Bernard Mendillo

Irish Baseball Bernard Mendillo

IRISH BASEBALL is a comedy about a young woman who is beset by trials-who harkens to the memory of her father for guidance. The essential focus of the play is that "life is not measured by a series of perfect actions, but, rather, by a series of perfect efforts." Mary Sorrento is a research biologist trying to develop a test that will serve as an early warning for a childhood disease. It's not going well. She's running out of time-she's running out of her grant money. Her boyfriend, Bill Connors, shows up to say that he is leaving her. Then, her best friend Moira, who used to be the Sorrento's au pair, announces that the government wants to deport her. Mary turns to her father, John Sorrento-who appears out of the darkness in another space and time. They talk of many things: baseball, McDonald's, King Arthur. Through these conversations-and through flashbacks-Mary's past is revealed: which holds the answers to her life. There is the underlying story of how John Sorrento, a widower, invites his friend Jane to the house for dinner-and it ends in disaster. To set matters right, Moira and Mary conspire to use a game of baseball between the staff of John's newspaper and a bunch of young Irish kids to get John and Jane together again. Meanwhile, it's Bill, ironically, who can help Mary and Moira solve their problems. But Bill has been pushed away by Mary's ideal of the man her father was. It can all work itself out-but only if Mary learns the secret to her life.