ROBERT SCHENKKAN
| Nationality: | USA |
| Literary Agent: *: | |
| Email: | n/a |
| Website: |
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Plays by Robert Schenkkan
By The Waters |
| 1st Produced: | Oregon Shakespeare Festival | 2005 | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | - | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | I don't think the play has been published but you could try abebooks.com or the playwright direct where their email is shown at the top of the page | |||||
| Genre: | - | Drama | Parts: | Male | - | Female | 0 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | Catherine is a widow and gossiped about due to the circumstances surrounding her husband's death. She employs Arturo a Cuban refugee as a gardener who comes with his own problems from the past. | |||||
Conversations With The Spanish Lady |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in Four One-Act Plays by Robert Schenkkan, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Play | One Act | Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | a sleepless old railroad man describes hauling trains full of the dead across Canada during the World War I home-front plague of influenza that killed thousands of people. As he defends his life, a Spanish lady, cloaked in white, hovers over him as a spectral visitor. | |||||
Courtship Of Morning Star, The |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in The Kentucky Cycle, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Drama | One Act | Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | part of the Kentucky Cycle | |||||
| Synopsis: | 1776. Into the hut built on his homestead, Rowen takes a wife by kidnapping Morning Star, a young Indian girl whose tribe has been ravaged by smallpox. To keep her from escaping, he cuts the tendon of her leg. Although she hates Rowen, she loves the child she bears for him, believing the baby to be a true son of her lost people, for whom she mourns the rest of her life. | |||||
Derelict |
| 1st Produced: | Studio Arena Theater, Buffalo, New York | 1982 | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | - | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | I don't think the play has been published but you could try abebooks.com or the playwright direct where their email is shown at the top of the page | |||||
| Genre: | - | - | Parts: | Male | - | Female | 0 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | - | |||||
Devil and Daniel, The |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | Plays For Young Audiences, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | - | Drama | Parts: | Male | 17 | Female | 3 |
| Parts Other: | extras | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | Jabez sells his soul to the Devil. After seven years of prosperity the Devil turns up wanting the soul. But Jabez hires lawyer Daniel Webster who takes the Devil to court | |||||
Dream Thief |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | - | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | I don't think the play has been published but you could try abebooks.com or the playwright direct where their email is shown at the top of the page | |||||
| Genre: | - | Childrens play | Parts: | Male | - | Female | 0 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | When their father becomes ill his children Jamie and Susan are convinced someone has stolen his dreams. | |||||
Final Passages |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatists Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | - | Play/Drama | Parts: | Male | 7 | Female | 1 |
| Parts Other: | flexible | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | In 1878, while sailing off the coast of Nova Scotia, the Elizabeth Watson sights the San Christobal, apparently abandoned. When a boarding party climbs aboard, however, they find the San Christobal's cargo intact as well as the remains of the ship's crew and passengers. They also find a diary belonging to a cabin boy. Reading the diary reveals life on board the ship and the incidents leading to the tragic end of the crew and passengers. Tom, the cabin boy, tried all his life to please others, trying hardest to please Lieutenant Brand, his surrogate father since Tom was orphaned as a boy. On this last trip, the San Christobal carried a mysterious Countess, with whom Tom was enchanted. Lt. Brand is also enchanted with this elusive and intoxicating woman and has an affair with her aboard ship. Tom finds out about the affair, which upsets him, yet then, the Countess takes Tom to bed too, confusing him even more. The Countess, regretting her momentary lapse with Tom, goes to Lt. Brand and accepts his proposal of marriage. The wedding takes place without Tom and unable to deal with this rejection, Tom puts rat poison in the wine and kills everyone on board, then disappears. The captain of the Elizabeth Watson is transfixed with the mystery of the story of the San Christobal, and the true ghost story told by the ghost of Tom. | |||||
