A gorgeously written imagining of the friendship and romance between Marlowe, Shakespeare, and Emilia Bassano. The script weaves together artistic passion, political intrigue, and forbidden love with language worthy of its subjects. This script will appeal to history buffs and causal theatre goers alike.

A polished, multilayered, and delightful reimagining which has Shakespeare, Kit Marlowe and The Dark Lady as a polyamorous throuple in London. Political intrigue, conflicting agendas, and forces beyond their control act upon the three loving people who just want to be together and create. McClain deftly shifts between intrigue, comedy, and romance with a great eye for detail, an ear for dialogue that is period-seeming but not contrived-sounding, and an assured sense of pace and tone.

We have heard this story before: who really inspired and wrote Shakespeare's plays? Many theories abound: some are outlandish (the Klingons), some are dryly scholarly; maybe it was just Shakespeare alone. That doesn't mean that a stylish and well-crafted tale with intriguing and fully-drawn characters can't be told. Emily McClain's deft, witty, and fast-paced drama with true consideration for both history and informed speculation -- not to mention a certain amount of sex appeal -- makes the case that another shadowy figure had a hand in them. In the reading at Valdez, it was a fun and heartfelt play.