Searching for Eden: the diaries of adam & eve

As one critic wrote about Searching for Eden: "In the beginning—and throughout the play—there was laughter. And the audience found it good." More than a hundred years after Mark Twain wrote his own short stories about Adam and Eve, James Still combines those stories for Act One of Searching for Eden, and then imagines Adam and Eve in the present day for Act Two to create this completely original and contemporary play about the world's first love story. Act One takes place at the dawn of time in the Garden of Eden. In the imaginations of Still and Twain, the Garden of Eden is a place where the battle of the sexes begins, where language is deliciously invented, and where loneliness and heartbreak are poignantly discovered. After intermission, we jump forward to the present day—but Adam and Eve have only aged into their 40s and are dealing with middle age and the distractions of high-power careers. Adam has surprised Eve with this trip back to Eden (a last-minute vacation package Adam found on the Internet) as an anniversary gift. The "first couple" returns to present-day Eden (now an upscale resort simply called "E") in an attempt to recapture the primal passions of their youth. While Act One is about childhood, discovery, and new love—Act Two is about middle age, rediscovery and trying to make old love new again. At its heart, Searching for Eden is about the pleasures and terrors of knowing one person—and being known by that person—for a long, long time.