Fire In The Hole |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in The Kentucky Cycle, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Drama | One Act | Parts: | Male | 14 | Female | 6 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | part of the Kentucky Cycle | |||||
| Synopsis: | 1920. Its coal tipple standing where once there were trees, the Blue Star Mining Company owns the valley. If coal is king, the people of the town are peasants, working like slaves in dangerous mines, paid in script, indebted to the Blue Star for life. Mary Ann Rowen, married to Tommy Jackson, has buried 4 sons and does not want to see her only remaining boy go into the mines. A stranger, Abe Steinman, tries to organize the miners into a union, but is betrayed by Mary Ann's husband during the strike. Abe is hanged and the miners lose heart. Spurning her husband, Mary Ann takes her son Joshua and leads the miners to victory | |||||
God's Great Supper |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in The Kentucky Cycle, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Drama | One Act | Parts: | Male | 12 | Female | 3 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | part of the Kentucky Cycle | |||||
| Synopsis: | 1861. The Rowen family has worked hard and long as poor sharecroppers, their land now owned by Richard Talbert, an arrogant aristocrat and son of Jeremiah. Patrick, now 86 and disabled by a stroke, lives in poverty with the pious Zeke and his family. Richard Talbert convinces Zeke's son, Jed, to join him in fighting with the Confederacy. But Jed, loyal to settling his family's account, murders Richard on the battlefield, and is ushered into the horrors of the Civil War. When Jed returns with his fellow deserters, they burn and destroy the Talbert place, killing the children, slaves and animals, leaving alive only the two Talbert women to witness the slaughter | |||||
Handler |
| 1st Produced: | 2000 | |||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | ISBN/ASIN | - | ||||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | 115-125 min | Drama | Parts: | Male | 7 | Female | 4 |
| Parts Other: | 7 males, 4 females (9-14 actors possible: 6-8 males, 3-6 females) | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | The rural South. Present day. Geordi has just been released from prison. He and his wife, Terri, a member of the Holiness Way sect, struggle to re-build their marriage. One night in service, Geordi handles snakes for the first time and is bitten in the throat and dies. Three days later, before the astonished eyes of the congregation, Geordi resurrects. What happened to Geordi? Who gets saved? Who gets forgiven? | |||||
Heaven On Earth |
| 1st Produced: | 1989 | |||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatists Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Comedy Drama | Comedy | Parts: | Male | 4 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | Bobby lives with his maternal grandmother, Martha, in Waylon, Texas, where not much goes on and work is hard to come by. Martha has worked for thirty years in the local beauty shop, and has raised Bobby since her daughter and son-in-law's death in a car accident, which Bobby, as a young boy, survived. Even after he'd grown and moved away, Bobby would return to Martha after each financial failure and drunken stupor. But it was always a tough living arrangement since Martha maintained incredible optimism and total belief in God, and Bobby rejected religion, was always pessimistic and remained angry over his parents' death. Bobby's latest business adventure has him set up a used appliance shop right on Martha's front lawn—used appliances and paraphernalia litter the yard. The business goes nowhere, sending Bobby into another tailspin and more fights with Martha over whether God will help him through another tough time. After taking a part-time job as a guard—and getting fired from it—Bobby challenges Martha to a duel: If God produces a miracle in twentyfour hours, he will change his ways; if not, Martha must give up religion. Within just a few minutes, the face of Jesus appears on one of the abandoned refrigerators. Martha's good friend Jesse witnesses it but also knows it's not a real miracle. She keeps quiet while watching Bobby parade the phenomenon and market it like crazy. Martha, at first delighted by her very own miracle, becomes increasingly upset as she looses her job, and any sense of privacy, to the mobs and the cameras. Jessie finally calls Bobby's bluff and turns off her porch light—the real reason the face appeared, coupled with some well-placed trees. Bobby's trumped-up world collapses, but with a little help from a stranger and Martha's regained world, Bobby sheds some of his anger, Martha relaxes in her views and they come together with a better understanding that believing in themselves and each other will make their lives full again. | |||||
