Iris Trimble is trying to hold it all together. She may very well fly off the face of the earth if she doesn’t hang on to the kitchen counter. At least that’s how she feels after her mother, Bernice, a lively, recently widowed fifty-five-year-old breaks the news that she has early onset Alzheimer’s. In an effort to cope with the stress, Iris makes her mother’s famous Everything-That-Is-Bad-For-You casserole, a childhood favourite. Her siblings, on the other hand, are on opposite sides of the spectrum: Sara, the eldest, irately calls for a second opinion, while Peter, the youngest, seems completely unfazed. As for Bernice, she’s still as vivacious as ever, always up for a good laugh, and, most of all, ready to finally put herself first.

The Gravitational Pull of Bernice Trimble is about the tricky nature of family dynamics, and the effects of mental illness seen through the eyes of a young woman who’s searching for her own feelings amidst the whirlwind emotions of her family.

Beth Graham is a playwright and an actor. She was a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Drama in 2015 for her play The Gravitational Pull of Bernice Trimble. Other plays include Icarus Air, Working It Out, and A Life in the Day. Other collaborations include The Drowning Girls, written with Charlie Tomlinson and Daniela Vlaskalic, Mules, and The Last Train, both written with Daniela Vlaskalic. Beth is a graduate of the University of Alberta’s BFA acting program. She lives in Edmonton.

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• Short-listed, Governor General's Literary Award for Drama

"Honest, revealing and darkly funny." —BroadwayWorld

"Exceptionally well written. The storytelling is intense, poignant, and exceptionally nuanced." —Winna Tse, Charlebois Post