Directed by Arun Welandawe-Prematilleke

Commissioned by the Young Presidents’ Organisation (YPO) of Sri Lanka in 2015.

Cast: Tracy Holsinger, Tehani Chitty, Rajinda Jayasinghe, Shanaka Amarasinghe and Tanuja Perera

Our show takes place in 1920s Ceylon. Under British rule, the island and its capital, Colombo have become a playground for a particular brand of the rich and powerful. People come to the small island to get away from their pasts and rebuild themselves in whatever image they please. Colombo allows solace to those disillusioned by the bright lights of home and provides a new escape. These lost souls look for meaning in whatever comes their way, desperate for a reason to exist. This yearning leads them to The Secret Order of the Golden Dawn, a society devoted to the study and practice of the occult and paranormal activities.

 This evening the Order is meeting at Zelda Fayre’s house. Zelda is the wife of an author and herself has been many things; actress, dancer, writer, painter, trophy. She is known both for her staunch belief in the mysticism of the East and for throwing a soiree like no one else can. Tonight Zelda presides over her closest circle of friends: luminaries such as Captain Aleister Fawcett, Edith Crowley and the renowned occultist Madame Blavatsky. They have gathered to meet a gentlemen of some interest. A mystic, an inventor, a doctor and a native; the gentlemen has taken Zelda’s eye and possibly her heart.

His mere presence rankles some members of the group, but the secrets he holds are too intoxicating to even the harshest cynic.

On this night, this young man will expose truths that have long lain dormant, shifting the delicate balance of the Order until it suffers irrevocable damage. He also has designs of his own, or rather a design of his own. An invention that he believes could change the world, make him rich and provide a passage out of Ceylon. He needs just one thing to complete it, and that he plans to find it tonight at the meeting of the Order of the Golden Dawn.