Samuel French, Inc latest plays

Samuel French Inc Latest Plays


Samuel French Inc
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45 West 25th Street, New York, NY 10010-2751
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(212) 206-8990
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(212) 206-1429

Plays - click on covers to see full Publisher's details

Steve Yockey
afterlife: a ghost story
Samuel french London:

A ghost story in the most literal sense, afterlife follows married couple Connor and Danielle as they prepare their beachfront home for an impending storm. They do their best to come together and get the job done while packing up items stained by painful memories they don't know how to talk about. But when the storm rolls in faster than expected and a great wave rises up to drag them under, it may be too late for the them to come to terms with their history and escape the haunting world of unsent letters, unexpected snow, unfinished sand castles, unrelenting birds, and unforgettable loss that threatens to swallow the pair forever.

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Alan Alda
Radiance: The Passion of Marie Curie
Samuel french London:

With backbreaking work in a ramshackle lab in Paris, Marie Curie and her husband Pierre achieve a revolutionary understanding of radiation and share a Nobel Prize. When her beloved Pierre dies in an accident, Marie is plunged into depression. Paul Langevin, fleeing an unhappy marriage, gives her the strength to return to her work. But the scandal over their affair threatens to end her career  just when she might become the first person ever to receive a second Nobel Prize.

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Zayd Dohrn
Reborning
Samuel french London:

Art and life become disturbingly interchangeable when a sculptor of baby dolls meets a woman desperate to recreate the past. This dark comedy takes an unsettling look at work, latex, and the power of creation.

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Steve Franco
In-Laws, Outlaws, and Other People (That Should Be Shot)
Samuel french London:

It is 6pm and the Douglas family is busily preparing to be invaded by their quirky relatives for their annual Christmas Eve dinner. After robbing a neighborhood liquor store, high strung and irritable Tony, and his dim-witted side-kick Vinny, find themselves in need of a place to briefly hide out. Using a ruse to gain entrance into the Douglas home, they suddenly find themselves in charge of an ever-growing list of family members that they are forced to hold hostage. From smart-aleck teenagers, to nosy neighbors, and bickering adults - the laughs (like the flow of people) are non-stop and we soon wonder who is holding who hostage?! With outrageous characters, laugh-a-minute-dialogue, and a surprise, heart-felt ending - Mr. Franco has created a comic treasure that is sure to leave your audience in stitches while celebrating the true meaning of Christmas.

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Larry Gelbart
Abrogate
Samuel french London:

This political comedy from acclaimed film, theatre, and television legend Larry Gelbart examines the long-term consequences of the Bush-era White House through an imaginary hearing investigating the abrogation of human rights under the Bush regime. Hillary Clinton is now president and, in an attempt to sift through the debris of the post-Bush regime, holds a congressional meeting to explore how the atrocities during the previous administration could have possibly happened. as the hearing progressing, some shocking truths about the infamous conservative leaders are revealed.

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Madeleine George
Precious Little
Samuel french London:

When Brodie, a gifted professor of linguistics and a lesbian, learns the child she's carrying may have a genetic abnormality, she returns again and again to the zoo, where she finds unexpected comfort sitting at the cage of a strange, compelling gorilla. a play that looks at the limits of language-and what lies beneath its surface.
- press release

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Jeff Goode
Savin Up For Saturday Night: The Honky-Tonk Musical
Samuel french London:

Lovin' ain't easy in this one-honky-tonk town, so when the bartender and the bandleader fall for the same dance hall girl, you're in for an evening of showstoppers and toe-tappers, cat fights, and love quadrangles that'll keep any joint jumpin' till way past last call.

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Joann Leonard
All the World's a Stage, Vol. III
Samuel french London:

Namaste, wa ho te sen. Welcome to six more globe-trotting one-acts with various plays for ages 8-18. Flex-gendered roles and cultural insights are incorporated into plays from Africa, Finland, India, Russia and the USA. Discovering inner qualities beyond appearances, modern day children time-warped back to pioneer days, children and parents at odds with each other, and what brings happiness in life are some of the timeless and universal lessons that folktales bring to bear on our own journey. Titles Include: The Healing Leaves, a folk tale from Russia; Johnny Applseed in Cyberspace, a folk tale from the United States; Search for Perfection, a folk tale from Nigeria; Song of the Sea, a folk tale from Finland; The Hand of Friendship, a folk tale from India; The Prideful Princess, a folktale from the Ashanti People of Ghana.

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James J Mellon
Yo Ho Ho! A Pirate's Christmas
Samuel french London:

It's up to a little seven year-old girl named Eve to save Christmas for everyone! What will become of Christmas when Santa Claus and the citizens of the North Pole are kidnapped by a bunch of directionally challenged pirates? This wondrous musical is destined to become a holiday tradition for you and your entire family.

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Evan Placey
Mother of Him
Samuel french London:

It's a snowy December morning like any other in Toronto, Canada, as Brenda Kapowitz sends her 8 year-old son Jason off to school, while her teenager Matthew remains asleep upstairs. Soon she'll begin lighting candles for the 8 nights of Hanukkah. You'd think Brenda was like any other mother, but today the press are camped outside, Matthew is under house arrest and it's the laws that form inside the house that matter most. She could be any mother. But she's not. She's his. Mother of Him is about how far our love for our children goes, and at what cost to ourselves.

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Marsha Lee Sheiness
Best All 'Round
Samuel french London:

A teenage high school senior, Michael Lee, struggles with homework, dating, her reputation and her self-esteem along side her best friend, Nickie. Michael's precocious eleven-year-old sister, Kay, attempts to help her solve her dilemmas with the simple wisdom of prepubescent innocence and common sense. Best All 'Round is a story about growing up in Texas, circa 1958.

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Tom Stoppard
Cherry Orchard
Samuel french London:

Set at the turn of the 20th century, The Cherry Orchard follows Madame Ranevskaya, a once wealthy landowner, who returns home to Russia almost impoverished after five years abroad to find that her vast and beautiful cherry orchard is to be sold off because of her crippling debts. She ignores the insistent warnings and advice of Lopakhin, a peasant's son turned wealthy businessman, and instead seeks solace in the past.

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William Cameron
Violet Sharp
Samuel french London:

Based on the true story 1932 Lindbergh Kidnapping Case, Violet Sharp is named for the young British maid working at the home of Anne Lindbergh's mother. In the wake of the historic kidnapping of beloved aviator Charles Lindbergh's 20-month-old son, Violet raises the suspicion of the police with a contradictory testimony about her whereabouts to police investigator Officer Walsh. Under pressure from her own personal demons as well as the police, Violet's efforts to clear her name cannot seem to overpower a growing reputation of guilt.

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Clara Mamet and Jack Quaid
Solvit Kids, The
Samuel french London:

A new play from critically-acclaimed young playwrights Clara Mamet and Jack Quaid. In The Solvit Kids, Bradley Phillips and Annie Wyatt are the stars of the world-renowned Solvit Kids movies - a series based off the popular children's books, the author of which dies just as he is finishing the last installment. Annie and Brad are then left with the rights to release it. However when something goes horribly wrong it is up to the former Solvit Kids to come up with a solution.

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Zayd Dohrn
Sick
Samuel french London:

A college professor brings a student home to meet his dysfunctional family - a home so obsessed with cleanliness that the real dirt lurks around every corner and behind every sentence. Toying with post 9/11 phobias, this dark comedy plays upon our fears, both real and imagined.

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Douglas E. Hughes and Marcia Kash
Too Many Cooks
Samuel french London:

It's 1932 in Niagara Falls, Canada, where the rum-running business is at its peak. In the aftermath of the Crash, Irving Bubbalowe and his daughter Honey, have risked everything they have to open a new gourmet restaurant. When their star-the renowned singing Chef Francois LaPlouffe - fails to appear, tonight's grand opening is suddenly placed in jeopardy. However, when unemployed chef Frank Plunkett wanders in looking for work, Honey persuades him to masquerade as the missing LaPlouffe. The beleaguered Bubbalowe, meanwhile, also has to contend with Chicago gangster al Feghetti and his sidekick who have come looking for an illegal shipment of booze residing in his basement. In addition, Bubbalowe has to keep at bay the hot-blooded Immigration officer Veronica Snook, on the trail of the vanished chef, as well as a suspicious tee-totaling Mountie, who is ready to arrest Bubbalowe for both murder and bootlegging. Madness ensues, and Bubbalowe and the others create a hornet's nest of fabricated stories (and identities) as they try to valiantly save the restaurant - and themselves - from both the gangsters and the law.

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William Missouri Downs
Exit Interview, The
Samuel french London:

Bertolt Brecht scholar Dick Fig has been terminated by his university and is having an excruciating exit interview with Eunice - a decidedly droll administrator. Downs' witty play ricochets through Brechtian interludes, a pair of politically-radicalized cheerleaders, a pompous newsman, communiques from God, and debates on religion, science and politics before reaching its surprising conclusion.

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Aditi Brennan Kapil
Agnes Under The Big Top
Samuel french London:

Agnes Under the Big Top: A Tall Tale explores the intersecting lives of several immigrants in a US city. It is a magical tale of hope and disappointment, identity and reinvention, narrated by an itinerant subway busker. Against the subterranean rhythms of a subway train, a Liberian home care worker, a former Bulgarian ringmaster and his wife, an Indian call center escapee, and a bed-ridden American woman, find and redefine themselves in todays America.

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Ken Ludwig
Game's Afoot, The
Samuel french London:

It is December 1936 and Broadway star William Gillette, admired the world over for his leading role in the play Sherlock Holmes, has invited his fellow cast-members to his Connecticut castle for a weekend of revelry. But when one of the guests is stabbed to death, the festivities in this isolated house of tricks and mirrors quickly turn dangerous. Then it's up to Gillette himself, as he assumes the persona of his beloved Holmes, to track down the killer before the next victim appears. The danger and hilarity are non-stop in this glittering whodunit set during the Christmas holidays.

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Clara Mamet
Paris
Samuel french London:

A pivotal meeting between a daughter and her father.

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Qui Nguyen
She Kills Monsters: Young Adventurers Edition
Samuel french London:

A comedic romp into the world of fantasy role-playing games, in a new edition created specially for High School performing groups! She Kills Monsters tells the story of Agnes Evans as she leaves her childhood home in Ohio following the death of her teenage sister, Tilly. When Agnes finds Tilly's Dungeons & Dragons notebook, however, she stumbles into a journey of discovery and action-packed adventure in the imaginary world that was Tilly's refuge. In this high-octane dramatic comedy laden with homicidal fairies, nasty ogres, and 90s pop culture, acclaimed young playwright Qui Nguyen offers a heart-pounding homage to the geek and warrior within us all.

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Qui Nguyen
She Kills Monsters
Samuel french London:

A comedic romp into the world of fantasy role-playing games, She Kills Monsters tells the story of Agnes Evans as she leaves her childhood home in Ohio following the death of her teenage sister, Tilly. When Agnes finds Tilly's Dungeons & Dragons notebook, however, she stumbles into a journey of discovery and action-packed adventure in the imaginary world that was Tilly's refuge. In this high-octane dramatic comedy laden with homicidal fairies, nasty ogres, and 90s pop culture, acclaimed young playwright Qui Nguyen offers a heart-pounding homage to the geek and warrior within us all.

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Ken Ludwig
Midsummer/Jersey
Samuel french London:

Midsummer/Jersey is the hilarious high-octane re-telling of Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream set on the boardwalk of a seaside town in modern-day New Jersey. The story revolves around the impending marriage of the Governor of New Jersey, the love affairs of four beach-bound high school crushes, a lively crew of fairies and the staff of the local beauty salon (run by Patti Quince and Stylist Nikki Bottom). The night takes a magical turn when Oberon and the impish Puck arrive on the scene armed with a powerful love potion and a desire for mischief making. With several weddings and the acting careers of six beauticians hanging in the balance, the lovers take to the boardwalk, backed by pop music and an iPhone-obsessed wood sprite.

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Jeff Goode
Your Swash Is Unbuckled, Book 2
Samuel french London:

These 11 short stage-combat plays about piracy, brigandry, and heartrobbery combine tongue-in-cheek word-play with swashbuckling swordplay in stories revolving around buccaneers, mutineers, damsels, fops, conquistadors, gladiatrixes and rapscallions of all shapes and sizes. This unique collection of playlets can be used to create a full night of entertainment, as well as in the classroom for teaching stage combat techniques. Of special note is that these combat scenes contain roles for both male and female actors.

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Theresa Rebeck
Seminar
Samuel french London:

In Seminar, a provocative comedy from Pulitzer Prize nominee Theresa Rebeck, four aspiring young novelists sign up for private writing classes with Leonard (JEFF GOLDBLUM), an international literary figure. Under his recklessly brilliant and unorthodox instruction, some thrive and others flounder, alliances are made and broken, sex is used as a weapon and hearts are unmoored. The wordplay is not the only thing that turns vicious as innocence collides with experience in this biting Broadway comedy.

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Tom Sharkey
Together Again
Samuel french London:

This is a love story that spans the years of a troubling and stormy relationship. This play offers a fascinating glimpse of the trials, trivialities, and triumphs of love without compromise. You'll laugh and cry as these lovers win their way into your heart. You may even recognize someone you love in Together Again. Together Again spans a touching and stormy relationship through three reunions. When Chrissie and Joe meet, something both dreadful and wonderful occurs. The story begins in the apartment of an aspiring young actress. Chrissie, an acting student, is about to host her acting class' fi fth reunion, when her hero, Joe, a rising young Hollywood star, arrives an hour too soon. Ten years later, at the fi fteenth reunion party, Chrissie is still studying drama, while Joe has won an Academy Award. The third reunion, ten years later, finds them together yet again in the hours before the reunion party. She is now a successful stage actress, he a recovering Alcoholic. Together Again is a romantic comedy that offers a fascinating glimpse of the trials, trivialities, and triumphs of love without compromise.

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Robert Caisley
Front
Samuel french London:

Set in England during the Blitz, a number of struggling individuals and families come to terms with war and the horrors and tragedies it provides. This includes Judith, a proud matriarch, who works in a factory that makes bomb detonators, her missing husband, Frank, and their two children, Sheila and John, who are forced to grow up much too quickly. A number of other war-torn individuals are also profiled, each butting heads with the raging war. A poignant account of female perseverance, Front is appropriate for all audiences.

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Athol Fugard
Train Driver, The
Samuel french London:

Roelf, a train driver, has spent weeks searching for the identities of a mother and child he unintentionally killed with his train. after a fruitless journey through shanty towns, he encounters an old gravedigger named Simon who helps the desperate man unburden his conscience. Based on a true story, The Train Driver is a soulful exploration of guilt, suffering, and the powerful bonds that grow between strangers.

