
The Playwrights Database
ADRIANO SHAPLIN
Nationality:
USA
email:
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Website:
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Literary Agent:
United Talent Agency UK representative
Curtis Brown Group Ltd
Adriano Shaplin is a co-founder of the internationally acclaimed Riot Group and has served as the company's resident playwright since 1997. He is the author of numerous plays for the company including Pugilist Specialist (2003), Victory at the Dirt Palace (2002), and Wreck the Airline Barrier (1999), all of which received the coveted Scotsman Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. In 2004, Mr. Shaplin collaborated with Philadelphia's award-winning Pig Iron Theater Company to create Hell Meets Henry Halfway, adapted from Witold Gombrowicz's The Possessed.His plays have been performed all over the world and he is published internationally by Oberon Books. Shaplin is currently under commission with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Soho Theatre + Writer's Centre. He lives in New York.
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Freedom Club
Synopsis:
Freedom Club is a savage comedy about the delirium and danger in American extremism.Freedom Club moves from a dream-play involving Abraham Lincoln and assassin John Wilkes Booth to Virginia, 2015, where a determined group of self-styled extremists are trying to become more radical.
- nytheatre.com
Notes:
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1st Produced:
Company:
New Paradise Laboratories and The Riot Group
1st Published:
- -
Music:
-
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If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
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Genre:
75 min Comedy
Parts:
Male: 4  Female: 3  Other: -
Further Reference:
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Hearts Of Man
Synopsis:
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Notes:
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1st Produced:
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Company:
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1st Published:
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Music:
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To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
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Genre:
Play/Drama
Parts:
Male: -  Female: -  Other: -
Further Reference:
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Hell Meets Henry Halfway
Synopsis:
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Notes:
Original Playwright - Witold Gombrowicz. Adapted by Adriano Shaplin in collaboration with Pig Iron Theatre Company from Possessed
1st Produced:
Company:
Pig Iron Theatre Company
1st Published:
- -
Music:
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To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
Adaptation
Parts:
Male: -  Female: -  Other: -
Further Reference:
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Pugilist Specialist
Synopsis:
Four highly trained U.S. Marines are assigned the task of eliminating a Middle-Eastern leader. A microphone records their conversations as they meet, receive briefings, travel, and finally attempt to execute a modern political assassination. At the center of the mission is a female explosives expert with a bad reputation for following the rules.
Notes:
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1st Produced:
Company:
The Riot Group
1st Published:
Playscripts, Inc - New York -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
70-80 min Play/Drama
Parts:
Male: 3  Female: 1  Other: 3 males, 1 female
Further Reference:
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Sophie Gets the Horns
Synopsis:
Sophie Gets the Horns is a play about young artists, fatal rivalries, sexual warfare and suicidal depression. Set in the mid-'90s at an elite liberal arts college, Sophie Gets the Horns tells the story of a collision between four students and a young professor and an event that changes all their lives. At once autobiographical and fantastical, Sophie Gets the Horns explores hallucinogenic mischief, the anxiety of influence, sexual experimentation and the ghost of Sylvia Plath. The play is The Riot Groups tenth full-length work and is inspired, in part, by real events surrounding the formation of the company.
- nytheatre.com
Notes:
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1st Produced:
Company:
The Riot Group
1st Published:
- -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
Play/Drama
Parts:
Male: 2  Female: 3  Other: -
Further Reference:
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Switch Triptych
Synopsis:
The play is set in New York in 1919. This is a time of change following a war. In the telephone exchange where the action takes place, a more radical change is coming in the form of the Strogen, an automated switchboard that will make the triptych of operators (looking much more creations of Francis Bacon than the renaissance) redundant in their own mini industrial revolution. he exploration of their reactions encompasses a picture of New York, an investigation of the battle between the sexes in a patriarchal society where the men are weak, individuality versus unionisation and in a mysterious way, a look at religion.
Notes:
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1st Produced:
Company:
The Riot Group
1st Published:
Music:
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To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
Play/Drama
Parts:
Male: 2  Female: 3  Other: -
Further Reference:
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Tragedy Of Thomas Hobbes, The
The Tragedy of Thomas Hobbes charts the revolution in philosophical thinking that took place during the seventeenth century. The play celebrates the growth of public scientific demonstrations at a time when, under Cromwell (and less than thirty years after Shakespeare's death) the theatres were closed. Against this backdrop of civil war and social upheaval, science became the new theatre and philosophy a new faith
Notes:
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1st Produced:
Wilton's Music Hall, London 2008
Company:
RSC
1st Published:
Music:
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To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
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Genre:
Play/Drama
Parts:
Male: 14  Female: 1  Other: -
Further Reference:
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Victory At The Dirt Palace
Synopsis:
The two most popular news broadcasters in the nation are father and daughter working for rival networks. Their vicious battle for supremacy becomes a national drama as sex scandals, terrorism, and dementia threaten both their careers. Loosely based on King Lear, Victory At The Dirt Palace is a vicious, witty avant-drama about primetime royalty and corruption.
Notes:
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1st Produced:
Company:
The Riot Group
1st Published:
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
Play/Drama
Parts:
Male: 2  Female: 2  Other: -
Further Reference:
-

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Why I Want to Shoot Ronald Reagan
Synopsis:
A multi-layered meditation on political assassination and pre-millenial tension, Why I Want to Shoot Ronald Reagan uses the life and writings of John Hinkley Jr. to explore the intersections of fame and obsession which compose the American media landscape.
Notes:
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1st Produced:
- 1998
Company:
The Riot Group
1st Published:
- -
Music:
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To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
-
Parts:
Male: -  Female: -  Other: -
Further Reference:
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Wreck The Airline Barrier
Synopsis:
Steve, Stone, and Sarah are three peppy Americans who meet each other on a passenger flight to Spain. They each say goodnight to their kids on their mobile phones, share their fears of flying while waiting in the departure lounge, then board their flight (where the meal choices are "chicken or egg"). Later on, the plane will crash. . ..Wreck the Airline Barrier is a quick-witted and brutal indictment of new-age conservatism and middle-class race evasion, performed with religious intensity by three actors who occupy a dizzying array of characters and voices.
Notes:
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1st Produced:
- 1999
Company:
The Riot Group
1st Published:
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
-
Parts:
Male: -  Female: -  Other: -
Further Reference:
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Zero Yard, The
Synopsis:
A dark and illegible tour-de-force on political and sexual domination. Set inside a prison, The Zero Yard details the struggle of a young female inmate against the structures of institutional terror. Locked amongst hardened criminals and sociopathic guards, she must translate the dense layers of violence and decode the prison mythology in order to survive her stay in "the zero yard, where no saints are allowed. . ."
Notes:
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1st Produced:
- 2000
Company:
The Riot Group
1st Published:
- -
Music:
-
To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies
Booksellers:
Genre:
-
Parts:
Male: -  Female: -  Other: -
Further Reference:
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