Ben Elton

SEMI DETACHED. If the end of the world is nigh, then surely it's only sensible to make alternative arrangements. All he cares is that his movie gets made and that there's somebody left to see it. In marketing terms the end of the world will be very big.

One house. Ten contestants. Thirty cameras. Forty microphones.Yet again the public gorges its voyeuristic appetite as another group of unknown and unremarkable people submit themselves to the brutal exposure of the televised real-life soap opera, House Arrest.Everybody knows the rules: total strangers are forced to live together while the rest of the country watches them do it. Who will crack first? Who will have sex with whom? Who will the public love and who will they hate? All the usual questions. And then, suddenly, there are some new ones.Who is the murderer? How did he or she manage to kill under the constant gaze of the thirty television cameras? Why did they do it? And who will be next?

And given that the average IVF cycle has about a one in five chance of going into full production, Lucy's chances of getting what she wants are considerably better than Sam's. What Sam and Lucy are about to go through is absolutely inconceivable.

It's two fifteen a.m., you're in bed alone and you're woken by the phone.Your eyes are wide and your body tense before it has completed so much as a single ring. And as you wake, in the tiny moment between sleep and consciousness, you know already that something is wrong.Only someone bad would call at such an hour. Or someone good, but with bad news, which would probably be worse.You lie there in the darkness and wait for the answer machine to kick in. Your own voice sounds strange as it tells you that nobody is there but that a message can be left.You feel your heart beat. You listen. And then you hear the one voice in the world you least expect . . . your very own Blast From the Past.

Ben Elton's plays in one volume for the first time Gasping: "...an often hilarious satire on yuppiedom, advertising and corporate greed" (Daily Telegraph); "...the sharpest futuristic comedy since Henceforward, and the best Green comedy since The Good Life was young."(Financial Times). Silly Cow: "It has an ingenious plot...another perfect occasion for a Ben Elton satire on the modern world..." (Financial Times). Popcorn: "An enjoyable, intelligent, thought-provoking play" (Independent); "It thrills on stage precisely because it adopts the sick humour, sickening violence and downright sexiness of the Stone-Tarantino school of film-making that Elton is satirising" (Evening Standard).

Set in the Beverly Hills home of Oscar winning movie director Bruce Delamitri, Popcorn is a satirical comedy thriller with the firepower of a hit squad. When notorious killers Wayne and Scout interrupt Bruce's passionate introduction to Brooke Daniels, a nude model and actress, they want more than an autograph from their cinematic idol. Wayne intends to use Bruce's "art" as justification for murder. Events are disrupted by the arrival of Bruce's soon to be ex wife and spoiled teenage daughter and his producer. However, Wayne means to succeed whatever the cost.5 women, 4 men

Doris Wallace, bitchy queen of the tabloid press, is on the verge of a glorious venture in TV. She's not going to let anything get in her way, not even the "silly cow" suing her for libel. Any skeletons she may have in her cupboard are, like her bondage gear, firmly locked up - or so she thinks.

A satire on big business, the media and product exploitation. Designer air proves to be the marketing phenomenon of the decade, but as demand outstrips supply, Lockheart Industries plunders the Third World for resources. The world is starting to gasp, and only the biggest suckers survive.