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Kyoko Yoshida, Yukiko Motoya, Andy Bragen
Vengeance Can Wait
Samuel french London:

Influenced by anime and manga (Japanese graphic novels and comic books), Vengeance Can Wait takes a peek into Japanese sub-culture as it charts a different kind of love story. a couple has the perfect domestic relationship: he spends his days planning the perfect revenge, while she awaits her perfect punishment. Dark, twisted, and touching, the couple come to understand the 'kinks' in their relationship-and embrace them

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Lisa Rafferty, Sheila Eppolito, Stefanie Cloutier
MOMologues2: Off to School
Samuel french London:

The MOM crew is at it again! MOMologues2: Off to School offers a frank and funny look at the true tales of motherhood, from homework hell to multitasking mania. Four separate characters tell their individual stories, either directly to the audience in monologues, or in scenes with each other. Moms everywhere will laugh in recognition at the playdates gone wrong, the crazy way to get a Mom day off, how to stalk a potential babysitter, and much more.

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Laural Meade
Harry Thaw Hates Everybody
Samuel french London:

Harry Thaw Hates Everybody is a genre-bending, high-speed, turn-of-the-century romp in four acts  each in a different theatrical style: vaudeville, living newspaper, courtroom farce and post-modern collage. Set against a backdrop of gilded-age opulence and accompanied by authentic period songs, the play takes as its starting point the real-life 1906 murder of New York's architectural eminence Stanford White at the hands of deranged coal baron Harry Thaw, his rival for the affections of Broadway super-soubrette Evelyn Nesbit. Using an eclectic mix of American pomp splashed with turn-of-the-century burlesque theatrics, Harry Thaw serves up a comedic tour de force for four great performers and a darkly whimsical look at the clash between hedonism and poverty, the emotional toll of romantic excess, and murderous revenge a la high society.

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Michael Heitzman, Ilene Reid, David Holcenberg
Bingo! The Winning Musical
Samuel french London:

Bingo is a splashy, zippy, fun new musical comedy - great for theatres looking to produce a small musical with a big heart. Bingo is about a group of die-hard bingo players who stop at nothing to miss their weekly game. In between the number calling, strange rituals and fierce competitions, love blossoms and long lost friends reunite. These lovable characters spring to life with a smart, funny script and bouncy, hummable score. Audiences will be laughing in the aisles when they aren't playing games of bingo along with the cast! Best friends and Bingo pals Vern, Honey and Patsy brave a terrible storm in order to attend the yearly celebration of the birth of Bingo and tribute to its founder, Edwin S. Lowe. As the storm knocks out power at the Bingo Hall, Patsy and Honey remind each other of the ominous night fifteen years ago that began in the same way. In flashback, Honey tells us about the night Vern and her best friend, Bernice, had their falling out. Bernice's sweet, yet headstrong daughter, Alison, enters the Bingo hall in disguise - Bernice's health is failing, and Alison is determined, with the help of Bingo, to reunite her mother with her long-lost best friend.

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A Rey Pamatmat
Edith Can Shoot Things And Hit Them
Samuel french London:

Three kids - Kenny, his sister Edith, and their friend Benji - are all but abandoned on a farm in remotest Middle America. With little adult supervision, they feed and care for each other, making up the rules as they go. But when Kenny's and Benji's relationship becomes more than friendship, and Edith shoots something she really shouldn't shoot, the formerly indifferent outside world comes barging in whether they want it to or not.

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Nick Mecikalski, Sam Van Wetter, Morgan Richardson, I.B. Hopkins
Thespian Playworks 2011
Samuel french London:

From the nationally recognized Educational Theatre Association's Thespian Playworks competition come four short scripts with unforgettable heroes  all created by high school-aged playwrights! Included in this volume are: The Goatman Cometh by I.B. Hopkins; Eisegesis by Nicholas Mecikalski; See You Soon by Morgan Richardson; Clipped by Sam Van Wetter.

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A Rey Pamatmat
Thunder Above, Deeps Below
Samuel french London:

Three homeless friends - a Filipina-American with a hidden past, a Filipina transsexual, and a Puerto Rican hustler - struggle on the Chicago streets to scrounge up enough cash to bus it to San Francisco before the winter cold hits. But when a bearded man on a quest, a mystery man in sunglasses, a wealthy john, and a doughnut shop's spell-casting assistant manager put their hopes and friendships to the test, the trio find they must spare some change of a far queerer kind.

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Thornton Wilder
Thornton Wilder One Act Series: The Ages of Man
Samuel french London:

Welcome to a new collection of Thornton Wilder's last plays - a series of one-acts that were part of his extravagantly ambitious project to creat two one-act play cycles based on the Deadly Sins and the Ages of Man. Published for the first time in a single acting edition, Wilder's Ages of Man presents his series of stirring short works that capture four important stages of life.

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Lisa Thompson
Single Black Female
Samuel french London:

Single Black Female is a two-woman show with rapid-fire comic vignettes that explore the lives of thirty-something African American middle class women in urban America as they search for love, clothes and dignity in a world that fails to recognize them amongst a parade of stereotypical images. SBF 1, an English literature professor, and SBF 2, a corporate lawyer, keep each other balanced as they face their fears of rejection, hopes for romance and reminisce about black girlhood wounds. While embodying a variety of characters, the girlfriends discuss the absurdities of interracial dating, the lure of recreational shopping and the merits of college reunions for bolstering one's self-esteem. After reviewing their escapades in past relationships and confessing their own mounting anxieties about commitment and the possibility of motherhood, the pair realize their best chance at love may be found closer than they ever imagined.

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Thornton Wilder
Thornton Wilder One Act Series: The Seven Deadly Sins
Samuel french London:

Welcome to a new collection of Thornton Wilder's last plays - a series of one-acts that were part of his extravagantly ambitious project to creat two one-act play cycles based on the Deadly Sins and the Ages of Man. Published for the first time in a single acting edition, Wilder's The Seven Deadly Sins presents a series of short works depicting the complexity and consequences of human frailty.

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Steven Yockey
very still & hard to see
Samuel french London:

This short play cycle recounts the history of a cursed hotel and the unfortunate guests who stay there. From riding in an erratic elevator and dealing with possessive ghosts to managing an ever-expanding hole in the floor armed only with gleaning supplies, these encounters with the unkown chillingly collapse the distance between the real and the surreal and remind us that, sometimes, bad things do happen for a reason.

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Thornton Wilder
Thornton Wilder One Act Series: Wilder's Classic One Acts
Samuel french London:

This collection of Wilder's most famous one act plays includes, The Long Christmas Dinner, The Happy Journey to Trenton and Camden, Pullman Car Hiawatha, Queens of France, Such Things Only Happen in Books, and Love and How to Cure It. In these mini-masterpieces, Wilder experiments with techniques and dramatic forms he would later develop in his celebrated full-length works, Our Town, The Matchmaker, The Skin of Our Teeth, and The Alcestiad. Among these plays we encounter a first glimpse of Wilder's Stage Manager; his use of pantomime, minimal scenery, and farce; as well as his signature connection between the commonplace and the cosmic dimensions of the human experience.

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Jeff Talbott
Submission, The
Samuel french London:

Danny has written a complex new drama about an African American family trying to get out of the Projects, and it has just been selected for the nation's preeminent play festival. Problem is: Danny, a young white playwright, submitted the work under a pen name in the hope of increasing its chances for production. So he hires Emilie, a black actress, to stand in for him as author. What starts as a terrible idea becomes more and more terrible as Danny drags Emilie, his boyfriend, and his best friend down a long and dirty path of truth, lies, revelation, and betrayal. A fiercely funny and intelligent new comic drama about the words we use to describe each other  and the things we'll do to get what we want.

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Freyda Thomas
Miser, The
Samuel french London:

The Miser is a new adaptation of Molieres most famous prose play by celebrated Moliere adaptor Freyda Thomas (The Learned Ladies, Tartuffe: Born Again). This side-splitting, comedic classic has all the hilarious elements of the original and is set in a pre-20th Century period, where marriages could be forced upon ones children. In The Miser, the elderly Harpagon obsesses over the feeling that he never has enough money, and unfortunately his obsession wreaks havoc on all around him. This includes his two children, Elise and Cleante, who are passionately in love with a valet and the girl next door, respectively. While Harpagons arranged them to be married to absurdly mismatched types, the two smart children plot against their frugal father until all erupts in a climatic dinner, and truths are revealed.

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David Belke
Next Year's Man of Steel
Samuel french London:

August 1940, New York. Struggling and opportunistic writer Everett Gardner is given the chance to make a mark in the still infant comic book industry. All he has to do is create a hero. But creating a real hero turns out to be much more difficult than he expects. And while badgered by a desperate publisher and partnered with an uncooperative artist, the task might prove to be impossible. Especially with distraction of the artists intriguing young wife. But heroes can arise in the most unexpected places... A full length play about creativity, collaboration and every day courage.

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David Mitchell Robinson
Carapace
Samuel french London:

In Carapace, we settle into the passenger's seat alongside a drunk driver as he steers his way through the backstreets of his memory. Jeff, a Minneapolis sportscaster, hasn't spoken with his daughter Margo since his alcoholism demolished their relationship. When Jeff hears that the speech-impedimented Margo has stopped speaking, he decides to pay her a visit on her birthday. Determined to finally do the right thing for his daughter, Jeff steers his Oldsmobile through the Twin Cities, navigating past the recently collapsed 35W Bridge to deliver the one gift that has the power to get Margo to open up again.

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Jordan Harrison
Maple and Vine
Samuel french London:

Katha and Ryu have become allergic to their 21st-century lives. After they meet a charismatic man from a community of 1950s re-enactors, they forsake cell phones and sushi for cigarettes and Tupperware parties. In this compulsively authentic world, Katha and Ryu are surprised by what their new neighbors - and they themselves - are willing to sacrifice for happiness.

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Kirsten Greenidge
Milk Like Sugar
Samuel french London:

It is Annie Desmond's sixteenth birthday and her friends have decided to help her celebrate in style, complete with a brand new tattoo. Before her special night is over, however, Annie and her friends enter into a life altering pact. When Annie tries to make good on her promise to her friends, she is forced to take a good look at the world that surrounds her. She befriends Malik, who promises a bright future, and Keera, whose evangelical leanings inspire Annie in a way her young parents have not been able to do. In the end Annie's choices propel her onto an irreversible path in this story that combines wit, poetry, and hope.

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Chad Beckim
After
Samuel french London:

When a wrongfully imprisoned man is exonerated by DNA evidence after seventeen years in prison, he is forced to re-assimilate into a cold, foreign world of toothbrush shopping, doggy day care, and a friendship with an anxious young woman with secrets of her own.

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Crystal Skillman
Cut
Samuel french London:

Three reality television writers find themselves just as desperate as the housewives they are shooting. Danno, a stressed-out editor, harbors secret guilt for deserting his sick sister. Renee is in the midst of a divorce and at a turning point in her career. The overly ambitious Colette finds herself in a world of trouble when she guns for Renees job and Dannos respect. Amongst the Ladies of Malibu show that they produce, the trio finds that it is much easier to yell cut! on set, rather than in ones own life.

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Rosary O'Neill
Awakening Of Kate Chopin, The
Samuel french London:

Nominated for the Pulitzer Prize and heralded by theaters in Kate Chopin's home town of Alexandria, Louisiana, Kate Chopin, author of The Awakening, must pick between her dying husband and her lover, the wealthy planter next door. She picks her lover, and he leaves her. In agony she goes forth to become the great writer she was meant to be. A tour de force drama of obsession rooted in the real life of the famous first great American novelist and based on detailed, shocking facts from her life. The selective setting of interior of old post-Civil War house provides poetic staging opportunities.

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Adam Bock
Small Fire, A
Samuel french London:

Adam Bocks meticulously crafted A Small Fire follows John and Emily Bridges, a long-married couple whose happy, middle-class lives are upended when Emily falls victim to a mysterious disease. As her senses are slowly stripped away  smell, taste, sight  Emily resolves to remain engaged with her community, relying on John to help her run her company and experience her daughter Jennys wedding. But her stoic outlook reaches a breaking point when the disease steals her hearing, leaving her with nothing but touch to communicate with the world. Suddenly, she is completely dependant on the husband whose endless devotions she had always taken for granted.

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Tom Sharkey
Dreams
Samuel french London:

In Dreams, two very unlike individuals become aware of each other and eventually come to fear each other by means of their very real nightmares and daydreams. A young lawyer awakens in terror and dread. He had been in an abandoned building; a sadistic policeman was beating him, demanding to know where he had hidden the stolen drugs. The woman at his side, who says she is his wife, the mother of his two children, comforts him. She says, "It was just a dream". A moment later, a young drug addict awakens in throbbing pain. His wounds from a beating are being tended to by a man who says he is a friend. The drug addict tells him about the woman and the two children. The friend says, "It was just a dream."

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Ron Osborne
Saturday Night At Old Smokey
Samuel french London:

In its heyday, Old Smokey was more than a mountain-top country store. . .its porch was the scene of Saturday night musical jamborees that rivaled the Grand Ole Opry. As Emma prepares to reopen Old Smokey for her son Teddy - injured in Afghanistan and almost home - the store has fallen into disrepair. There to help are Jinks, a playful friend and a Yankee wannabe; Olive, a sassy defender of all things Southern, who - with Jinks - was a member of the Mountain Mamas, a singing duet once destined for fame; and Cordelia, Olive's daughter and Teddy's fiancée, who's more talented than even she realizes. When the county threatens foreclosure, the women plan a fundraising musical jamboree reminiscent of the good old days. That is, until a storm closes the road, stranding them and wrecking their plans. The arrival of strangers - mysterious Howard and his ditzy wife Tammy - adds to the challenges. Who is Howard and why is he so interested in Old Smokey? More important, how do Emma and her friends preserve the values that built this homey little store at the top of the mountain? Challenges mount as secrets are revealed, laughs are shared, and songs are sung in a live on-the-air musical tribute to tradition, friendship and family.

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Amy Herzog
4000 Miles
Samuel french London:

After suffering a major loss while he was on a cross-country bike trip, 21 year-old Leo seeks solace from his feisty 91 year-old grandmother Vera in her West Village apartment. Over the course of a single month, these unlikely roommates infuriate, bewilder, and ultimately reach each other. 4000 MILES looks at how two outsiders find their way in today's world.

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John Morogiello
Blame it on Beckett
Samuel french London:

Heidi Bishop is a wide-eyed dramaturgy intern, eager to better American drama. What she encounters instead is an endless stream of bad scripts by desperate playwrights and an office filled with cynicism and turf battles, led by her bitterly hilarious boss Jim Foley. When Heidi's efforts to improve things run into unintended consequences, she is forced to confront idealism with reality to save her career, reputation, and relationships.

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Warren Leight
No Foreigners Beyond This Point
Samuel french London:

Paula and Andrew, two twenty-something Americans, arrive in China right after the Cultural Revolution, when the country is just starting to open up to foreigners. Paula has come to teach English and Andrew has come to spend a semester close to Paula. Their naivete is astounding as they blunder into the heavily socialist and guarded community of the school. They are spied on by everyone, obliquely threatened, mystified by local customs, and generally fish out of water. Ultimately, Andrew returns to the States, but Paula decides to stay, despite her seeming distaste for their surroundings.