Homecoming, The |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in The Kentucky Cycle, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Drama | One Act | Parts: | Male | 3 | Female | 3 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | part of the Kentucky Cycle | |||||
| Synopsis: | 1792. Michael Rowen returns home from Louisville with news that Kentucky has become a state and with a young black slave woman he has bought with the idea of breeding a second family. Morning Star fears his treachery, remembering when he took their infant daughter and buried her alive because he didn't want a girl. Morning Star warns Patrick, now a young man who wants to marry Rebecca Talbert, the daughter of their neighbor Joe Talbert, that Michael will never give him the family land. Enraged, Patrick murders Michael just before the Talberts arrive. Joe Talbert, in love with Morning Star, refuses to overlook the crime. Patrick then kills him, banishes his mother from the homestead, and marries the dead man's daughter. | |||||
Intermission |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in Four One-Act Plays by Robert Schenkkan, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Play | One Act | Parts: | Male | 4 | Female | 0 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | During INTERMISSION, in the star's dressing room, on a disastrous opening night, old debts are settled while love and power vie for a place on the bill. | |||||
Kentucky Cycle, the |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatists Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Short Plays | One Act | Parts: | Male | 14 | Female | 6 |
| Parts Other: | flexible, doubling | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | Winner of the 1992 Pulitzer Prize. This sweeping epic of three families in eastern Kentucky spans 200 years of American history from 1775 to 1975. Fast-paced and finely drawn, Schenkkan's stunning six-hour, nine-play cycle examines the myths of the American past which have created, for better or for worse, the country we are today. "There are nine plays in all—each written with the kind of impassioned economy that immediately evokes memories of Sophocles and Euripides, short, taut, bloody actions that sparingly recreate the evil, mayhem, and retribution which permeates each of these two turbulent evenings." —TheaterWeek. "…as vast and bold as the emerging nation itself." —Variety. | |||||
Lewis and Clark Reach the Euphrates |
| 1st Produced: | - | 2005 | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | - | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | I don't think the play has been published but you could try abebooks.com or the playwright direct where their email is shown at the top of the page | |||||
| Genre: | - | - | Parts: | Male | - | Female | 0 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | - | |||||
Lunch Break |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in Four One-Act Plays by Robert Schenkkan, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Play | One Act | Parts: | Male | 2 | Female | 0 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | At LUNCH BREAK, two strangers strike up a lunchtime conversation in the park that will leave both of them changed forever | |||||
Marriage of Miss Hollywood and King Neptune, The |
| 1st Produced: | University Of Texas At Austin (Austin, TX, United States) | 2005 | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | ISBN/ASIN | - | ||||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | 110-130 min | Comedy | Parts: | Male | 13 | Female | 5 |
| Parts Other: | 13 males, 5 females (18-30 actors possible: 13-20 males, 4-10 females) | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | Hollywood, 1929. Sly-as-a-fox talent agent Manny Weisenberg has got a problem. Several. His biggest client, Bob "Whiplash" McCord -- a British classical actor trapped playing a silent cowboy hero -- wants out of his contract. Manny's girlfriend Cherie, an aspiring actress, wants out of LA. And local gangster Joey Bananas wants to break Manny's legs for default of certain debts. Manny's solution is to create the greatest seaside pageant ever seen: "The Marriage of Miss Hollywood and King Neptune." A screwball comedy a la Kaufman and Hart, set against the backdrop of early Hollywood and classic LA political corruption. | |||||
Masters Of The Trade |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in The Kentucky Cycle, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Drama | One Act | Parts: | Male | 9 | Female | 0 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | part of the Kentucky Cycle | |||||
