Nurse:
Works with Dr. Dysart at the psychiatric Hospital. She is a go-between Alan and Dr.
Dysart.
Harry Dalton:
Owner of the stable that Alan and Jill work at.
Alan works here on the weekends
mucking stalls.
He believes Alan belongs in prison for his crime against the horses.
Horseman:
A man Alan met on the beach as a child.
He puts Alan on a horse for the first time.
Nugget:
A Horse in Harry Dalton’s stable.
Alan feels a strong connection to this horse.
To him,
Nugget is the horse god “Equus”.
4.
Who is Equus – Equus is latin for horse.
Alan sees horses as a representative of god.
In his mind
the horse Nugget is Equus.
He becomes erotically fixated on Nugget.
He desires to pet their
coats, feel their muscular bodies, and smell their sweat.
He takes Nugget on secret midnight
rides while Alan is naked and barebacked.
He envisions himself sitting on a ‘god’ while
destroying their enemies.
5.
Realistic Play Elements

The play is told by the point of view of a singular narrator to the audience, Dr. Martin Dysart.
He
uses monologues, both long and short, to inform the audience what is happening.
The speeches
are eloquent, almost poetic.
The dialogue between the characters is harsh.
The characters are
realistic and defined by their environment.
This play uses expressionism.
This includes:
the
chorus of horses, the sounds they make, the lights going black.
There are no scenery changes.
The actors do not leave the stage, but simply watch the action.
6.
Speech -
Page 98 Dysart
(Crying out.)
All right!
I’ll take it away!
He’ll be delivered from madness.
What then
? He’ll feel
himself acceptable!
What then?
Do you think feelings like this can be simply re-attached like
Band-Aids? Stuck on to other objects we select
Look at him
!...My desire might be make this boy
an ardent husband-a caring citizen-a worshipper of abstract and unifying God.
My achievement,
however is more likely to make a ghost!...Let me tell you exactly what I’m going to do to him!(
He
steps out o the square and walks around the Upstage end of it, storming at the audience
.)
I’ll
heal the rash on his body.
I’ll erase the welts cut into his mind by the lying manes.
When that’s
done, I’ll set him on a metal scooter and send him puttering off into the concrete world and he’ll
never touch hide again!


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- Summer '17
- Dysart, Alan Strang