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Various
Samuel French OOB Festival
Samuel french London:

At a private girls' school on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, one student's behavior leads to a series of escalating acts of violence. In the aftermath of the scandal, three mothers and a guidance counselor try to come to terms with their confusion and anger, struggling to understand what went wrong and who can be held responsible.

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Phil & Paul Olson
Don't Hug Me I'm Pregnant
Samuel french London:

The story takes place in Bunyan Bay, Minnesota, in a little bar called The Bunyan, owned by Clara and Gunner Johnson. Clara is 8½ months pregnant with their first child, and today she's looking forward to her baby shower, getting lots of presents, and taking a break from her raging hormones. Suddenly, a freak snow storm, a tsnownami, hits Bunyan Bay and they find themselves snowed in. All roads are closed. No one can get in or leave. Gunner's worst nightmare comes true when Clara goes into labor and he realizes he's going to have to deliver the baby in the bar. Featuring 17 original songs including, Babies and Beer, If I Only Had a Boy, Bun in the Oven, Baby Fever, The Just Got Hosed Over by a Dork' Blues, and If Men Had Babies, We'd All Be Extinct.

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Bekah Brunstetter
Be a Good Little Widow
Samuel french London:

Young wife Melody has never been to a funeral  until her husband dies in a plane crash. Expected to instantly assume proper widowhood, Melody is left to wonder, whats the right way to grieve? Fortunately, her mother-in-law is a professional. Widow, that is. Under her guidance, Melody must try her best to be a good little widow. A sad comedy about loss and longing.

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Sheila Callaghan
Roadkill Confidential
Samuel french London:

A possibly rogue g-man stalks a stalled-out artist with a suspicious affinity for accident victims. Traps are set, traps are sprung, and everyone gets caught. Roadkill Confidential tackles, with style, humor and high theatricality, mediated violence and the numbness it produces, and, whether in art or in global politics, the ends can justify the means.

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A John Boulanger
House Of Several Stories
Samuel french London:

Bastian returns home for Thanksgiving with news of joining the service. Mother suggests he join a gym. Bastian's news takes a backseat when his sister, Rissa, suddenly decides that she's pregnant, and though not yet showing, expects to deliver any minute now. Both children are then bombarded with Mother's news of an older brother that they've never known about, Thom, who has returned home for Thanksgiving from the war. Things are further complicated with the arrival of the mysterious, young Abigail, who has simply stopped by to drop something off--her newborn baby. That is, until she discovers the baby's father might be in the house.

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Alaina Kunin and Bradford Proctor
Bunked!: A New Musical
Samuel french London:

Sponsored by LogoTV, Bunked features the exploits of five summer camp counselors as they embark on their first taste of adulthood. Fatal secrets, impassioned jealousy and triangular love trysts entangle the counselors as the bittersweet end of summer approaches.

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Charles Busch
Olive and the Bitter Herbs
Samuel french London:

Olive Fisher is an elderly character actress whose claim to fame were the iconic Gimme the Sausage commercials of the 1980's. She's a classic New York curmudgeon, at war with the world and in particular her next door neighbors. Her closed-off life is shaken by the appearance of a spectral male figure viewed through her living room mirror. A series of strange and outrageous coincidences reveals that the man in the mirror has intimate links to everyone in Olive's world and most revealingly to Olive, encouraging her that it's never too late to change one's life.

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John Heimbuch
William Shakespeare's Land of the Dead
Samuel french London:

Described as a true and accurate account of the 1599 zombie invasion at the Globe Theatre, William Shakespeares Land of the Dead explores the Elizabethan era of Shakespeare, Francis Bacon and Queen Elizabeth, all of whom are struggling to survive a zombie attack! In the midst of an argument in which Will Kemp is thrown out of the theater for refusing to acknowledge Falstaffs death in Henry V, a costume designer is mysteriously bitten by a zombie, thus causing all hell to break loose. As the Globe becomes a quarantine-zone in a zombie-riddled London, the characters must learn how to survive amongst both the undead and each other.

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Ramona King
Wildlife!
Samuel french London:

WILDLIFE! Not Your Usual Slave Tale, is the dangerous journey of 1800's pre civil war non-enslaved women. Women, who, accused of murder, have kidnapped the plantation Missus, escaped by horseback, and galloped into deep forest. There, they roughed their way inside a secret shelter inhabited by fugitive women to map their final disappearance. But fiercely hunted and stripped of time, together, the women dealt one breathtaking blow. WILDLIFE! Not Your Usual Slave Tale is the riveting story of seven ordinary, yet unforgettable diverse women who fought to ultimately give their lives for the future of...a little girl. This daring work dramatizes their experiences from terror to an explosive triumph of love. Ramona King has created WILDLIFE! Not Your Usual Slave Tale, as a one-of-a-kind American story, composing horses, women and nature into a hauntingly elegant yet unforgettable American adventure.

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EM Lewis
Infinite Black Suitcase
Samuel french London:

Several families are facing the death of loved ones - and there are other problems - the lack of space in the graveyard and Kal wants to know how his brother died

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Kristoffer Diaz
Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity, The
Samuel french London:

Mace is a professional wrestler. He's a really good professional wrestler. He's not the champion though  that's the impossibly charismatic Chad Deity. When Mace discovers a young Indian-American Brooklyn kid whose charisma rivals that of the champ, Mace decides to get him a job in the company. Only problem is, the boss has a very specific plan for the duo: put them onscreen as terrorists. Kristoffer Diaz's The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity is a serious minded comedy about wrestling, geopolitics, and raisin bread.

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David Landau
Bullets for Broadway
Samuel french London:

A sequel to The Altos, Tony & Toffee Alto are back, by popular demand. This time, Toffee wants to be a Broadway star and Tony needs to "clean" some money. So he hires two producers to mount a hit musical - "The Mafia Queen" - starring Toffee. The only catch - the show must be sold out opening night and get great reviews, no matter what it costs - or else! Leave it to Baxter Mallystock and his playwright partner Eli Blain. You're invited to the party after opening night to revile as the reviews come in, along with the FBI and a few stray bullets. It's a brand new evening of Mystery, Comedy, Music and great Food which just goes to prove that sometimes when people say they're going to make a hit, they mean it!

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Larry Gelbart
Better Late
Samuel french London:

As Better Late opens, Julian (Nussbaum) is forced to move in with his ex-wife and her new husband in order to recuperate from a sudden illness. With each passing day, the awkward situation spirals further and further out of control. As the laughter builds, the question becomes: how long will Julian have to stay? This bitingly funny December-December-December romance is a not-to-be-missed new comedy.

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Samuel D Hunter
Bright New Boise, A
Samuel french London:

Samuel D. Hunter's A Bright New Boise is a earnest comedy about the meager profits of modern faith. In the bleak, corporate break room of a craft store in Idaho, someone is summoning The Rapture. Will, who has fled his rural hometown after a scandal at his Evangelical church, comes to the Hobby Lobby, not only for employment, but also to rekindle a relationship with Alex, his brooding teenage son, whom he gave up for adoption several years ago. Alex works there along with Leroy, his adopted brother and protector, and Anna, a hapless young woman who reads bland fiction but hopes for dramatic endings. As their manager, foul-mouthed Pauline, tries ceaselessly to find order (and profit) in the chaos of small business, these lost souls of the Hobby Lobby confront an unyielding world through the beige-tinted impossibility of modern faith

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Frank & Malachy McCourt
Couple of Blaguards, A
Samuel french London:

A Couple of Blaguards, a two-man show by literary greats Frank and Malachy McCourt, is a bubbling stew of their well-known humor with a dash of poignancy to sharpen the flavor. A comedic springboard for Angela's Ashes, Tis, and Malachy's A Monk Swimmin', this brilliantly structured comedy is a proven crowd-pleaser offering solid entertainment. Similar to Frank McCourt's best-selling novels, the story follows the trials of the young McCourts in poverty-stricken Limerick, Ireland, to their journey to the U.S. and Brooklyn, New York, where the young men learn to incorporate the day-to-day lessons of their hard Irish past. A story of immigration, triumph over hardship, and the love between family, A Couple of Blaguards is a theatrical event that will find a place in the heart of every audience member.

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Ben H Winters
Uncle Pirate
Samuel french London:

With help from Uncle Pirate and his faithful talking penguin, maybe, just maybe, Wilson can survive the fourth grade. Wilson is just your average kid. Then one day he finds out his uncle is a pirate& like, a REAL pirate! Grab yer eye patches and pirate hats, mateys! The adventure begins now!

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James J Mellon
Boy Called Lizard, A
Samuel french London:

This musical revolves around a boy named Lucius Sims. With his sea-green eyes more displaced than most people's and a nose deformed at birth, Lucius, or Lizard as he is called by his friends at the Leesville State School for Retarded Boys, looks and feels like a freak due to his reptilian features. So when Callahan, a shoe salesman from up North arrives and claims to be his father, Lizard takes a chance. Believing that his father is dead, he escapes from his miserable life at the reformatory and into the madcap world of Callahan's traveling theater troupe and their ragtag production of Shakespeare's The Tempest. His journey with the charismatic yet brooding Callahan is at the heart of this deeply affecting story as Lizard touches the lives of all that know him and in his search to find a real home, Lizard just might find a world in which he can truly be accepted and set his spirit free

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James Sherman
Relatively Close
Samuel french London:

In Relatively Close, James Sheridan scrutinizes human relationships by inviting us to the summer home of one quirky and quarrelsome extended family. But then, what family isnt?. Three sisters return to the house on the shores of Lake Michigan where they spent the summers of their youth. Now, the sisters are grown, their parents are gone, and the house is just sitting there. One sister wants to keep it, one sister wants to sell it, and one sister just wants everyone to get along. They each have brought a husband combining three men with very little hope of finding any common ground. And one sister has one very disgruntled teenage son in tow who may be the hope for the future or the downfall of the present.

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Richard Alfieri
Sisters, The
Samuel french London:

Using a college on New Yorks Upper East Side as their surrogate home and sanctuary, four siblings struggle to banish the ghost of their dead father and create some semblance of harmony as adults. Suggested by Chekhovs Three Sisters, this unflinchingly honest drama with comedy explores and explodes the myths about family and friendship. But in contrast to Chekhovs family, who yearn to leave the staid provinces for the excitement of Moscow, Alfieris modern siblings long to escape the chaos of Manhattan for the simpler life they left behind in their childhood home in Charleston. As they strive to reconcile their individual desires, they expose each others deceptions with barbed wit and candor escalating to moments of shocking power. Their final realization is that violence and chaos reside within the walls of their sanctuary -- and within the heart.
- nytheatre.com

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Toshiki Okada
Enjoy
Samuel french London:

From acclaimed Japanese director/playwright Toshiki Okada, Artistic Director of the internationally-lauded chelfitsch Theatre Company, comes a chronicle of post-college ennui and 21st Century relationships in Japan's Lost Generation. The static lives of several self-obsessed GenX comic book store clerks are thrown out of balance by the presence of a younger female co-worker, who rightly makes them question the meaning of their lives in a shifting socio-economic landscape. Written in the hyper-colloquial style Okada has become famous for, this play is presented for the first time in English in a translation by Japanese American playwright Aya Ogawa, and was met with massive critical praise upon its New York premiere.

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Michael and Susan Parker
What is Susan's Secret?
Samuel french London:

The Cider Mill Inn is an old, rustic and somewhat run down country inn owned and operated by an endearing elderly couple, Michael and Susan Edwards. At first they appear to be bordering on senility. We quickly learn however that they are very clever con artists, preying on their unsuspecting guests, by advertising huge discounts to various tradesmen. Using an elaborate check-in form with duplicate copies, guests are, in fact, signing a work contract, requiring them to perform various tasks and improvements at the inn. Over the course of three weekends, plumbers, tile layers, carpenters and electricians are recruited to do work they never expected. This unique play offers theatres the opportunity for the other twelve characters (Besides Susan and Michael) to be played by either two males and two females, or twelve different actors, or any number in between. The characters vary from the world's most boring man, (his wife says he's had charisma bypass surgery), to a young couple on their honeymoon. Audiences will fall in love with each of these distinctive characters, but especially the loving relationship between the two main characters, Michael and Susan, so touching that this play might be called a love story, if it wasn't first and foremost a farce. So, what is Susan's secret? On this subject the authors remain silent, preferring instead to let the audience decide on the truth, which of course, in a Parker play, is only revealed in the last few seconds of the show.

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Tom Frye
Mosley Street Melodramas, Vol 4
Samuel french London:

FAST FOOD FRENZY - 3m, 3f, 1 non-gender dog / 1 Exterior & 3 Interior. The restaurant business is booming for the Frye family of Rose Hill, Kansas. Theres only one problem - well, maybe more than one - the neighbor is crazy and the dog talks! This wacky famly is facing a treacherous villain, Mr. Sour Kraut, who wants the mortgage, but even more, he wants their beautiful daughter Lendy. Who will save the day? It seems the answer lies in the hands, er paws of Trixie the dog. Hope hes not barking up the wrong tree. LITTLE SCHOOL HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE - 3m, 3f, 1 non-gender / 1 Interior & Exterior. Things cant get much screwier than this tale of woe! The hero is more like a heroine and vice versa. Our female villain is also masquerading as&well a villain. The children run wild, the teacher runs for his life and school superintendent runs everyone crazy, and everyone is bored of education. A real gender bender thats not so tender set in Wachita, Kansas. WHERES THE GOLD? - 6m, 2f, 1 non-gender / 2 Interior. Alaska is known for gold and adventure - well, our story has more adventure than you can shake a prospector at! A bartender named Sam de Milo with no arms, a branded woman, a Canadian Mountie, a drunken housekeeper and a villain who has a heart as cold as an Eskimos igloo. This story has an ending with more turns than&two pretzels playing twister. OLD MCDONALD HAD A FARM - 4m, 3f, 1 non-gender / 2 Interior & 2 Exterior . When one of Americas last farms is in danger of being taken over by a large poultry processing company, our hero, John Deere, is taken in under the spell of a company vamp named Holotta Trouble. This farm epic pits the little farmer against Chick Liesome, owner of Liesome products and it gives new meaning to Farm Aid. Set in Independence, Kansas, the fireworks never stop in this bang-up comedy of farm follies.

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Billy Van Zandt, Jane Milmore
High School Reunion
Samuel french London:

Welcome to the 30th Reunion of the Class of '79. Everyone you ever loved, hated, had a crush on, or wanted to punch in the face will be there. They are just older, fatter and angrier. Old scores will be settled, old games will be replayed and new (or should we say old) love will be found. And they will all be singing and dancing to an amazing score by Van Zandt, Milmore & Nick DeGregorio including "I Hope They Know Me," "I Want to Bang Miss Blumquist," "(I'm in a) Garden State of Mind," and the show stopping "I'll Never Dance With You."

