Synopsis of Blood Brothers

BloodBrothers is a contemporary Rock musical that tells the tragic story of twin boys separated at birth -- one raised by the natural mother in poverty, the other by a wealthy couple. The story is narrated by a rather Mephistopholean character, and superstition plays a large part in the action of the play.

The poor mother, who already has a brood of children, is abandoned by her husband when she is pregnant. She discovers that she is expecting twins, and despairs of being able to provide for both. The wealthy woman by whom she is employed as a housekeeper desperately wants a child and has been unable to conceive. And as the wealthy woman's husband is away for 9 months, she asks to take one of the twins and pretends that she gave birth while he was away.

The adoptive mother becomes obsessed with the idea that the birth mother will reclaim the child; she fires the natural mother from the housekeeping job and orders her to stay away from the boy. Yet, as young children, the brothers meet and become best friends--"blood brothers" (though remaining ignorant of their true relationship). As they grow, they stay close, but each is envious of the other.

The twins ultimately fall in love with the same woman. The very different paths their lives have taken converge in this and in a prophesy which attends to twins separated at birth and ignorant of their kinship. The play opens with the tragic consequence of this convergence and of the prophesy; the rest is a flashback tracing how the characters ended up at that point.

The setting is a factory town in England--with interior scenes both in a slum dwelling and in a mansion; sets are suggestive rather than architecturally realistic.

The play begins in the mid-1950's, and spans approximately 25 years.

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