|
|
WILLARD SIMMS |
|
Nationality: n/a Email: n/a Website: n/a |
|
|
Literary Agent: n/a |
Please send me a biography and information about this Playwright
xxx doollee
Plays by Willard Simms |
Acting Lesson, The | ||
| 1st Produced: | Southwest Theatre Conference | - - - | ||||
Company: | n/a | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatists Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN: | - | |||
| Music: | - | doollee no | #32191 | |||
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 | |||||
|
| ||||||
Genre: | drama One Act | |||||
| Parts: | Male | 3 | Female | 1 | ||
Parts other: | - | |||||
Notes: | Part of the trilogy entitled "Variations on an Untitled Theme." | |||||
Synopsis: | Beginning with rudimentary exercises in self-expression, the Teacher has his three students (two actors, one actress) become plants opening forth to the sun, and then various trees with their characteristic natures. From this they go on to depict children playing with imaginary toys-and falling into the pouts and tantrums to which such activity so often leads. And then comes a more complex situation. Both actors are to be young lovers proposing marriage to the actress, and each is to follow the same script-with the final lines left blank. They are free to vary their style of delivery to fit their feelings, putting as much as possible of their own personalities into their playing, with the final decision as to who will be accepted left to the actress to improvise. The last lesson is for the actors to play the most difficult roles of all-themselves. One of them reaches a point of true self-understanding. The others flounder-but in their failure is a greater lesson, and one which infuses the play with a signific | |||||
Further Reference: | - | |||||
|
Bye Bye Blackbird | ||
| 1st Produced: | 1998 | |||||
Company: | n/a | |||||
| 1st Published: | I don't think it has been published. Try emailing Playwright or Agent where listed at top of page. | ISBN/ASIN: | - | |||
| Music: | - | doollee no | #32192 | |||
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 | |||||
|
| ||||||
Genre: | Play/Drama | |||||
| Parts: | Male | - | Female | - | ||
Parts other: | - | |||||
Notes: | - | |||||
Synopsis: |
| |||||
Further Reference: | - | |||||
|
Einstein | ||
| 1st Produced: | - - - | - - - | ||||
Company: | n/a | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatic Publishing Company, | ISBN/ASIN: | - | |||
| Music: | - | doollee no | #79855 | |||
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 | |||||
|
| ||||||
Genre: | n/a | |||||
| Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | - | ||
Parts other: | - | |||||
Notes: | - | |||||
Synopsis: | The story of Albert Einstein | |||||
Further Reference: | - | |||||
|
Miss Farnsworth | ||
| 1st Produced: | West Texas State University | - - - | ||||
Company: | n/a | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatists Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN: | - | |||
| Music: | - | doollee no | #32193 | |||
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 | |||||
|
| ||||||
Genre: | drama One Act | |||||
| Parts: | Male | 3 | Female | 1 | ||
Parts other: | - | |||||
Notes: | Part of the trilogy entitled "Variations on an Untitled Theme." First presented at West Texas State University, this touching and highly imaginative play mingles humor and pathos in its affecting examination of a lonely spinster who seeks in fantasy what she does not-or cannot-find in the real life. | |||||
Synopsis: | Over the years Miss Farnsworth, now nearing 50, has found the world of reality to be a more and more painful experience, and has begun drifting off into increasingly frequent and wildly extreme fantasies involving herself and her fellow employees at the Goodwill store where she works. A young employee, Ralph, has begun to take a compassionate, kid-brother sort of interest in her-which she has completely misinterpreted-and he soon becomes the center of her fantasies. However, this is all shattered when Hymie, Ralph's partner in the storeroom, tells her of Ralph's wife and children. In a tender and moving fantasy scene Miss Farnsworth informs Ralph that she must go away because "you're too real, there's too much truth in you." She cannot go on seeing him every day, knowing that it had never been as she imagined, or ever could be, and she transfers to a Goodwill branch in the suburbs. The play ends on a tragic note as Miss Farnsworth, no longer able to escape into fantasy and yet unwilling to face the sterility of what real life has brought her, drifts helplessly into the futile half-world between. | |||||
Further Reference: | - | |||||
|
Now | ||
| 1st Produced: | - - - | - - - | ||||
Company: | n/a | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatists Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN: | - | |||
| Music: | - | doollee no | #32194 | |||
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 | |||||
|
| ||||||
Genre: | drama One Act | |||||
| Parts: | Male | 3 | Female | 1 | ||
Parts other: | - | |||||
Notes: | - | |||||
Synopsis: | In NOW (subtitled SOFT DISCS DON'T DRIVE HARD ENOUGH) the time is 1987 (or later), the place a high-tech, futuristic employment office in Los Angeles, dominated by a super-computer named "Leslie." Programmed to give almost human responses, Leslie is both the nemesis and delight (and even the love object) of the office manager, Mr. Worthmore, and, more than that, becomes a vital element of the play. In fact Worthmore, his compliant secretary, Miss Bunson, and a luckless job-seeker, Luke Luckington, all find themselves hilariously ensnared in Leslie's toils before the play reaches its ironic-and cautionary-conclusion. | |||||