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David Birney
Christmas Pudding II, A
Samuel french London:

A Christmas celebration told in songs, stories, poems and tales by Dickens, Mark Twain, Frank McCourt, Emily Dickinson, Alfred Lord Tennyson, A.J. Carothers, and many others collected with a host of traditional carols and holiday songs. This piece provides a perfect evening to warm hearts, stir memories and give laughter during the holiday season.

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Sheila Callaghan
Fever/Dream
Samuel french London:

Chained to his desk in the basement of customer service hell, Segis suddenly finds himself set free in the CEO's penthouse-but is it a dream? This raucous reinvention of Pedro Calderon de la Barca's Life is a Dream gleefully skewers corporate America with razor-sharp wit and the biggest cast ever assembled on Woolly's stage.

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Cusi Cram
Lifetime Burning, A
Samuel french London:

If you had the power to revise your past, what would you change? Who would you be? In A Lifetime Burning, trust fund darling Emma imagines what her life would have been like had she come from a less privileged background. Trouble is, she chronicles her alternate life in a new tell-all 'memoir' that was sold for a hefty advance. When Emma is exposed, will her sister, Tess, stand by her? Or will Emma's deceit destroy their already fractured relationship? This dark comedy brings up questions of legacy, loyalty and what it means to belong.

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Jason Grote
Maria/Stuart
Samuel french London:

Up-and-coming cartoonist Stuart fights to keep the lid on his mother's and aunts' simmering angst. But the family's secrets channel themselves into a bizarre shapeshifter that guzzles soda, communicates by fax, and spouts old German verse. Friedrich Schiller's classic tale of warring queens inspires this gothic romp through the weirder side of suburban America.

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Joe Iconis
ReWrite
Samuel french London:

ReWrite, a musical comedy triple feature is comprised of three wild musicals that connect in surprising and dangerous ways. Nelson Rocks! is a pop/rock show about a young dude who needs to fix his life before the 'You better get to class' bell rings. Populated by adolescents, the show throbs and pulses along a locker-filled hallway, barreling towards its inevitable showdown. Miss Marzipan is a dizzy musical about the life changing preparation that goes into a high stakes dinner party. In this heightened look at the suburban experience, a little bit of blood is spilt, but nothing that some kitchen towels can't clean up. The Process deals with a writer. With a deadline. As the Dunkin Donuts fills with the voices in his head, the writer must conquer his writer's block and finish his musical. The Dunkin Donuts counter lady acts as our guide through this passionate look into one man's writing process.

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Eduardo Machado
Havana Journal
Samuel french London:

In Havana Journal, 2004, Ruth, a disillusioned writer and radical, leaves the halls of American academia to travel to Cuba. She hopes to find people there who share her beliefs and validate her struggle. It's not until her return to Columbia University that she is confronted by the realities of sacrifice and idealism.

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Jane Martin
Somebody/Nobody
Samuel french London:

So you think you want to be famous? So did teen idol and shark-movie star Sheena Keener, the darling of the press, the obsession of the paparazzi, and the Goddess of the 'E! Channel'. But now she can't stand to be looked at anymore and her Godzilla of an agent is on the warpath. When Sheena ends up on the doorstep of naïve newcomer Loli, a recent arrival from Flatt, Kansas, it's a wild ride on the road to fame. Sheena is a somebody who wants to be a nobody. Loli is a nobody desperate to be a somebody. In this hilarious comedy about Hollywood, fame and the TMZ, renowned playwright Jane Martin takes dead aim at our culture of celebrity.

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Carly Mensch
Now Circa Then
Samuel french London:

Meet Julian and Josephine, an immigrant couple on New York's Lower East Side, circa 1890. Meet Gideon and Margie, an unlikely pair of historical reenactors, circa now. A museum tour goes off the rails in this jaunty tale of old places, new beginnings and timeless questions.

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Crystal Skillman
Birthday and Nobody
Samuel french London:

In Birthday, an anxious young woman slips away from a unwelcoming birthday party in a bar only to discover a stranger sitting in the other room. Confiding old secrets and past mistakes as the party rages nearby, they find they may have a chance to forgive themselves and each other. In Nobody six people come together, each for their own reasons, at a restaurant on the Lower East Side. Obsessively going over the events of the day, they grasp at trying to come to terms with their disjointed lives and their singular, unsettling dream.

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Various Authors
Thespian Playworks 2010
Samuel french London:

From the nationally recognized Educational Theatre Association's Thespian Playworks competition come four short scripts with unforgettable heroes  all created by high school-aged playwrights! Included in this volume are: A Backwards Fairytale by Allie Lehnhoff; In Facebook Wii Trust by Lien Le; The Porcelain Vase by Christopher Poore; Splinters by Meg Bradley.

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Daniel Beaty
Emergency & Through the Night
Samuel french London:

In 2006, a slave ship rises out of the Hudson River in front of the Statue of Liberty sending New York into a frenzy. Daniel Beaty assumes 40 diverse personalities as they collide in an intricately woven exploration of our shared humanity and what it means to be free.
nytheatre.com

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Sheila Callaghan
Lascivious Something
Samuel french London:

It's 1980 and Reagan has just been elected. August had fled the country six years prior to be with his beautiful young Greek bride on a secluded Mediterranean island, where he planted a modest vineyard. Now, his young wife his pregnant, his crop is robust, and he is about to have his first tasting. . .when a strange woman in a large-brimmed hat arrives at the couple's guesthouse

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Emily and Beau Bridges
Acting: The First Six Lessons
Samuel french London:

Beau Bridges, winner of three Emmy Awards and two Golden Globes, teams up with his daughter Emily Bridges, a recent college grad, to create this stage version of Richard Boleslavsky's 1933 narrative about a dedicated acting teacher who, while instructing a young actress in her craft, gives her valuable lessons for living as well. Over the course of ten scenes, the action moves from the teacher's studio to a small theater to a film set to Central park and back, and finally, to a moving denouement atop the Empire State Building in 1936.

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Madeleine George
Zero Hour, The
Samuel french London:

Rebecca and her chronically unemployed butch girlfriend, O, have created a happy nest in their run-down walk-up in Queens, but things are starting to unravel. The more O pushes Rebecca to stop hiding their relationship, the more Rebecca's work lifewriting a textbook for seventh graders about the Holocaust begins to bleed into her personal life: She starts meeting World War II Nazis on the 7 train, passing as hipster professionals in New York City but hungry to come out about who they really are. Back home in Queens, O is also sparring with convincingly real visions: her long estrangedand recently dead?mother keeps showing up to argue with her about her choices. This almost-love story explores the relationship between honesty and cruelty: How do you tell the truth about yourself when that truth might devastate the people you love? A tour-de-force for two actors playing eight different roles.

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Michael Golamco
Year Zero
Samuel french London:

Vuthy Vichea is sixteen years old, Cambodian American. He loves hip hop and Dungeons and Dragons. He has thick-ass glasses. He is a weird kid in a place where weirdness can be fatal: Long Beach, California. Since his best friend moved and his mother died, the only person he can talk to is a human skull he keeps hidden in a cookie jar. Year Zero is a comedic drama about young Cambodian Americans - about reincarnation, reinvention, and ultimately, redemption.

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Jeff Gould
It's Just Sex
Samuel french London:

With the kids away, three married couples get together for an evening of relaxation and laughs. But as the liquor flows and secrets are revealed, trust is tested and boundaries are broken. It's Just Sex is a comedic and thought-provoking look at fidelity, lust, communication, and what it really takes for a marriage to survive and thrive. By the end of the evening, what should have been just an innocent party turns into an event that changes all three relationships forever.

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Jordan Hall
Kayak
Samuel french London:

Alone on a vast stretch of water, Annie Iversen recounts the strange chain of events that left her stranded in her son's old kayak. A doting suburban mother, Annie is blindsided when her son, Peter, falls in love with Julie, a passionate environmental activist. Unable to reconcile herself to Julie's radical worldview, Annie struggles desperately to keep Peter from falling further into the young woman's dangerous world. Climate change, S'mores, SUVs, and Noah's Ark are all onstage as Annie sets out to save her son, and unwittingly throws herself into the path of events larger than she ever could have imagined. Touching and provocative, Kayak invites us all to confront our choices in the landscape of the growing environmental crisis.

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Keith Huff
Steady Rain, A
Samuel french London:

Joey and Denny have been best friends since kindergarten, and after working together for several years as policemen in Chicago, they are practically family: Joey helps out with Denny's wife and kids; Denny keeps Joey away from the bottle. But when a domestic disturbance call takes a turn for the worse, their friendship is put on the line. The result is a difficult journey into a moral gray area where trust and loyalty struggle for survival against a sobering backdrop of pimps, prostitutes, and criminal lowlifes. A dark duologue filled with sharp storytelling and biting repartee, A Steady Rain explores the complexities of a lifelong bond tainted by domestic affairs, violence, and the rough streets of Chicago.

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John Hancock and Dorothy Tristan
Brother, The
Samuel french London:

Written by noted stage and film director John Hancock, The Brother is the largely untold story of the Rosenberg spy case, based on the book by New York Times editor, Sam Roberts. It follows the espionage trial that led to the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, focusing on the memories of Ethel's brother, David Greenglass. He was the spy ring's man inside Los Alamos while America was developing the atomic bomb, and his confession saved his wife from indictment but implicated his sister and her husband, ultimately sending them to the electric chair. In this account, Greenglass admits to lying for the first time about the memory of his sister's role. Recounting this bitter episode in American history, The Brother is a dramatic and cautionary tale of families, state power in times of fear and repression, and the all-too-human capacity for rationalization.

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Gregg Kreutz
Death by Golf
Samuel french London:

When an escaped convict, an anxious bride, a scheming new husband, and a suspicious attorney all convene at Grandpa's house--it doesn't take long for Grandpa to realize he has to reschedule his golf game. This lively combination of uproarious comedy and terrifying murder mystery revolves around the uncanny resemblance between escaped convict Tony and recent bridegroom Prescott (both played by the same actor). Newlywed Ashley's desperate attempt to figure out who is the real murderer is sometimes helped and sometimes hindered by her golf-fanatic grandfather and a mysterious visiting attorney named Muriel.

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Jim Leonard Jr
Battle Hymn
Samuel french London:

the story of 16-year-old Martha's epic pregnancy and her incredible search for motherhood, meaning, and love in a war-torn American landscape. After being abandoned by her father, losing her true love and witnessing the horrors of the Civil War firsthand, Martha settles on one incontrovertible fact: She will not raise her baby in a blood-soaked, violent country. And so, Martha keeps traveling in search of a better world and a safe place to bring forth her child. . . this is easier said than done. From the mud and the blood of Fort Sumter to singing cows, San Francisco and the summer of love, Martha's journey embodies the tragedy, humor and hope that have helped shape the last 150 years of U.S. history.

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Charles Ludlam
Camille
Samuel french London:

Tubercular courtesan Marguerite Gautier abjures her rich lover, Baron De Varville, and sells all her jewels and furnishings to live in the counry with her true love, poor young Armand Duval. Her heart is broken when he agrees to his father's request to abandon him, and returning to her unhealthful life in Paris, she declines rapidly, but is reunited with Armand in a deathbed scene that provokes both laughter and tears.

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Charles Ludlam
Christmas Carol, A
Samuel french London:

A Ridiculous but surprisingly faithful rendition of the Dickens classic in which Ebenezer Scrooge is haunted by the ghosts of his late partner, Jacob Marley, Christmas Past, Christmas Present, and the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come. Faced with his own mortality, and the evil results of his misanthropic, miserly ways, Scrooge is redeemed, reconciled with his nephew and his neighbors, and becomes a second father to his assistant's son, Tiny Tim.

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Charles Ludlam
Jack And The Beanstalk
Samuel french London:

A Ridiculous retelling of the children's classic. All the familiar elements are there, including Jack, his mother, their cow, the magic beans, the beanstalk, the giant, the giantess, the goose that lays the golden eggs, and the harp that talks, but Ludlam adds his usual mix of wordplay and sight gags - and a very light touch of vegetarian and proletarian rabble-rousing - to create a fresh, thought-provoking, utterly delightful stage version of approximately 45 minutes.

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Ken Ludwig
Fox on the Fairway
Samuel french London:

A tribute from Ken Ludwig (Lend Me A Tenor, Moon Over Buffalo) to the great English farces of the 1930s and 1940s, The Fox On the Fairway takes audiences on a hilarious romp which pulls the rug out from underneath the stuffy denizens of a private country club. Filled with mistaken identities, slamming doors, and over-the-top romantic shenanigans, it's a furiously paced comedy that recalls the Marx Brothers' classics. A charmingly madcap adventure about love, life, and man's eternal love affair with. . . golf.

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Nick Jones and Rachel Shukert
Nosemaker's Apprentice: Chronicles of a Medieval Plastic Surgeon
Samuel french London:

A father weaves a magic tale for his daughter to justify his unlicensed plastic surgery practice, tracing the origins of cosmetic surgery to craftsman in medieval Europe. The hero of this tale is Gavin, a young orphan rescued from a dismal existence in the Ivanhoe Workhouse for Criminally Impoverished Boys when he is apprenticed with the local Nosemaker, and who eventually becomes one of the finest surgeons in Vienna, cradle of quack medicine. Using innovative skin grafting techniques and cutting edge alchemy, Gavin and his master seek only to do the Work of the Almighty by restoring small appendages lost to rat bites, dueling, and syphilis. But when they are unable to help a powerful and mutilated knight recently returned from the crusades, they find their feet over the fire...literally. Hilarious, subversive, quasi-historical, and thoroughly debauched. . . a fated collaboration between two innovative (and troubling) writers.

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Matt Pelfrey
John Ball's In the Heat of the Night
Samuel french London:

It's 1962. A hot August night lies heavy over the small town of Argo, Alabama. A dead white man is discovered and the local police arrest a black stranger named Virgil Tibbs. The police discover that their prime suspect is in fact a homicide detective from California. As it happens, Tibbs becomes the racially-tense community's single hope in solving a brutal murder that is turning up no witnesses, no motives, and no clues.

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Ralph Covert and G. Riley Mills
Nutty Nutcracker Christmas, A
Samuel french London:

A rockin' holiday treat from Ralph Covert of 'Ralph's World' and Jeff Award winning playwright G. Riley Mills. A Nutty Nutcracker Christmas is a fun, fresh holiday spectacular for the entire family. Boasting holiday hits like Welcome to Christmas Wood, The Wind-Up Toy Ballet, and crowd favorite Let's Ruin Christmas, this rockin' contemporary adaptation follows Fritz and the Nutcracker through Christmas Wood. When trouble arises with the dastardly Mouse King, Fritz and Nutcracker must save the day.

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Jonathan Tolins
Secrets of the Trade
Samuel french London:

In show business, it's all about who you know. Or is it? Andy Lipman, a smart, ambitious kid from Long Island dreams of a career on Broadway and hopes that his idol, theater legend Martin Kerner, can give it to him. Will Kerner open Andy's door to success, or will their complicated relationship force him to question a life in the theater?

