Every Good Boy Deserves Favour

Set in 1970’s Soviet Union Russia, Tom Stoppard’s Every Good Boy Deserves Favour marries music with politics as two men, coincidentally both sharing the name Alexander Ivanov, find themselves also sharing the same cell in a mental institution. One Ivanov, a genuine lunatic, believes he is the conductor of an orchestra and spends his days with a triangle rod commanding “invisible” musicians. The other Alexander, a political dissident, has been arrested by the Soviet government for “anti-social” slander against the restrictive regime. The drama springs from Sacha, Alexander’s likewise rebellious but confused son, who can’t understand why the imposing and distant government has stripped him of his father.