The Cement Garden

"I did not kill my father, but sometimes I felt I had helped him on his way. And but for the fact that it coincided with a landmark in my own physical growth, his death seemed insignificant compared with what followed. I am only including the little story of his death to explain how my sisters and I came to have such a large quantity of cement at our disposal."

In the relentless summer heat, four children retreat into an isolated world left to them by their parents and attempt to create their own version of a family. Ian McEwan's first novel, The Cement Garden, written in 1978, explores coming-of-age, burgeoning sexuality and the distortions of a fourteen-year-old mind.

David Aula and Jimmy Osborne's stage adaptation approaches the horror of the story through the innocent eyes of children, and encourages an audience to remember the games, irreverence, and shadows of their youth: to remember and reinvent their sense of invincibility.

The Cement Garden received its world premiere as part of Vault Festival Waterloo, on 28 January 2014.


About the Author

Jimmy Osborne's play Meat was staged at Theatre503 in June 2012 in a joint production by FallOut Theatre and Theatre503. He is one of the writers selected for the 4Screenwriting 2013 Programme run by Channel 4, developing an original serial for television. His short play, This is Jack, Leave a Message, Alright? won a national BBC Writersroom competition and has been performed in London and Sydney. Jimmy's collected short plays have recently been published as Transmission. He is a graduate of the Royal Court Theatre's Young Writers Programme.

David Aula is a director and an actor. He was educated at Cambridge University. His directing credits include Mummies and Daddies (White Bear Theatre, FallOut); Something/Nothing (The Colour House Theatre, Black and White Rainbow); An Oak Tree (ADC Theatre, FallOut); Three Sisters (ADC Theatre, ADC); Hamlet (European Tour, ETG); the first-ever stage adaptation of Ian McEwan's The Cement Garden (Judith E. WIlson Drama studio, FallOut) and After the End (Corpus Playrooms, FallOut). He was the Assistant Director to Simon Evans on Madness in Valencia (The White Bear and Trafalgar 2, Black and White Rainbow) and The Misanthrope (The White Bear, Black and White Rainbow). His acting credits include Alceste in The Misanthrope (The White Bear, Black and White Rainbow); Nostalgia (Alma Tavern, Bristol, directed by Anna Harpin), Hypnotist in An Oak Tree (ADC Theatre, FallOut); Tupolski in The Pillowman (ADC Theatre, FallOut, directed by Abigail Rokison); Polonius in Hamlet (European Tour, ETG), and Cornelius in Cymbeline (Cambridge Arts Theatre, Marlowe Society, directed by Sir Trevor Nunn).