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Kristine L (Vosler) Bauske
Good Old Fashioned Redneck Country Christmas, A: The Musical
Samuel french London:

Lou's Diner is the friendliest place in the south, but this Christmas Eve, Lou and the girls are steamed. Lou's husband, Bill, and his pals Dave and Jimmy have taken off for a day of hunting in the mountains. Dave is married to one of Lou's waitresses while Jimmy is trying to avoid marriage to the other. Seems they want to avoid family issues by getting out of town for the day. With the warm-hearted women hard at work in the diner on Christmas Eve and the men staunchly avoiding the traditional holiday setting back home, we get to witness each group's perspective of the other through the eyes of a stranded truck driver named Bob. Whoever said, "Men are from Mars, and Women are from Venus" must have met this crew! When Mary Sue, the pregnant and poignant stranger gets lost in the woods and ends up having her baby in a cow shed in the middle of a blizzard, the red-neck boys become the most unlikely Wise Men at the Nativity you ever saw! Bob is there to witness it all and give us the narrative of their adventure. The first miracle of Christmas blesses everyone in this tender comedy, and with simplicity and grace, gently reminds the audience of the real reason for the season! Blending a healthy dollop of southern comedy with a pinch of O'Henry's "Gift of the Magi", "A Good Old Fashioned Redneck Country Christmas" is overflowing with infectious high spirits! Laughs abound!

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Charles Busch
Divine Sister, The
Samuel french London:

The Divine Sister is an outrageous comic homage to nearly every Hollywood film involving nuns. Evoking such films as The Song of Bernadette, The Bells of St. Mary's, The Singing Nun and Agnes of God, The Divine Sister tells the story of St. Veronica's indomitable Mother Superior who is determined to build a new school for her Pittsburgh convent. Along the way, she has to deal with a young postulant who is experiencing visions, sexual hysteria among her nuns, a sensitive schoolboy in need of mentoring, a mysterious nun visiting from the Mother House in Berlin, and a former suitor intent on luring her away from her vows. This madcap trip through Hollywood religiosity evokes the wildly comic but affectionately observed theatrical style of the creator of Die, Mommie, Die! and Psycho Beach Party

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Michael Golamco
Cowboy vs Samurai
Samuel french London:

A laugh-out-loud, romantic comedy exploring the sexual dynamics that surface around race when an attractive Korean American woman moves to town. The play is a politically edgy examination of inter-racial dating and identity through irony, humor, and social commentary. Travis Park is a high school English teacher and the only Korean American man living in a dusty cowboy town known as Breakneck, Wyoming. When a gorgeous, whip-smart Asian American woman moves into town, he immediately falls for her; the only problem is that she only dates white men. In this savagely funny and often moving comic re-telling of Edmond Rostand's Cyrano De Bergerac, one man must choose allegiance between his cowboy friend (a dim, handsome, Caucasian P.E. teacher named Del) and his Asian Brother-with-a-Capital-B (crazed, militant Asian of Unknown Origin, Chester). He must choose between the Asian American and the American within himself - between Cowboy Vs. Samurai - in a pursuit of a love that may only be as real as the love letters he writes for someone else.

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Tajlei Levis
Glimpses Of The Moon
Samuel french London:

musical adaptation of the novel by Edith Wharton. The following description is from the show's press release: "Glimpses of the Moon is the first original musical created specifically for the intimate wood-paneled Oak Room of the Algonquin Hotel. Set in 1922, Glimpses of the Moon follows the jazzy whirl of Manhattan society, from champagne-soaked dinner parties to luxurious vacation cottages and back to New York's elegant hotels. Popular but penniless, Suzy Branch and her friend Nick Lansing devise the ultimate fund-raising scheme: to marry and live off the wedding gifts while they help one another find suitable millionaires. The plan works perfectly-until they fall in love."

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Michele Lowe
Inana
Samuel french London:

On the eve of the U.S. invasion of Baghdad, one man, an Iraqi museum curator, plots to save the statue of Inana, Goddess of War, from destruction by the invaders. Fleeing to London with his young bride, he makes a life-altering deal to ensure the statue's preservation. Michele Lowe opens a window of hope and healing with her poignant love story amidst a background of international, and personal, intrigue.

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Adam Mathias
See Rock City and Other Destinations
Samuel french London:

See Rock City & Other Destinations is a contemporary pop-rock musical road trip that ventures to tourist destinations across America, mapping out stories of sightseers in search of fellow travelers: a wanderer believes his destiny is written on rooftops along the North Carolina interstate; a young man yearns to connect with intelligent life in Roswell, New Mexico; a woman at the Alamo steps out of the shadow of her past to take a chance on love; estranged sisters cruise to Glacier Bay to scatter their father's ashes; high school boys face unexpected fears in a Coney Island spook house; and a terrified bride-to-be ponders taking the leap. . .over Niagara Falls. See Rock City & Other Destinations creates a vivid travelogue of moving characters and connections missed and made along the way.

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Walter Mosley
Fall of Heaven, The
Samuel french London:

Tempest Landry, a quick-witted African American man from Harlem, is walking home when a case of mistaken identity leads to his being shot and killed by the police. Denied access to heaven because of what he considers to be a few minor transgressions, Tempest refuses Saint Peter's judgment to go to hell, believing that heaven is refusing to see the full truth of his justified "sins." Stymied, Saint Peter returns Tempest to Manhattan, with a new face and an angel named Joshua to watch over him. As Tempest sets up one morally complex situation after another, Joshua engages him in discussions of situational ethics, trying to get Landry to accept Saint Peter's edict. Can the street-smart Landry outwit his angel. . .and the devil himself?

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Sarah Ruhl
Passion Play, a cycle
Samuel french London:

This intimate epic occurs at the timely intersection of politics and religion. Ruhl dramatizes a community of players rehearsing their annual staging of the Easter Passion in three different eras: 1575 northern England, just before Queen Elizabeth outlaws the ritual; 1934 Oberammergua, Bavaria, as Hitler is rising to power; and Spearfish, South Dakota, from the time of Vietnam through Reagans presidency. In each period, the players grapple in different ways with the transformative nature of art, and politics are never far in the background, as Queen Elizabeth, Hitler, and Reagan each appear, played by a single commanding actor.

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Heidi Schreck
Creature
Samuel french London:

In medieval England, a vain, wealthy young woman named Margery goes mad after the birth of her first child and is tormented by devils for half a year, eight weeks, and four days. Then one night, she is restored to sanity by a vision of Jesus Christ in purple robes. In gratitude, she devotes her life to God, becomes the acolyte of a local friar, and sets about trying to become a saint. Battling her intense appetites for earthly pleasures and her complete unsuitability for religious vocation, she becomes increasingly fanatical, alienating her friends and family and endangering her own life

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Kathryn Walat
Bleeding Kansas
Samuel french London:

A political play set in pre-Civil War Kansas, with contemporary resonance.

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Anthony Wilkinson
My Big Gay Italian Wedding
Samuel french London:

Andrew and Anthony are getting married  and everyone wants to help! My Big Gay Italian Wedding spins into a hysterical fiasco as everyone tries to have their way. From a saboteur ex-boyfriend to a loud, opinionated, outspoken Italian mother, personalities and culture collide in a music and dance-filled extravaganza.

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Kate Aspengren
Blue Yonder
Samuel french London:

A familiar adage states, "Men may work from sun to sun, but women's work is never done." In BIue Yonder, the audience meets twelve mesmerizing and eccentric women including a flight instructor, a firefighter, a stuntwoman, a woman who donates body parts, an employment counselor, a professional softball player, a surgical nurse professional baseball player, and a daredevil who plays with dynamite among others. Through the monologues, each woman examines her life's work and explores the career that she has found. Or that has found her.

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Hannah Bos and Paul Thureen
Buddy Cop 2
Samuel french London:

Two cops...in the kind of quiet little town where a kid dreams of growing up to be a fireman. Or a racecar driver. Where the only question you ask yourself at the end of the day is if you're gonna knock back your cold one at Swanky's, Spanky's, or Zingers. A town where neighbors pitch in to help neighbors in need, and where if you wake up in the middle of the night...you should keep your eyes closed. Because the man in red is there in the corner. Watching you. Smiling at you with his yellow eyes and black teeth. Best to pretend you're still asleep. In this comedic action/mystery of holiday nostalgia and athletic rigor, when a flood destroys the police station, the local cops set up shop in the nearby community center. Mysteries emerge. Criminals are chased. Racquetball is played. In this town, nothing is what it seems...or is it?

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Kia Corthron
Cool Dip in the Barren Saharan Crick, A
Samuel french London:

A Cool Dip offers glimpses into the lives of Abebe, a young Ethopian man with a passion for the unlikely combination of Christianity and ecology, and the family that houses him during his college studies in Maryland. Through their interactions, the play uncompromisingly tackles the issues of drought and social injustice, combining a realistic evocation of human emotion with the fantastical to bring attention to the scarcity of something we so often take for granted: water.

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Allison and Margaret Engel
Red Hot Patriot
Samuel french London:

The story of the unsinkable Molly Ivins, the famously brassy newspaper columnist and best-selling author. A true Texas original, Ivins was a sharp-tongued wit who skewered the political establishment and the "good ol' boys" with her unforgettable humor and wisdom. Written by twin sisters, themselves longtime journalists, the play celebrates Ivins' courage and tenacity  even when a complacent America wasn't listening.

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Christine Evans
Trojan Barbie
Samuel french London:

Past and present violently collide when Lotte, an English tourist who repairs dolls, is captured while on a tour of current-day Troy and flung back into the ancient camp of Euripides' Trojan Women. Lotte Jones, a doll repair expert, needs a vacation. She books herself on a cultural tour for singles and travels with them to modern-day Troy, where she finds more of a change of scene than she'd bargained for she's in the midst of an attack by the Greek army threatening to destroy the last fragments of a mighty civilization. When the camp is torched, the women are enslaved and Lotte is rescued by the British Embassy. Her life returns to normal  until a revenge-obsessed Hecuba claws her way up through the centuries into Lotte's doll shop, in search of her murdered children's bodies. Part contemporary drama, part homage to Euripides' Trojan Women, Trojan Barbie recasts the legendary fall of the city of Troy against the vivid reality of modern warfare. Poetic, compassionate, and tinged with great warmth and humor, Trojan Barbie is an epic war story with a most unlikely heroine, who always looks on the bright side even as past and present collide about her.

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Kathryn Grant
Good Counselor, The
Samuel french London:

The Good Counselor is a new drama about a chosen son's quest for truth. Vincent, a bright young lawyer in the Public Defender department has been assigned to defend a young woman accused of killing her three-week-old son. Hounded by his community and haunted by his past, Vincent struggles to defend both neglectful mothers: his client, and his own. A thought-provoking and beautifully written play, The Good Counselor literally prompts the audience to serve as the jury in determining what it means to be a good parent.

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Tina Howe
Chasing Manet
Samuel french London:

In Tina Howes comedy, Chasing Manet, a rebellious painter from a distinguished family in Boston and an ebullient Jewish woman with a huge adoring family form an unlikely bond. Inside the confining walls of Mount Airy Nursing Home, the two plot an escape to Paris aboard the QE2. But can they possibly pull it off amidst the chaos of their surroundings? The tension and comedy grow as they struggle to take wing for the last time.

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Jordan Allen-Dutton, Jason Catalano, Gregory J. Qaiyum, Erik Weiner
Bomb-Itty Of Errors, The
Samuel french London:

Mix Shakespeare, a DJ and four guys rappin' / Throw on a beat and watch what can happen / A knee slappin', hands-clappin', hip-hoppin' comedy

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Josh Koenigsberg
Al's Business Cards
Samuel french London:

When New Jersey Gaffing Assistant Al Gurvis accidentally gets his new business cards swapped with those of real-estate agent Eileen Lee, he's mildly annoyed. Little does he know that this tiny mix up has sparked a chain reaction which will ultimately ruin his life. A comedy about waking up from the American Dream. A New York Times Critics Pick!

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Deborah Zoe Laufer
Sirens
Samuel french London:

When Sam Abrams first fell in love with Rose he wrote her a song which has been covered by every recording artist and translated to every language. It is heard in every elevator and on every cell phone ringtone. And for twenty-five years, Sam has been looking for the creative spark that this first flush of love had inspired in him  to no avail. Sam and Rose are now celebrating their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary with a cruise in the Mediterranean. And while on this cruise, Sam hears the most sublime music ever heard, jumps overboard, and winds up with a Siren. And there on her island he must struggle with the terrors of middle age, the tortures of creative failure, and the desire to live in his past rather than face his uncertain future. And he must find a way to get home and win his wife back.

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Lisa Rafferty, Stefanie Cloutier and Sheila Eppolito
MOMologues, The
Samuel french London:

This original comedy about motherhood rips away the gauzy mask of parenthood to reveal what all mothers know but don't always talk about: it's overwhelming and exhausting, but also very, very funny. Mothers everywhere can relate to the labor stories, the frustration of a simple trip to the store, the quest to connect with other mothers - and everyone will laugh hysterically at this tribute to "the toughest job you'll ever love."

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Marie Cain, Mark Winkler and Shelly Markham
Too Old for the Chorus, but Not Too Old to be a Star
Samuel french London:

Too Old for the Chorus is a smart, funny musical revue about men and women who find themselves suddenly 50! Set in their neighborhood retro coffee shop, five characters express in 18 musical numbers the gamut of their frustrations and joys  from troublesome relations with still demanding parents and cutting edge technology to finding delight in second careers (and second chances), getting smarter, and finally knowing that "Age is just a Number." The title celebrates life, finding fulfillment and being appreciated for exactly who you are  all while getting a senior discount.

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Rosary O'Neill
Marilyn / God
Samuel french London:

The action takes place n the mind of Marilyn on an empty stage with a chair. In this play, Marilyn confronts voices in her head to validate her life as an actress. She finds in the afterlife that she must audition and interview to get into heaven and that her judges are her enemies and aborted children. Along the way she is confused and intrigued by the signs she must follow to climb her way into heaven. The play explores the multi-levels of complexity of cult goddess Marilyn Monroe--her vulnerability, anger, and loneliness and the ways that American culture and the worship of beauty and fame shaped, aborted and forwarded her rise to stardom. In the afterlife she relives three painful scenes from her life and a life review and strains to justify her choices to male unsympathetic judges as well as shocking people from her past.

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Octavio Solis
Bethlehem
Samuel french London:

A dark work about self-knowledge and the nature of evil, where the devil lives in a godless world. Lee, accompanied by his photographer girlfriend Dru, arrives in El Paso to interview Mateo, (a convicted murderer recently released), over a period of a few days. During the intense interview process, Lee so empathizes with his subjects life in the past that he merges his own past with it in order to reenact it. The bloody conclusion draws upon the dangers of defining the nature of evil.

