Well, that brought back memories... I was up all night with a newborn baby in 2003 as American tanks rolled into Iraq.

I didn't have high hopes for this when I saw it was one of my set texts, but I thought it was excellent. It radiates anger and is (surprisingly? or not?) so relevant to current politics. I would really like to see this performed. ( )

Stuff Happens is a play by David Hare, written in response to the Iraq War. Hare describes it as "a history play" that deals with recent history. The title is inspired by Donald Rumsfeld's response to widespread looting in Baghdad: "Stuff happens and it’s untidy, and freedom’s untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things.” (April 11, 2003)

The play presents a mix of viewpoints, including arguments for and against the attack on Iraq. It mixes verbatim re-creations of real speeches, meetings, press conferences and fictionalized versions of private meetings between members of the Bush and Blair administrations. The play also includes international figures such as Hans Blix and Dominique de Villepin. An ensemble cast plays over 40 roles during the 3-hour play, although the actors playing the principals—Bush, Rice, Powell—play only one role.

In 2020, Andy Propst of Time Out dubbed Stuff Happens "one of the most impressive political dramas to emerge in recent memory" and ranked it the 30th greatest play of all time. (Wikipedia)

This is an intesting work of creative nonfiction, and fully of interesting and frightening nformation. It does come off moreso as a semi-documentary that is more worried about presenting facts than entertaining, but for someone interested in the Bush presidency, the surrounding politics, or the train of events that led to Iraq, this is worth reading. Most of the reader's or viewer's emotion comes not so much from the story as from the acknowledgement that, loosely, this very much happened as as given----which is frightening. Performing the play is problematic as you need actors and actresses who resemble the principle political personalities of the time, but as a read, it's a quick and worthwhile look into recent history, though admittedly liberal in approach. ( )

2 acts/24 sections