I have a certain amount of healthy suspicion for plays best-known for being banned.
What was too unspeakably controversial to be staged in - in this instance - 1907,
tends to have lost its shock value by now, and all too often what's left without it
would have been long-since forgotten under normal circumstances. It seems to have
been a combination of themes of abortion, suicide, and corruption at the highest
levels of power that kept
Waste off the stage until 1936. Harley Granville
Barker's play about political scandal sees the Conservative Party win a General
Election, with a mandate that requires them to pass a law separating Church from
State. It's not a job anyone in the party actually wants so the new Prime Minister,
Horsham (Michael Elwyn) takes the unusual step of inviting Independent MP Henry
Trebell (Charles Edwards) to join his cabinet with particular responsibility for
drafting and passing the disestablishment bill.
