←Recommendations of Nonsense and Beauty

An ode to love that speaks on so many levels of the differences between classes and between sexualities and age differences. Opposites attract they say and it's definitely true in the case or Morgan and Bob, but what exists between them transcends just a biographical tale of E,M. Forster and Bob Buckingham as they face the harsh realities of the day and age to cherish a love that each have for the other even after Bob marries May. Despite what the Christian mind-set teaches us, thinking outside those rigid boxes allowed them all to find beauty in the nonsense.

Nonsense and Beauty is perhaps the most apt way to define the word "love." How easy it is to sit to the side and see people's messy loves and think, "No, I could not." Yet I understand. Those people I have loved and do love, the feelings I have and all I would do for them, they aren't the choices that perhaps serve best. But they keep love close. They let me back in the nonsense and the beauty. I have a love I hope extends to forever and whose beautiful nonsense might end up in such a beautiful play.

A touching and simple story about E.M. Forster and the love of his life, kept under wraps because of society's strictures against homosexuality. Lovely, with excellent roles for actors.

A moving and powerful portrait of a beautiful deep love kept hidden due to oppression from society. Excellent work.

Nonsense And Beauty is the finest play that I have thus far read from the files of NPX, my admiration lubricated by tears in the later scenes. Mr.Sickles rendition of the everyday diction of E.M. Foster's world is superb, and his resurrection of theatrical asides as elegantly efficient Brechtian scene change notifiers is lovely. The play offers directors and lighting designers a thrilling challenge worthy of its dedicatee--Michael Montel, who is far and away the favorite director that I have designed for. Thank you Scott Sickles.

A true love story -- in all senses of the words -- is not all roses and rainbows. This beautiful work has passion and joy, heartache and devastating disappointment that anyone ever in love will know and feel, and for those who are yet to be in love it is a story worth knowing because it makes clear that the highs and lows are so worth it. Scott Sickles tells of the life and love of novelist E.M. Forster in a way that rises to the level of Forster's works: powerful, delicate, and enduring.

A moving, wonderfully theatrical and deeply humane rendering of the complexity and transcendence of love in the face of the mores of a different time. Filled with rich characterizations and vivid conflicts, mostly internal but clearly realized. A simply gorgeous work.

A wonderful period play about the complexity of love, beautifully written to capture the era and problems of love returned and rejected. A powerful piece that will move audiences to tears.

Wow! What a beautiful and engrossing period piece. Sickles manages to capture distinct senses of place, time, and character through dialogue that feels from another era but that is still economical and wonderfully paced. The love triangle between Forster, Bob, and May is extremely intriguing and well-executed, and the supporting characters colorful and honored with their own powerful arcs. I hope to see this staged soon!

What a gorgeous play, easily the most elegant, and passionate, of Scott Sickles' oeuvre. Simmering with a delicious sexual tension that never boils over into melodrama, this is a delicate but frank look at the mores of a different time, when "the love that dare not speak its name" spoke in many hidden ways, most of them unfulfilling to those speaking them, and the emotional toll it cost was devastating. As is "Nonsense and Beauty." Devastating, and achingly beautiful.