| Synopsis: | 1775. Michael Rowen, an indentured servant from Ireland, watched his wife and children massacred by Indians. Determined to survive in the hostile wilderness of Eastern Kentucky, he swindles an old trapper, murders an innocent boy and sets up gun trade with the Indians. They give him land he craves with a warning that it is haunted; in return, Rowen promises more gunpowder and gives them blankets tainted with smallpox. Clutching a gold watch stolen from the dead trapper, Rowen sets in motion a legacy of corruption that will curse his valley and its people for generations to come | |||||
Survivalist, The |
| 1st Produced: | - | |||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in Four One-Act Plays by Robert Schenkkan, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Play | One Act | Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | 0 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | - | |||||
| Synopsis: | Calvin Renner is THE SURVIVALIST, a "survival engineer," a doomsday prophet/profiteer with a very special pitch for surviving the twentieth century. Don't be the last on your block. | |||||
Tell Tales |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in The Kentucky Cycle, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Drama | One Act | Parts: | Male | 3 | Female | 3 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | part of the Kentucky Cycle | |||||
| Synopsis: | 1890. Greed and deceit catch up with Jed Rowen in the guise of JT Wells, a storyteller who arrives one day to flirt with Mary Anne, Jed's pretty young daughter. After charming the Rowen family with his stories, JT convinces Jed to sell the mineral rights to his land. When Mary Anne saves JT's life, he gives her back the deed, telling her the mining company will strip and ruin the land. Mulish and defiant, Jed refuses to tear up the deed and JT's direst predictions for the beautiful valley come to pass. | |||||
Ties That Bind |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in The Kentucky Cycle, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Drama | One Act | Parts: | Male | 8 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | part of the Kentucky Cycle | |||||
| Synopsis: | 1819. Patrick Rowen, as land hungry as his father before him, fights desperately to keep his land before a corrupt judge about to foreclose on the property. As his sons, Zeke and Zach, watch in horror, Patrick trades off everything he possesses to a stranger who holds the note on the land. When he offers to sell the slave, Sally, and her son, Jessie, Sally pleads for her son, revealing that he is in fact Patrick's brother. Even this does not stop Patrick from sacrificing Jessie. When he has given up everything, the stranger introduces himself as Jeremiah Talbert, the brother of Patrick's dead wife. With him is Morning Star, who has helped wreak revenge on her only son. Outraged, Zach leaves his father, never to return. Patrick is left alone with Zeke, to work as a sharecropper on the land he has lost. | |||||
War On Poverty, The |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in The Kentucky Cycle, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Drama | One Act | Parts: | Male | 5 | Female | 0 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | part of the Kentucky Cycle | |||||
| Synopsis: | 1975. At the original Rowen homestead, Franklin Biggs, James Talbert Winston and Joshua Rowen have gathered with guns and liquor to hunt a wolf rumored to be in the region. They discover an old grave with a beaded buckskin cover with the remains of a baby. Joshua Rowen, ousted from his union post, an embarrassment to his friends, and with his many losses, has finally recognized the tragic flaws that have plagued his family for 200 years. His remorse for the greed and stupidity that have stripped the land of its bounty and his family of any legacy, leads him to give the baby a proper burial, placing beside her the gold watch stolen by the first Rowen two centuries ago. As he kneels beside the grave, all of the dead Rowens rise up behind him, and the curse is put to rest at last. | |||||
Which Side Are You On? |
| 1st Produced: | - | - | ||||
| Company: | - | |||||
| 1st Published: | in The Kentucky Cycle, Dramatist Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN | - | |||
| To Buy This Play: | If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies | |||||
| Genre: | Drama | One Act | Parts: | Male | 11 | Female | 2 |
| Parts Other: | - | |||||
| Notes: | part of the Kentucky Cycle | |||||
| Synopsis: | 1954. Joshua Rowen has grown powerful and prosperous as head of UMW local, the union his mother founded. At a farewell party for his only son, Scott, who is going to Washington, D.C. to work at union headquarters, Joshua has gathered together his cronies to celebrate. They include James Talbert Winston, the owner of the mine, Franklin Biggs, a successful black businessman, the county judge and the sheriff. When Joshua cuts a deal with these men to insure his re-election as union chief, his compromising of the miner's safety leads to an explosion and the death of his son | |||||