23, 2022
The Fastest Clock in the Universe is cold-hearted, pretentious, obtuse, and deliberately perverse. I loved it.
Wickedly funny, hideously dark, and strangely intense, the play careens by at warp speed, even when practically nothing is happening. It is principally the story of Cougar, a moody, handsome narcissist who shares an apartment with his protector (lover?) Doctor Tock. Cougar is thirty, but don't mention it: his fear of age is neurotic bordering on psychotic. He is in the habit, to make himself feel better (i.e., younger), of giving himself 19th birthday parties, to which he invites a single young man whom he will seduce before the evening is over. Tonight's intended victim is Foxtrot, a simple and naive 16-year-old whom Cougar met at a nearby hospital. Foxtrot frequented the hospital because his brother was dying of a disease that sounds rather like AIDS (Cougar, ever compassionate, simply tells Doctor Tock that he was dying of something terminal). Encouraged by Cougar, Foxtrot has begun to replace his beloved older brother with this ghoulish predator, and has cheerfully agreed to come to the party. But things do not go according to plan. Foxtrot surprises his new friend by inviting along his pregnant young fiancee, Sherbet.
Act Two is built mostly around the inevitable confrontation between Sherbet and Cougar--a battle over Foxtrot that becomes, for Cougar, a fight for his very life.
The play's flaws are apparent: the symbolism, which is rampant, mostly doesn't work; the outlandish character names smack of gimmickry and the events depicted are deliberately coarse and violent; the story that gives the play its title doesn't really make sense. But out of ugliness we often find beauty; I find it here in this nasty, brutally funny play. Much of the time, I felt thrilled and moved by The Fastest Clock in the Universe, and at the end I felt strangely exalted. I won't presume to explain it or to fight it: somehow The Fastest Clock in the Universe works.
Wickedly funny, hideously dark, and strangely intense, the play careens by at warp speed, even when practically nothing is happening. It is principally the story of Cougar, a moody, handsome narcissist who shares an apartment with his protector (lover?) Doctor Tock. Cougar is thirty, but don't mention it: his fear of age is neurotic bordering on psychotic. He is in the habit, to make himself feel better (i.e., younger), of giving himself 19th birthday parties, to which he invites a single young man whom he will seduce before the evening is over. Tonight's intended victim is Foxtrot, a simple and naive 16-year-old whom Cougar met at a nearby hospital. Foxtrot frequented the hospital because his brother was dying of a disease that sounds rather like AIDS (Cougar, ever compassionate, simply tells Doctor Tock that he was dying of something terminal). Encouraged by Cougar, Foxtrot has begun to replace his beloved older brother with this ghoulish predator, and has cheerfully agreed to come to the party. But things do not go according to plan. Foxtrot surprises his new friend by inviting along his pregnant young fiancee, Sherbet.
Act Two is built mostly around the inevitable confrontation between Sherbet and Cougar--a battle over Foxtrot that becomes, for Cougar, a fight for his very life.
The play's flaws are apparent: the symbolism, which is rampant, mostly doesn't work; the outlandish character names smack of gimmickry and the events depicted are deliberately coarse and violent; the story that gives the play its title doesn't really make sense. But out of ugliness we often find beauty; I find it here in this nasty, brutally funny play. Much of the time, I felt thrilled and moved by The Fastest Clock in the Universe, and at the end I felt strangely exalted. I won't presume to explain it or to fight it: somehow The Fastest Clock in the Universe works.
June 2, 2024
Brilliant! Funny, inventive, not afraid to be nasty and naughty with perfectly simple twists. Phillip ridley odd post-nuclear (or not idk!) worldbuilding works every time. a total modern classic
July 5, 2025
mid-book, but the ending was a bit creative and unexpected. probably that's why it's featured among best-sellers of theatre plays
August 23, 2025
A new fave of mine!!!
May 14, 2012
Once again, Philip Ridley has proved that he is an absolutely brilliant playwright. While I didn't enjoy this story quite as much as The Pitchfork Disney, I still found the characters thoroughly enjoyable and the humour to be very well placed.
January 6, 2015
I thought this play was quite interesting, quite a classic stylised contemporary text. The writing style reminded me of Caryl Churchill a little! The story itself was quite interesting, not what I expected, although I felt it was a little unnecessarily explicit for my liking! But overall, an interesting read!
March 22, 2008
I loved this play and want to do it.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews