‘In the Next Room’ goes up Feb. 17

The Cornell College theatre department is presenting “In the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play)” on Feb. 17, 18 and 24, 25 at 7:30 p.m. and Feb. 26 at 2 p.m. in Kimmel Theatre. For tickets contact the Box Office at 319-895-4293.

The show was written by Sarah Ruhl and is directed by Saffron Henke. A 2010 Pulitzer Prize finalist and Tony nominee for Best Play, Sarah Ruhl’s provocative and sometimes tender comedy is set in the 1880s—a time when doctors believed that “hysterical” women (and men) could be treated with vibrators, and electricity was a brand new technology.

The play finds a Victorian-era doctor in New York championing the effects of this new electronic device, while in the adjoining room, the doctor’s wife is yearning for a different kind of intimacy. “In the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play)” is a sex comedy with a head on its shoulders and a heart on its sleeve.