NHB Modern Plays Little Wars

Set in the French Alps in 1940, this thrilling play – based on truth – is an enthralling, entertaining and ultimately moving portrait of seven exceptional women. A dinner party during the Second World War unites celebrated writers Agatha Christie, Lillian Hellman, Dorothy Parker, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas – with a mysterious guest. With copious booze flowing, acid-tongued barbs flying, and the threat of global conflict looming, the guests – and the world around them – are close to boiling point. Everyone has a confession. Someone has a secret. Set in the French Alps in 1940, Steven Carl McCasland’s Little Wars is an enthralling, entertaining and ultimately moving portrait of seven exceptional women – and a thrilling fiction based on truth. It was workshopped Off-Off-Broadway, first performed in 2015, and received an acclaimed digital premiere in 2020, featuring Linda Bassett, Sarah Solemani, Juliet Stevenson and Sophie Thompson. It provides glorious opportunities for an all-female cast to play some of the greatest literary figures of the twentieth century.