Back to Methuselah – In the Beginning and The Gospel of the Family Barnabas

The Washington Stage Guild continues its Season of Dreams with the start of a three-year dramatic extravaganza that will culminate in the company’s 30th anniversary! Back to Methuselah, a cycle of plays by George Bernard Shaw that takes us from Adam and Eve meeting the Serpent in the Garden of Eden to a world 30,000 years in the future, is subtitled “a Metabiological Pentateuch.” Rarely produced because of its expansive proportions,the five parts of Back to Methuselah will be presented in three annual installments, with the first two, In the Beginning (BC 4004) and The Gospel of the Family Barnabas (present day) this season. Back to Methuselah is a visionary, fantastic masterwork that examines humanity’s failings, from moral to political, and posits “Creative Evolution” as the solution. The various parts– whether fable, drawing room comedy, farce, or fantasy– add up to what is considered one of the first theatrical works of science fiction.