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Tom Shelton and Susan C. Hunter
Caddie Woodlawn
Samuel french London:

Carol Ryrie Brinks Newberry Award-winning novel Caddie Woodlawn is brought to exuberant life as a musical. Caddie (the iconic, high-spirited Wisconsin pioneer girl beloved by generations of readers) leads her willing siblings in a series of thrilling adventures, not always with the approval of her traditional Bostonian mother. Her father, however, encourages her antics, that she might thrive amidst the new, tougher ways of the West. In a dramatic climax, Caddie single-handedly diffuses a potentially deadly clash between the terrified settlers and the local Dakota tribe through a daring and dangerous act. But her action only deepens her conflict with her mother. Ultimately, Caddie learns invaluable lessons about reconciling the head-strong child shes been, and the responsible adult she is soon to be. Through it all, the sacredness of tradition  passed from one generation to the next  is powerfully dramatized. As one wise friend tells Caddie: Families  theyre our link to forever, lass.

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Lauren D Yee
Ching Chong Chinaman
Samuel french London:

A privileged life. A stable home. Indentured servitude in the name of galactic conquest. Upton Wong has it all. But when his Chinese slave starts romancing his mother, will the Wongs ever learn how to be Asian American?

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Sam Bobrick
Psychic, The
Samuel french London:

Adam Webster, a down-on-his- luck writer, in desperation to make the rent, has put a sign in his apartment window, Psychic Readings $25. The characters it draws in lead into a tangled murder mystery of sorts in this hilarious original comedy.

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Jessica Dickey
Amish Project, The
Samuel french London:

The Amish Project is a fictional exploration of the Nickel Mines schoolhouse shooting in an Amish community, and the path of forgiveness and compassion forged in its wake.

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Eric Fallen
Small Talk: Eight Ten-Minute Plays
Samuel french London:

When a dying mans request for a strawberry milkshake is denied by his long-suffering wife, the couple descend into a battle that could be their last.

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Garson Kanin
Remembering Mr Maugham
Samuel french London:

Remember Mr. Maugham by Garson Kanin is a stage adaptation of his own memoir of the same name. This graceful memoir by Garson Kanin is a treasure trove of private conversations, amusing anecdotes, and candid recollections of his beloved friend and confidant W. Somerset Maugham. Through decades of personal notes and journal entries, Kanin and Maugham poignantly reminisce about life, art and the unconquerable human spirit.

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Buddy Thomas
Spotlight
Samuel french London:

From the author of the hit plays Devil Boys From Beyond and The Crumple Zone comes this hilarious one-act about college theatre majors waiting for the cast list for West Side Story to be posted. . .and the aftermath. A finalist in HBO's New Writer's Workshop and a Second Place winner at American College Theatre Festival, Spotlight is a fast-paced comedy about the desperate drive to succeed, and delusions that get in the way

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Jean Lenox Toddie
Round and Round the Mulberry Bush
Samuel french London:

Two one-act plays by internationally known playwright Jean Lenox Toddie celebrating with poignancy and humor the struggle of the heart to find its way home. Eleven colorful characters range in age from a sassy teen, to a middle-aged professor, to an old woman waiting for a bus. What bus? The bus for which we all will wait.

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Michael Bloom
Emma
Samuel french London:

Pledging never to marry, the mischievous Emma Woodhouse is nevertheless the matchmaker of Highbury. Her newest project, Harriet Smith, has already received a proposal, but Emma insists she marry the eligible vicar Mr. Elton, while, an older family friend, Mr. Knightly, warns her to give up matchmaking. When Emma discovers Mr. Elton is more interested in her, she is forced to fend him off and find another suitor for Harriet. Highbury welcomes two new guests, a mysterious Jane Fairfax and the charming Frank Churchill, and Emma finds herself falling just a little in love with him. Ultimately, she decides that Frank is better suited to Harriet, but when she suggests the match, Emma is astonished to discover that Harriet has fallen for Mr. Knightly. A horrified Emma suddenly realizes she has always been in love with Mr. Knightley. In the end, all is set right as Frank reveals his secret engagement to Jane, Harriet receives a second offer from her first beau, and Mr. Knightley proposes to the deliriously happy Emma.

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Victor L Cahn
Embraceable Me
Samuel french London:

Edward is smart, shy, and quirky. Allison is sexy, dramatic, and vulnerable. Embraceable Me is a witty and touching "He said / She said" that traces the journey of these unlikely friends along many surprising detours and byways.
- nytheatre.com

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Victor L Cahn
Roses in December
Samuel french London:

In this play of letters, a young official in a college alumni off ce invites a celebrated but reclusive author to the thirty-fifth reunion of his class. When he declines, she charmingly prods him, and thereby begins a witty and revelatory correspondence that becomes part mystery, part memory, and part romance.

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Martin Casella
Irish Curse
Samuel french London:

What The Irish Curse is  and how it manifests itself  is the raw centerpiece of this wicked, rollicking and very funny new play. From its blistering language to its brutally honest look at sex and body image, The Irish Curse is a revealing portrait of how men, and society, define masculinity. In doing so, it dares to pose the fundamental question that has been on the minds of men since the beginning of time: Do I measure up to the next guy? Size matters to a small group of Irish-American men (all professionally successful New Yorkers) who meet every Wednesday night, in a Catholic church basement, at a self-help group for men with small penises. This alleged Irish trait is the focus of their weekly sessions, as they all feel this "shortcoming" has ruined their lives. One evening, when a twenty-something blue-collar guy joins the group, he challenges everything the other men think about "the Irish Curse" ...tackling their obsession with body image and unmasking the comical and truthful questions of identity, masculinity, sex and relationships that men must face every day in the world.

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Mart Crowley
Avec Schmaltz
Samuel french London:

A divorced couple who cannot live with each other - or live without each other

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Mart Crowley
Remote Asylum
Samuel french London:

In the heat of a blazing summer, three physically and spiritually exhausted Americans: Tom, a famous tennis pro; Dinah, his beautiful, cosmopolitan, not-yet divorced lover; and their mutual pal, Michael, a gay writer (first introduced in The Boys in the Band), try to "get away from it all" by visiting Dinahs enormously wealthy retired friends - the older, imperious Irene and her terminally ill husband, Ray - at their fabulous cliff-side villa on an island in the Mediterranean. But it turns out to be far from the perfect, restorative holiday they were so desperately seeking. This odyssey has not brought them or their hosts anywhere near the paradise they were seeking, but rather to an inferno where a painful, purgatorial breakthrough occurs, releasing them all and providing true escape from this distant and deceptively idyllic haven. Remote Asylum is a play which observes the classical unities of time, place and action, which remorselessly exposes a group of bruised souls - wanderers all, and forces them to deal with their fears of loneliness and mortality, to open past emotional wounds not yet healed. The event is one of forceful, dynamic transfiguration; the conversation is intelligent and adult, both witty and grave, best described as a kind of orchestrated tone poem.

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J Michael DeAngelis, Pete barry * John Dowgin
Accidents Happen
Samuel french London:

Seven of The Porch Room's best short plays collected together into an evening of comedy that proves that no matter what you plan for - accidents happen.

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Emily DeVoti
Milk
Samuel french London:

Rural New England just before Reagan's second term. Meg and Ben are a creditor away from losing their family farm. To the rescue flies a high-powered businessman-in a private chopper no less-offering a tidy sum for a taste of farm life and the pure, raw milk that goes with it. Even before locavores roamed the earth, back to the land was hardly as simple as its promise; livestock and humans aren't known for behaving as expected. And so it is in Milk, an elegant parable of change set on the cusp of a shifting American landscape.
- nytheatre.com

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Gino Diiorio
Dead Ringer
Samuel french London:

The action of the play takes place in 1885 in Sunset Valley, Texas where Tyrus Cole, a crusty, ill-tempered horse trainer lives on a ranch with his invalid sister, Mary. Because he is unable to watch her during the day, Mary is confined to a root cellar. Enter Dwight Foley, a young stranger seeking help with his horse. His arrival soon upsets the delicate balance between brother and sister, and the three find themselves trapped in a complex web of intrigue, greed and secrets.
- nytheatre.com

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Five Lesbian Brothers
Oedipus at Palm Springs
Samuel french London:

Irreverent theater group the Five Lesbian Brothers get their greasy prints on a classic. Oedipus at Palm Springs follows the dark adventure of two couples on a retreat to the desert resort town. While new parents Fran and Con try desperately to jump-start their sex life, May-December love bunnies Prin and Terri can't keep their hands off each other. What begins as a hilarious, boozey weekend takes a horrific turn after a secret is revealed. Two parts comedy with a shot of tragedy shaken over ice, Oedipus at Palm Springs is a brave examination of the messy guts of relationships.

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Chris Grabenstein
Curiosity Cat
Samuel french London:

"To my way of thinking, there are no such things as strays; only those who have not yet found their homes." From the imaginative mind of award winning TYA author Chris Grabenstein comes a very funny, very touching new comedy filled with laughter, learning, and heart that's ideal for school groups and professional children's theatres.Curiosity Cat is the play-within-the-book from Grabenstein's award-winning novel for middle grades readers The Hanging Hill. It's a story bout displaced children and homeless cats as well as family and the value of curiosity. When their mother becomes very ill Claire and Charlie are forced to live with their father's Aunt Jenny. A stray cat named Curiosity also wanders into the house. When he breaks Claire's prized music box, she immediately throws him back out into the streets. Being homeless is an adventure, not a concern, for a cat this curious and cool. Soon, the children (with Fred the dog) set out to rescue Curiosity Cat who is busily trying to help other forlorn felines find homes while simultaneously avoiding a newly appointed "cat catcher" who vows to put him to sleep! Filled with memorable characters -- such as Coot, the geriatric cat; Slicker the big city alley cat; Penelope, the pampered Persian Princess; Fred the extremely loyal dog; a nervous and nutty squirrel; a chorus of cute jailbird strays; and the evil cat catcher Skeevelberger -- the play builds to a funny and touching climax that will leave audiences laughing and cheering!

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Rob Handel
Aphrodisiac
Samuel french London:

Congressman Dan Ferris is being questioned about the disappearance of intern Ilona Waxman. Sound awkward? Imagine if he was your dad. . .

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Rob Handel
Millicent Scowlworthy
Samuel french London:

A girl found murdered in the cellar on Christmas morning. A massacre at the high school. The grownups of the community want to forget, but the children have begun to meet in the middle of the night to remember. Nine teenagers gather at an overgrown memorial and reenact the story.

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Matt Hoverman
Christmas Shorts
Samuel french London:

A celebrated Winner of the 2009 Samuel French Off Off Broadway Short Play Festival, playwright Matt Hoverman brings an evening of hilarious short holiday comedies to the stage. A wonderful alternative for theatres tired of mounting the traditional seasonal play, Christmas Shorts offers five original plays that humorously comment on holiday themes: family, the nativity, Xmas cards, and elves. An outstanding Christmas collection for any theatre! Included are the plays: Going Home, The Christmas Witch, Xmas Cards, Nativity, and the Samuel French Festival award-winning play The Student .

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Walton Jones
1940s Radio Christmas Carol, A
Samuel french London:

The long-awaited sequel to the popular The 1940's Radio Hour. Its Christmas Eve, 1943, and the Feddington Players are now broadcasting from a hole-in-the-wall studio in Newark, NJ, and set to present their contemporary take on Dickenss A Christmas Carol. Whether its the noisy plumbing, missed cues, electrical blackouts, or the over-the-top theatrics of veteran actor, but radio novice, William St. Claire, this radio show is an entertaining excursion into the mayhem and madness of a live radio show. St. Claires escalating foibles and acting missteps propel the show to a simultaneously comedic and heart-wrenching dramatic climax: St. Claire has an on-air breakdown, and begins to connect his own life with that of the classic Dickens tale. In order to save the show, the company improvises an ending to Charles Dickens classic as a film noir mystery, featuring a hardboiled detective, a femme fatale, and an absurd rescue of Tiny Tim (and the Lindbergh baby) from the clutches of a Hitler-esque villain named Rudolf! High School Musical lyricist Faye Greenberg and composer David Wohl have written four delightful period songs for the Feddington Players, and swing arrangements of many Christmas standards. Seamlessly combining drama and comedy, heartbreak and hope, The 1940's Radio Christmas Carol will sing its way into your heart. If you enjoyed 1940's Radio Hour, step back in time once again with the Feddington Players, and get into the holiday spirit with The 1940's Radio Christmas Carol

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Craig Lucas
Prayer For My Enemy
Samuel french London:

In Prayer for My Enemy, a hell of a night for the Noones finds father Austin watching his nature shows and trying to keep from falling off the wagon, mother Karen keeping an eye on Austin, son Billy just back from Iraq, and pregnant daughter Marianne upset about the state of her marriage to Tad, Billy's childhood friend who may still harbor a crush on him. As an enigmatic outsider, Dolores (Victoria Clark), relates a tale of taking responsibility for her ailing mother, an American family's long-held secrets are dragged to the fore in what may be its final reckoning. Prayer for My Enemy is a paean to our age, a keenly-layered drama about the preciousness of life and the grace to share common ground-even with those we love the least
- press release

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Scott Martin
Little Green Men
Samuel french London:

Several young campers and their adult counselors are stranded at a mountaintop wilderness retreat on the night of October 30th, 1938. When someone switches on the radio to Orson Welles' War Of The Worlds live broadcast, the night that panics America also becomes the night that panics Camp gitchiegoomie. Are little green men from Mars actually surrounding the mess hall, ready to make a mess of everyone inside? Can the feuding boys and girls work together to save themselves from the mysterious alien invasion? And why is that strange hairy, bug-eyed monster lurking in the bushes? This hilarious, family-friendly musical recreates the innocent fun and slapstick humor of the wise-cracking, high-spirited film comedies of the late 1930s, complete with spooky campfires, ghostly shadows, hair-raising Halloween surprises and the scariest radio play of all time that nearly fooled the entire nation. The lively, toe-tapping original songs are fondly reminiscent of the popular scores from the golden age of the Warner Brothers and MGM film musicals with plenty of high-kicking, energetic and imaginative choreography in the unforgettable styles of Busby Berkeley, Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly

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Gabe McKinley
Extinction
Samuel french London:

This is a play about what transpires between two college buddies whose annual outing of male-bonding and debauchery veers precipitously off course when unmet expectations spiral into a volatile showdown. James Roday, star of the hit television series Psych, and Michael Weston of TV's House play the two friends, reprising roles they created this past fall in Los Angeles at the Elephant Space Theatre.
- nytheatre.com

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Stephen Metcalfe
Loves And Hours
Samuel french London:

Love. Age. Perspective. The wisdom learned of experience. The innocence and impatience of youth. Thrills. Romance. Movies, wine, antiques and rock and roll. Loves & Hours is the story of Dan Tilney; newly divorced, empty nester, and a man now totally at a loss as to what to do with the rest of his life. His friends know. Dan needs a girl. But will it be Charlotte, beautiful, bursting with life and twenty years his junior? Or will it be Julia; his life long friend and confidant. And what about his teenage son who is having an affair with a neighbor? And his ex-wife who has announced shes gay? What about his best friend, Harold,who is going through a mid-life crisis and his daughter, Rebecca, who is seemingly furious with everything and everyone. In this gentle comedy, life and love are complicated for young and not so young alike.

