The Boundary

By Tom Stoppard and Clive Exton

Directed by Kiara Downey

at the Eureka
215 Jackson Street, San Francisco

October 2-28, 2001

Tom Stoppard collaborated with Clive Exton on The Boundary, produced in the BBC series Eleventh Hour and first broadcast in 1975. The idea behind the series was to pair two playwrights, give them a very a tight deadline - hence the title ­ and have them come up with a 39-minute TV script. In Stoppard and Exton’s concoction, two lexicographers 'of a certain age' are plagued by a series of misfortunes that turn their tidy world topsy-turvy. Packed full of ingenious puns, double entendres, word-play and pedantry, the plot hangs on two mysteries left hanging until the strands are interwoven in a hilarious surprise conclusion. The Boundary has all the earmarks of early Stoppard, written as it was soon after The Real Inspector Hound and Travesties.