Snow on the Stand

Snow on the Stand is a one-act tragedy about a middle-aged man, bruised and battered by life, who wants to take possession of his childhood home, and the brother who’s determined to see him fail.

After the reading of their mother’s will, Harry, Eleanor, and Lance gather to sort out her bequest: the estate was left to the three of them equally. Harry, 50, whose life has been a series of failures and disappointments, wants to return to the house of his youth, which he sees as his birthright, and spend his old age there; Eleanor, 48, who lived there with her aging mother, wants to move on and resume the life she put on hold 10 years earlier, after their father died; Lance, 35, wants to sell the property for a killing to please his young wife, Kit, who is part vixen and part Lady Macbeth.

When Harry proposes to buy his siblings’ shares, Lance counters with a price well out of Harry’s range, based on a builder’s offer for the property, including a wooded area known as The Stand that Harry particularly loves — his cherry orchard. As each brother tries to win Eleanor to his side, and she resists following either one’s vision for her future, the family’s history is dredged up, revealing each character’s motivations and weaknesses. With all of their futures hanging in the balance, the mention of a casual cruelty from years earlier tips the scale.