(Translation of Gamètes)

How do modern young women negotiate love, ambition, and reproduction? What are the lines we can never cross, not even for a friend? In this age of trolling and tribes and irreconcilable views, do we ultimately love our opinions more than we love each other? Acclaimed Québec writer Rébecca Déraspe tackles female friendship, sexuality and fertility, self-fulfillment, and other stuff that shouldn't be so damn funny, as Anne's pregnancy threatens her relationship with her lifelong friend Lou. This poetic yet no-holds-barred two-hander features virtuosic transformations as two actresses play both the BFFs and all the people who have shaped their lives over the years. Another comic triumph from the author of You Are Happy, Gametes won the Montreal critics’ prize for best new play of the 2016-17 season.

Cast Size: 2F

This translation was commissioned by Ruby Slippers Theatre and supported by a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts' Theatre International programme. It was developed at the Glassco Residency in Translation with the support of Playwrights Workshop Montreal, the Glassco family, and the Cole Foundation. A public reading, directed by Leanna Brodie, was presented by Ruby Slippers as part of the Advance Series of new work by women at the Vancouver Fringe Festival on Sept. 10, 2018.

"I really, really love this production...a tender and ferocious play, a play that presents two intelligent young women who are absolutely believable in their self-examination and disarray when life throws one of them a curveball. One of the few times I have ever seen an onstage representation of female friendship that is powerful and true." – Huffington Post

"Undeniably one of the most promising voices of the last decade" –revue.leslibraires.ca

"By presenting the views of strong women for whom motherhood is not a given, Rébecca Déraspe gives voice to a segment of the female sex which is rarely represented onstage." – labibleurbaine.com

"Tells the story of a moment of crisis between two fast friends, with sensitivity and humour." – Le Devoir

"...questions the inherent paradoxes of an age where we are defined by our opinions." – Voir

"GAMETES, a nuanced text on female fulfillment, examines the force and complexity of the friendships between women. In a society that continues to dream of equality between the sexes, Lou and Aude, two inseparable thirtysomethings, have no secrets from each other. But when one of them finds that she is carrying a baby with Down syndrome, it throws a spanner in the works. Intelligent, funny, and moving, the unifying feminism of GAMETES avoids the pitfals of pamphleteering to guide us from the intimate to the universal. GAMETES is a success." – Jury citation, Critics' Prize for Best New Montréal Play of 2016-17.

More information about Rébecca Déraspe, whose playsI Am William and You Are Happy are also available through this site..

LOU: Why don't you adopt?

ANNE: Because we don't have that kind of colonialist empathy, and because we want to have our child.

LOU: Your child?

ANNE: Yes.

LOU: Do you discuss your DNA while you're making love?

ANNE: Bye, Lou. Have a nice life.