Nigel Planer

"The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, 1508: the blockbuster project of the Renaissance world. But this time the Pope has surely backed a loser: the man he's put in charge is simply not up to the job - a temperamental sculptor with next to no experience of painting. He didn't even want the job in the first place and has never done anything remotely on this scale. He's all over the place - when, that is, he even deigns to turn up for work." "So who has to cover for him? Who has to put in the hours, teach him his craft, patch up his mistakes and get the job done right - like any big project, it's the little guys, the professionals, the men who've been doing this kind of thing all their lives. There' re the ones that are actually going to have to make it happen ... As for gratitude, they'll be lucky if he even remembers to pay them." "On the Ceiling by Nigel Planer, starring Ron Cook and Ralf Little, opened at Birmingham Rep before transferring to the West End."--Jacket.

"Deep in the Polynesian islands of the Pacific Ocean, hungry spirits circle the homes of writer Robert Louis Stevenson and artist Paul Gauguin who lived and died on the islands only a few years apart. Stevenson has spent thirty years in rigorous combat with the Grim Reaper, but is he finally ready to concede defeat? Gauguin has bought rum, arsenic and morphine for his suicide cocktail and is certain he'll be damned if they give him a Catholic burial in consecrated ground. As their final hours approach, they face the eternal question: is it how we prepare for death that really governs the way we live?"--Back cover.