(This article is about the stage play. For the French film adaptation, see Private Fears in Public Places (film).) Private Fears in Public Places is a 2004 play by British playwright Alan Ayckbourn. The bleakest play written by Ayckbourn for many years, it intimately follows a few days in the lives of six characters, in four tightly-interwoven stories through 54 scenes. In 2006, it was made into a film Cœurs, directed by Alain Resnais.