Further Reference: | - | |||||
|
Passing Of An Actor, The | ||
| 1st Produced: | West Texas State University | - - - | ||||
Company: | n/a | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatists Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN: | - | |||
| Music: | - | doollee no | #32195 | |||
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 | |||||
|
| ||||||
Genre: | comedy drama One Act | |||||
| Parts: | Male | 3 | Female | 1 | ||
Parts other: | - | |||||
Notes: | Part of the trilogy entitled "Variations on an Untitled Theme." Presented originally at West Texas State University. A highly original and affecting work which combines power and pathos in its revealing study of an aging actor who seeks to find reality-and himself-through his uniquely personal interpretation of Rostand's CYRANO DE BERGERAC. ". . .a moving work. It touches the viewer with pathos first, and then comedy, but tragedy, which overrides the whole, is the culminating force." -Amarillo (Tex.) Globe-Times. Especially recommended for play contest use. | |||||
Synopsis: | An aging actor, forced into retirement after a lifetime on the stage, but knowing no other way to live, decides he will create for himself a life entirely of his own choosing. He takes up residence in a rundown, abandoned theatre, and hires other performers to come and act with him in a drama based on Rostand's immortal "Cyrano de Bergerac," in which he, of course, is Cyrano. However, the play is really a kind of perversion of the original in that it allows Cyrano to live at the close of the play, and also to win Roxanne as his own, forever. At first the actors are rather amused at the Old Actor's comical and quaint actions but, ultimately, one of them becomes quite angry at the way he is being "used." He challenges the Old Actor to a duel, following the true script of the play. The Old Actor now has to make a choice. He can accept the challenge and lose, as Cyrano did, or, instead, he can attempt to retreat as tactfully as possible-and thereby live to fight another day. His decision raises the play to a level of true tragic dimension, and saves the Old Actor from being nothing more than an escapist fool; showing him instead to be an honest, human, sympathetic character somehow pathetic and yet almost noble at the same time. | |||||
Further Reference: | - | |||||
|
Then | ||
| 1st Produced: | - - - | - - - | ||||
Company: | n/a | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatists Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN: | - | |||
| Music: | - | doollee no | #32196 | |||
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 | |||||
|
| ||||||
Genre: | drama One Act | |||||
| Parts: | Male | 3 | Female | 1 | ||
Parts other: | - | |||||
Notes: | - | |||||
Synopsis: | THEN (subtitled I LOVE LUCY WHO?), takes place in 1957 in a small Theatre in Connecticut, where Neville Smythe, a cape-swinging classical thespian of the old school, offers acting instruction to young hopefuls aiming for careers in television. The present batch of would-be superstars includes a compulsive stutterer (who fancies himself as a future network anchorman); a sexy, foul-mouthed blonde who has appeared in "art" films (meaning soft porn) but wants to move up to bigger (and better) roles; and a handsome, painfully conceited leading man type who aspires to be a talk show host. Neville's method is to plunge them into his beloved "Cyrano de Bergerac"-which results first in a near mutiny and then in some surprisingly affecting (albeit very funny) moments. | |||||
Further Reference: | - | |||||
|
Two's A Crowd | ||
| 1st Produced: | - - - | - - - | ||||
Company: | n/a | |||||
| 1st Published: | Dramatists Play Service, NY, | ISBN/ASIN: | - | |||
| Music: | - | doollee no | #32197 | |||
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 | |||||
|
| ||||||
Genre: | comedy One Act | |||||
| Parts: | Male | 1 | Female | 1 | ||
Parts other: | - | |||||
Notes: | Gentle but slyly revealing study of the restless hopes and dreams which can foster a dangerous discontent in the hearts of young men and the feminine wiles which can so effortlessly bring things back to the way a girl wants them to be. | |||||
Synopsis: | Filled with a numbing sense of discontent about the purpose of his life and the tedium of his job at the travel agency, Jack tells his fiancee that they must get away from it all, find a sanctuary in the mountains, recapture the feeling of oneness with nature. Perhaps, Mary Anne suggests, he should just change jobs, try for a managerial position with a larger salary. (Which, of course, shows how little she comprehends the import of what he is trying to say.) And yet a gentle embrace, a kiss, the promise of greater delights to come-and suddenly the impracticality of it all dawns on the male mind. Why not a better job? If you're committed in the right direction, doesn't it make the waiting easier? Whatever you say, agrees Mary Anne sweetly, as she mulls over what kind of furniture to buy with their riches to come. | |||||
Further Reference: | - | |||||
|
Wizard of Oz in the Wild West, The | ||
| 1st Produced: | - - - | - - - | ||||
Company: | n/a | |||||
| 1st Published: | I don't think it has been published. Try emailing Playwright or Agent where listed at top of page. | ISBN/ASIN: | - | |||
| Music: | - | doollee no | #79856 | |||
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 | |||||
|
| ||||||
Genre: | n/a | |||||
| Parts: | Male | - | Female | - | ||
Parts other: | - | |||||
Notes: | - | |||||
Synopsis: | Billy the Kid versus Dorothy! The Wicked Witch sends Dorothy, The Scarecrow, The Tin Man and The Cowardly Lion to the Old Wild West. | |||||
Further Reference: | - | |||||
|