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Allison Moore
Slasher
Samuel french London:

When she's cast as the "last girl" in a low-budget slasher flick, Sheena thinks it's the big break she's been waiting for. But news of the movie unleashes her malingering mother's thwarted feminist rage, and Mom is prepared to do anything to stop filming. . .even if it kills her.

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Julie Marie Myatt
Happy Ones, The
Samuel french London:

Orange County, California, 1975. For Walter Wells, its the happiest place on earth. He has a beautiful wife. Two great kids. A house with a pool. Contentment. Until fate strikes a devastating blow, leaving Walter with no reason to put the pieces of his life back together. He resists attempts to help, especially the unexpected  and unwanted  offer from a Vietnamese refugee named Bao Ngo, who bears his own sadness. Then, across a cultural divide, Walter and Bao find a game to share, a song, a meal and then a way back in this uplifting  and surprisingly funny  new play by a rising star in American theatre.

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Theresa Rebeck
Our House
Samuel french London:

Are news and entertainment interchangeable? A cocksure TV bigshot faced with dwindling ratings installs Americas favorite news anchor as host of a popular reality show. Meanwhile, in Middle America, a houseful of roommates bickers over high-stakes real-world conflicts: Merv doesnt clean the bathroom. Someone ate Alices yogurt. And the rent is long past due. When reality collides with reality TV, we find ourselves front and center in a drama that holds the nation riveted. Our House is a deliciously scathing new comedy that takes on a media-obsessed culture intent on turning even the most sobering crisis into sexy entertainment.

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Jason Wells
Perfect Mendacity
Samuel french London:

Walter Kreutzer, a microbiologist for a defense contractor, is being investigated by his employers over an incriminating memo that was leaked to the media. Walter thinks his Moroccan wife may have done the whistle-blowing, and to protect her - and himself - Walter needs to learn how to beat a lie detector, and fast. D'avore Peoples, a polygraph consultant, is happy to help - for a price, of course. But D'avore's technique will require Walter to look deep within himself, a terrifying prospect for a man hiding from his past. With his best friend spying on him, his wife intent on opening old wounds, and D'avore uncovering dark secrets, Walter's desperate journey toward the perfect lie becomes a spiral into paranoia and bitter reckoning.

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David Adjmi
Stunning
Samuel french London:

Set in the insular Syrian-Jewish community in Midwood, Brooklyn, Stunning tells the story of Lily, a teenager newly married to a much older man, whose sheltered life is disrupted when Blanche enters her life.
- press release

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Five Lesbian Brothers
Brave Smiles. . . Another Lesbian Tragedy
Samuel french London:

In Brave Smiles. . .Another Lesbian Tragedy, master satirists the Five Lesbian Brothers turn their merciless eyes on the history of lesbians in theater, film, and literature. From their dismal yet erotically charged beginnings at the orphanage under the grip of a sadistic headmistress, our five heroines cross continents and a century to face their absurdly tragic ends. Along the way, they experience alcoholism, suicide, loneliness, pill popping, blacklisting, and a malignant brain tumor. Students of the lesbian art of misery will recognize gleeful skewerings of The Well of Loneliness, The Group, Maedchen in Uniform, and The Children's Hour in this rollicking, hilarious, and smart multicharacter classic.

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Five Lesbian Brothers
Secretaries, The
Samuel french London:

If Russ Mayer and John Carpenter were characters on The L Word, had a baby and moved to Stepford, perhaps that child would dream up this play. Luckily, such a fantastic turn of events is unnecessary, as the Five Lesbian Brothers have already undertaken this feat in writing The Secretaries. The play bridges the gaps between hilarious and horrifying as the slim-fast slurping secretaries at Coony Lumber Mill in Big Bone, Oregon, induct Patty, the new girl, into their ritualistic world of female empowerment. They count their calories, workout till it hurts, and dress to impress. They wear their hair big and their heels high. They work together and play together and once a month they slaughter a lumberjack together
- press release

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Jim Geoghan
Two Gentlemen Of Corona
Samuel french London:

In this world-premiere comedy, it's 1963 and Joey and Carmine are low-level soldiers in the New York mob. Joey services juke boxes and vending machines. . .Carmine makes two runs a week to South Carolina for illegal cigarettes. But things are looking up for the pair. The 1964 World's Fair is just around the corner and these Two Gentlemen of Corona are plotting to help their boss, John, swindle thousands of foreign tourists. It looks like nothing can stand in their way. . .oh, except for the fact that Joey is falling in love with his boss's mistress!

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Jack Kyrieleison
Reunion: A Musical Epic in Miniature
Samuel french London:

A moving musical narrative of the Civil War, told in the words of the very diverse men and women who sided with the Union. Presented as a musical entertainment years after the events by the rag-tag company of actor Harry Hawk, the man who stood alone on stage when Lincoln was shot by Booth. Reunion is an attempt to tell the story of the Civil War through the eyes of those who took up the Union cause--an intersection of theatre and history, weaving together songs, visual images and dialogue. It is designed as a Victorian entertainment--the great American epic as it might have been told by a 19th-Century Homer and a wandering company of actors.

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David Mamet
Race
Samuel french London:

about a pair of lawyers trying to decide whether to take on the case of a rich white man accused of raping a black woman. Mamet has said that the "theme is race and the lies we tell each other on the subject."

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Jane Milmore
Wrong Window!
Samuel french London:

Van Zandt and Milmore pay tribute to Master of Horror Alfred Hitchcock, with this comedy whodunit. Off-and-on New York couple Marnie and Jeff enter an even more complicated phase of their relationship when they think they spy their cross-courtyard neighbor do away with his wife. After they draw their torn curtain, the lady vanishes, and suspicion places murder beyond a shadow of a doubt. The bumbling witnesses sneak into their neighbor's apartment - 39 steps away - and the fun begins. Among multiple door-slammings, body-snatchings, and a frantic flashlight chase scene, two questions remain: Who killed Lila Larswald? And. . . if she's not dead. . .then who is? The crazy farce plays out on a shadow-box set that allows the audience to be present in one apartment, while viewing the action in its mirror-image neighboring unit across the way.

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Matt Morillo
American Soldiers
Samuel french London:

In American Soldiers, a new play by Matt Morillo, the patriarch of a politically prominent Long Island family fights to hold the family together when his eldest daughter, an Army veteran, returns from the Middle East for an uneasy homecoming. The girl, emotionally scarred from her military service, is struggling to take her ex-boyfriend and sister away with her to start a new life in Colorado. Her aim is to liberate them of the hometown influences of society, religion, and class that led her to enlist.
- nytheatre.com

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Laurence Roman
Moving Mountains
Samuel french London:

(Formerly titled Grapes and Raisins.) Charlie is a 65 year-old widower-turned-Casanova who spends his days pursuing ladies on a beach in Southern California. But he's not interested in those younger girls; he's after "mature women", those who've built up history, depth, and loss. Charlie offers his companionship and insights, and they're all too happy to accept his advances. That is, until he meets Polly, a recent widow who doesn't make things easy for this suitor. Humor is also added by Charlie's daughter, who's shocked to hear about his romantic gallivanting.

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Tanya Shaffer
Baby Taj
Samuel french London:

The legendary Taj Mahal is the next assignment for Rachel, an American travel writer whose failed romances have led her to ask: Why not have the baby she craves - on her own? She finds unexpected answers  and larger questions - among the glittering legacies of India's past. Alive with the sounds and colors of a remarkable country, this bittersweet comedy of mischievous matchmaking raises provocative questions about love, friendship, family, and what it means to be ready to be a parent.

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Phil Willmott
Jason and the Argonauts
Samuel french London:

based on the classic tale. This ancient legend has enchanted people of all ages inspiring 1950s Hollywood, modern game designers and storytelling down the centuries. This brand new version especially conceived for the Scoop at More London injects a little brainiac science into the mix too to keep modern kids intrigued and on their toes. Expect all the knockabout comedy, toe-tapping songs, ingenious puppetry and summer fun that make the Steam Industry's free family shows an unmissable teatime treat in The Scoop at More London.
- British Theatre guide

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Steven Yockey
Large Animal Games
Samuel french London:

This incisive, unexpected, and larger than life tale of sex, love, and self delusion tracks the overlapping escapades of a group of friends old enough to know better in love but still naive enough to mess things up anyway, and the man who supplies them with equal parts tough love, lingerie and self awareness. In a series of fluid scenes, Large Animal Games takes a comically skewed and razor-sharp look at modern relationships through a mix of bullfights, big game hunting and intimate apparel.

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Marsha Norman
Secret Garden, The
Samuel french London:

The long-awaited new 70-minute version of the beloved musical is as beautiful and spirited as the original in just half the time. Adapted by Marsha Norman from her Tony-award winning book, it tells the story of Mary Lennox, orphaned in India, who returns to Yorkshire to live with an embittered, reclusive uncle and his invalid son. On the estate, she discovers a locked garden filled with magic, a boy who talks to birds, and a cousin she brings back to health by putting him to work in the garden. The original chorus of ghosts has been replaced with a chorus of Readers, who sit onstage and watch the musical unfold before their eyes, singing in most scenes, and even participating as desired in the storm scene at the end of the first act, and the frolic in the Night Garden. Lucy Simons music, some of the most beautiful ever written for Broadway, has made this tale of regeneration a favorite for almost 20 years. This new "Spring Version" promises to be a treasure for children and adults.

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Jane Anderson
Quality Of Life, The
Samuel french London:

Explores hot-button issues of life and death. When a religious Midwestern couple, Bill and Dinah, visit free-spirited cousin Jeannette and her husband, Neil, in their Northern California home, both couples confront loss and survival in the face of explosive circumstance.

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Rachel Axler
Smudge
Samuel french London:

about the changing face of the American family and the limits of love and cheesecake, as a hopeful young couple gives birth to a smudge.
- nytheatre.com

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Carole Caplan-Lonner
Kids Left. The Dog Died. Now What?, Th
Samuel french London:

As introduced on NBC's TODAY show, The Kids Left. The Dog Died. Now What? is a musical comedy that salutes those valiantly struggling with divorce on their hands, gravity on their bodies, grandchildren on their self-images and the dating scene on their egos. The risks and uncertainties of being alive come alive through song and scene. Aging gracefully is the final frontier! This entertaining musical about baby boomers facing a host of midlife crisis first premiered at the New York Musical Theatre Festival in 2007. Boasting a four-person cast, the show takes a humorous and heartfelt look at the day-to-day concerns of the over-50 'empty-nester' crowd including everything from retirement and AARP-dating - to divorce, plastic surgery and grandparenting.

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Cusi Cram
Dusty and the Big Bad World
Samuel french London:

Dusty is the most popular animated character on children's television. But when Dusty goes to visit a family with two Daddies, the big bad world brings the hammer down hard and things get decidedly adult. DUSTY AND THE BIG BAD WORLD is a hilarious, no-holds barred dramatization of the clash between freedom of speech, art (or at least children's TV), and politics.

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Katherine DiSavino
Nana's Naughty Knickers
Samuel french London:

Bridget and her Grandmother are about to become roommates. However, what Bridget saw as a unique opportunity to stay with her favorite Nana in New York for the summer quickly turns into an experience shell never forget. It seems her sweet Grandma is running an illegal boutique from her apartment, selling hand-made naughty knickers to every senior citizen in the five borough area! Will Bridget be able to handle all the excitement? Will her Nana get arrested - or worse! - evicted?

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David Foley
Deadly Murder (as If/Then)
Samuel french London:

It's got everything you associate with the venerable dinner theatre's thriller oeuvre - recognisable faces in the cast, a high standard of realism in the set design, guns and knives in the props cupboard, and blackmail, murder, cross and double cross aplenty in the script.
- Matt Boothman, British Theatre Guide

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Karl Gajdusek
Fubar
Samuel french London:

Mary and David live in a small apartment crammed full of boxes her abused mother left behind. When Mary is the victim of random violence, it leads the two of them down different paths of addiction and reconciliation. Meanwhile, Richard is a benevolent drug dealer working on a book while Sylvia uses the internet to lead a double life. These four people try to recognize the people they have become in a time that is totally FUBAR

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Bruce W Gilray
And Then There Was Nun
Samuel french London:

. . .And Then There Was Nun is written in the style of a classic 1940's murder mystery; and is a blend of humor and who-dun-it as the actors emulate iconic movie stars of the past. Take one foreboding mansion on a secluded island, throw in ten whacked-out members of The Holy Order of the Sisters of San Andreas, stir in their unseen and mysterious leader, add an assortment of the sharpest tongues this side of Hollywood and Vine; then infuse with a healthy dose of some of the most famous lines in cinema (slightly warped). Roast well in a preheated treasure trove of movie facts, trivia, legends and gossip for two acts, sit back and savor. . . .And Then There Was Nunis a treat for movie buffs and non-movie buffs alike. Actors who take on the personas parodied in this play will be creatively challenged to mold their performances with the mannerisms and vocal styles of famous actors of the past, having an amazingly fun experience along the way.

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Aditi Brennan Kapil
Love Person
Samuel french London:

A four part love story in Sanskrit, ASL and English, Through Sanskrit, American Sign Language, and English, two sisters and their partners search for human contact and for love. Is it possible for two languages to fall in love, or for love to survive without communication? And does sex really trump words?
- http://www.aatrevue.com

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Arthur Laurents
Come Back, Come Back, Wherever You Are
Samuel french London:

Come Back, Come Back, Wherever You Are, a play by the widely-acclaimed, Tony Award-winning theatre legend Arthur Laurents, is an intimate, emotional drama about a cabaret singer coping with the devastating death of her husband, while trying to navigate her overbearing, controlling mother-in-law and the aggressive advances of a sexually persistent, handsome, new suitor. Recently widowed Sara must comes to terms with her husband's death but is haunted by visions of him. Her fixation on his posthumous messages dampens her historically lukewarm relationship with Marion, her therapist mother-in-law, who is disturbingly pragmatic about the passing of her son. Sara's grief is also altered by Michelle, her under-appreciated sister-in-law, who is struggling both with her sexual identity and her relationship to her deceased brother. All is complicated by Dougal, a picture framer who is struck by the earnest Sara. Come Back, Come Back, Wherever You Are is a gripping drama about grief and the ability of a family to cope with loss. But at its heart, it is a play about love

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EM Lewis
Song of Exticntion
Samuel french London:

Max a High School student is falling of the edge of the world and only his biology teacher has noticed.

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Frank McGuinness
Gates Of Gold
Samuel french London:

Inspired by the lives of Hilton Edwards and Michéal MacLiammóir, the two founders of The Gate Theatre, Gates of Gold is about a marriage, a theatre starting and a life ending. The play explores the magic of theatre and the imagination, and addresses questions of sexuality, gender confusion and human mortality.

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Richard Montoya
Palestine, New Mexico
Samuel french London:

Rumors, Secrets, Sand and Blood. U.S. Army Captain Catherine Siler journeys to the New Mexico reservation home of Private First Class Raymond Birdsong on a search for answers. The questionable circumstances surrounding Ray's death in Afghanistan create a crisis of conscience for the captain giving her no choice but to re-examine her own life along the way.

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Phil Olson
Polyester - The Musical
Samuel french London:

It's "Mamma Mia" meets "Spinal Tap." Polyester The Musical is the story of The Synchronistics, an over-the-hill, ABBA wannabe group that re-unites after 20 years to perform at a public access TV Telethon. It was 1979, and The Synchronistics were big. Johnny Carson big. Their hit single, "Better Together" rose to #2 on the Billboard Charts. Then something terrible happened that drove the group apart. And now, twenty years later, they're back together to perform at the WKLN public access TV Telethon. Will they overcome their differences, act professionally, and help save WKLN from going under? Probably not. But, you never know what to expect when this dysfunctional group gets together...one last time! Featuring 16 Original 70's Songs including, "The Funk Train," and "Bump Your Booty Rump."

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Sarah Ruhl
In the Next Room, or the Vibrator Play
Samuel french London:

In the Next Room or the vibrator play is a comedy about marriage, intimacy, and electricity. Set in the 1880s at the dawn of the age of electricity and based on the bizarre historical fact that doctors used vibrators to treat 'hysterical' women (and some men), the play centers on a doctor and his wife and how his new therapy affects their entire household. In a seemingly perfect, well-to-do Victorian home, proper gentleman and scientist Dr. Givings has innocently invented an extraordinary new device for treating 'hysteria' in women (and occasionally men): the vibrator. Adjacent to the doctor's laboratory, his young and energetic wife tries to tend to their newborn daughter - and wonders exactly what is going on in the next room. When a new 'hysterical' patient and her husband bring a wet nurse and their own complicated relationship into the doctor's home, Dr. and Mrs. Givings must examine the nature of their own marriage, and what it truly means to love someone.

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Jill Santoriello
Tale Of Two Cities, A
Samuel french London:

When Dr. Manette is released from the French Bastille after 17 years, he must be resurrected from the brink of madness by his daughter, Lucie. In England they meet two very different men: the exiled French aristocrat, Charles Darnay, whom Lucie marries, and the drunken cynic, Sydney Carton. Soon family secrets and political intrigue combine to draw Lucie and her family back to Paris. At the height of the Reign of Terror, the musical finds an unlikely hero in Carton
- press release

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Stephen Sislen
Midnight Ride of Paul Revere, The
Samuel french London:

The story of how a simple colonial silversmith became a radical revolutionary and a hero. Fun and fast-paced

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Jeffrey Sweet
Flyovers
Samuel french London:

Flyovers is a play about a film critic who finds himself caught up in a culture clash of economics, sex, and long-submerged resentment when he returns to the small Ohio town where he grew up.

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Sarah Treem
Mirror Mirror
Samuel french London:

A high school Homecoming dance in the south. In the bathroom Gretchen Black, the most popular girl in school, lights a cigarette and asks the mirror on the wall whos the fairest of them all. The mirror shows her a horrible witch instead of her own reflection. Gretchen puts the cigarette out in her armpit and the witch disappears. Moments later a mysterious new girl named Rose White arrives at Homecoming. She has no hips or chest to speak of, but her skin shines white as snow and her lips are as red as the rose. Shes after Gretchens boyfriend, Badger Biers. In this dark comedy, based on Snow White, ten teenagers love, lose, betray and revenge each other over one autumnal weekend in a kingdom far, far away. It is a precarious landscape where magic lurks behind make-up, mirrors and memories.

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Jaston Williams
Red, White and Tuna
Samuel french London:

The much anticipated third installment in the Tuna trilogy takes the audience through another satirical ride into the hearts and minds of the polyester-clad citizens of Texas' third smallest town. Along with Tuna's perennial favorites, some new Tuna denizens burst into the 4th of July Tuna High School Class Reunion. This sets the stage for a show full of fireworks and fun from the land where the Lion's Club is too liberal and Patsy Cline never dies. It's been several years since we left Bertha and Arles dancing at the end of A Tuna Christmas...Did the romance blossom? Has Didi Snavley received any "cosmic" communications from R.R.'s UFO? Did Stanley make his fortune in the Alburquerque taxidermy business? These and other burning questions will be asked and answered in the side-splitting spoof of life in rural America.

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Thomas Bradshaw
Dawn
Samuel french London:

Dawn revolves around Hampton, an abusive alcoholic who has completely alienated his wife and children. Can he stop drinking and make up for the past, even amidst some very dark revelations of incest and pedophilia? Dawn is one father's story of redemption and reconciliationwith a twist
- press release

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Thomas Bradshaw
Southern Promises
Samuel french London:

When the master of the plantation dies, he wills his slaves to be freed, but his wife doesn't think that good property should be squandered. Pandemonium ensues. The play pulls from the true stories of slave narratives from The Great Escapes including that of Henry Box Brown, a 19th century Virginia slave who escaped to freedom by arranging to have himself mailed to Philadelphia abolitionists in a dry goods container. Southern Promises provides a unique portrait of the Old South
- press release

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George Brant
Elephant's Graveyard
Samuel french London:

Elephant's Graveyard is the true tale of the tragic collision of a struggling circus and a tiny town in Tennessee, which resulted in the only known lynching of an elephant. Set in September of 1916, the play combines historical fact and legend, exploring the deep-seated American craving for spectacle, violence and revenge.

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Cat Delaney
Welfarewell
Samuel french London:

Esmerelda Quipp is 80, still of sound mind, but her body is beginning to 'come unglued', as she puts it. Having spent her working life as an actress, age pushing her gradually out of the business, she now faces the fact that her meagre government pension is insufficient to support her, even with her minimal needs. When she is arrested for attempting to bury her dead cat in her landlord's yard, she finds that there is some sense of community, not to mention free room and board, within the prison system. She devises a plan to get herself sent back to jail; she robs a bank. But a well-meaning public defender gets the charges against her dropped. Esmerelda Quipp is undeterred! Using money she gets from returning stolen wine bottles to a recycling depot, she buys a toy gun at the local dollar store, and commits armed robbery. Knowing that she will be convicted because she will plead guilty, she assumes that she can spend the rest of her days living free, hanging out with other women, and being fed decently in a women's prison. But the system that has failed her also wants to forgive her because of her age and general health, and the public defender wants to use an insanity plea to get her off. How will Esmerelda convince the legal system she should be incarcerated, literally, for life?

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Ron House
California Scheming
Samuel french London:

Roger Gallais, a small time hustler, is in a desperate fight to save his office/home from demolition. He needs $1500 in 24 hours or his estranged wife Lola Montezuma, an illegal alien, and her new boyfriend Nobby Carlyle, a fugitive from British justice, will take procession of the property, turn it into a mini mall and make a million bucks. Roger and his sole employee, Jules, are at the end of their rope, when Wanda Harrington, a naive middle-aged woman from Texas enters. She has just inherited the family oil fortune and is in Los Angeles to find her long lost lover, Henry, who she hasn't seen or heard from in 25 years. Roger reinvents himself and becomes a private detective specializing in missing persons cases and guarantees he will find Henry in one hour. Hilarious results ensue, involving Harvey Martin, 'Gay Activist' who is running for mayor of West Hollywood, and wants to turn the city into a living 'Camelot' and Shelly Levine, a failed New York standup comic who hates Los Angeles.

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Wayland Pickard
Polyester - The Musical
Samuel french London:

It's "Mamma Mia" meets "Spinal Tap." Polyester The Musical is the story of The Synchronistics, an over-the-hill, ABBA wannabe group that re-unites after 20 years to perform at a public access TV Telethon. It was 1979, and The Synchronistics were big. Johnny Carson big. Their hit single, "Better Together" rose to #2 on the Billboard Charts. Then something terrible happened that drove the group apart. And now, twenty years later, they're back together to perform at the WKLN public access TV Telethon. Will they overcome their differences, act professionally, and help save WKLN from going under? Probably not. But, you never know what to expect when this dysfunctional group gets together...one last time! Featuring 16 Original 70's Songs including, "The Funk Train," and "Bump Your Booty Rump."

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Ron West and Phil Swann
People vs. Friar Laurence: The Man Who Killed Romeo and Juliet
Samuel french London:

A musical comedy spoof starring the Friar of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juilet! Friar Laurence is behind bars, charged for the 'murder' of the lovers. As the trial progesses, mayhem and silliness are abound with bits, songs, and scenes equal parts Vaudeville and Bard. A 'load of laughs' (Chicago Sun Times, highly reccomended), The People Vs. Friar Laurence: The Man who Killed Romeo and Juilet is sure to leave both Shakespeare scholars and low-brow humorists rolling in the aisles!

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Jaston Williams
Tuna Does Vegas
Samuel french London:

Tuna Does Vegas re-unites the lovable and eccentric characters from the 'third smallest town in Texas' as they take a rambling romp in Sin City. The hilarity begins when oddball-conservative radio host Arles Struvie announces on air that he and his wife Bertha Bumiller are heading to Vegas to renew their wedding vows...but everyone in Tuna, Texas goes along for the ride! Written by Jaston Williams, Joe Sears and Ed Howard, Tuna Does Vegas will feature the favorite characters from the award-winning 'Greater Tuna' productions with some new characters too! ----all staged under the directorial hand of Mr. Howard. Tuna Does Vegas balances as both an affectionate comment on small-town life and attitudes as well a hilarious satire of the same. The eclectic band of citizens that make up this town are portrayed by only Mr. Sears and Mr. Williams, making this send-up on life in rural America even more delightful as they depict all of the inhabitants of Tuna - men, women, as well as Vegas showgirls, Elvis impersonators and more!

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David Church
Judy's Scary Little Christmas
Samuel french London:

Judy Garland is primed for her biggest comeback ever - the dazzling star of her own TV special, broadcast live on Christmas Eve, 1959. Judys guests include Bing Crosby (making some holiday grog), Ethel Merman (plugging her Hawaiian album), and Liberace (with a handsome sailor in tow). However, mysterious snafus behind the scenes and cameo appearances by commie-baiting Vice President Richard Nixon (who performs a magic act) and blacklisted writer, Lillian Hellman, (whos forced to read Childrens Letter to Santa with a puppet) throw Judys program off course. The surprises climax when the arrival of Joan Crawford is interrupted by the spectral figure of&Death. The evening takes a detour into the twilight zone as the celebrities are forced to confront the lies behind their legends. Devastated and alone, Judy meets a special fan who ultimately proves that, despite her flaws, her shining legacy still endures.

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Mark Dunn
PIGmalion
Samuel french London:

nspired by Pygmalion, Shaw's classic drawing room tale of language and class division, and its musical incarnation, My Fair Lady, the play tells the story of one Eliza Doolittle - the daughter of a hardscrabble Mississippi pig farmer - who sells homemade pork rinds at the Tri-Counties Fair and Livestock Show, and dreams of someday working as a waitress at one of those nice downtown barbecue restaurants where all the tourists go. With the support of her best friend, a sassy Transgender firecracker named Miss Tiffany Box, patroness Ida Hill and her daughter Clara; and with Ida's instantly enamored son Freddy nipping romantically at Eliza's heels, Delta-drawlin' Eliza engages the services of a Kudzu-league college prof named Henry Higgins to take the country out of her speech and give her some semblance of class. Devotees of Shaw's original will delight in the transplantation of Eliza and Professor Higgins and his colleague Pickering to the American South. But this gentle, warm-hearted comedy gives us something else as well, a question for which everyone in the play must find the answer: how do we reconcile the way we present ourselves on the outside with who we truly are on the inside?

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Arthur Giron
Emilie's Voltaire
Samuel french London:

Set during the French Enlightenment, the play chronicles the volcanic, law-breaking, sexually-driven, intellectually-fuelled, 16-year love affair between Francois-Marie Arouet (Voltaire) and Gabrielle Emilie Le Tonnelier de Breteuil, Marquise du Chatelet. It is an absolutely true account of what could be termed the 18th century's sexual Bonnie and Clyde. He was a philosopher. An upstart poet. A staggeringly prolific writer. An essayist. A free thinker. A civil libertarian. A blasphemer. A worshipper of Venus. Corrupter of morals. A playwright. He is on fire at the peak of his powers both intellectual and financial. He is running from the law. She is arguably the most beautiful woman in France suffering the most tedious marriage in Europe. She is an independent upstart who bullied her father into secreting the finest minds on the Continent to their country estate in order to quench her undying thirst for knowledge; the result being that she has emerged as one of the most profound physicists in the world. She is broke and has been applying her mathematical wizardry and her famously rouged décolletage at the royal gambling tables. To no avail. The Queen of France cheats at cards and wants to collect on the debt that amounts to a small fortune. She is running from the law. The play begins as Emilie breaks into Voltaire's Parisian apartments through a secret door with a key she convinces Madame de Pompadour to fork over. As Emilie sees it; she's got brains and beauty, and Voltaire's got money. It is New Year's Eve 1733. The bells of Notre Dame are ringing eleven. The rest is history.
- press release

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Lauren Gunderson
Emilie: La Marquise Du Châtelet Defends Her Life Tonight
Samuel french London:

Passionate. Independent. A great beauty. A prodigious scientific intellect. These are the qualities that inspired this story of 18th century Parisian noblewoman Emilie du Châtelet and her lifelong affair with the Enlightenment superstar Voltaire. In this highly theatrical rediscovery of one of history's most intriguing women, Emilie must defend her life by tallying her achievements in Love and Philosophy-and searching for a formula that will convince the world of her worth.

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Michael Kaplan
Love Town
Samuel french London:

Sea Spray is a charming beach town, perfect for romantic getaways and cliff-side proposals. While tourists walk around with stars in their eyes, the locals take their lumps and watch their relationships fray and fizzle. Karl is a self-professed good guy who bought the little village dream for his wife, only to have her run off with the town aromatherapist. Now he's stuck with a quaint souvenir shop he never wanted, and the vengeful impulse to run it into the ground. As the local merchants scheme to drive Karl away, his bitter emporium becomes a safe haven for the romantically scarred men of Sea Spray.

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Shirley Lauro
All Through The Night
Samuel french London:

An intense, ensemble play, inspired by interviews, centering on the lives of four German Christian women who come of age during the tumultuous years of The Third Reich. One becomes a nurse who resists, treating the enemies of The Reich; one bears the illegitimate child of a gypsy boy; one is a country woman who owns the Village Bakery and survives by "finagling" around the Regime; and one becomes a die-hard Nazi Concentration Camp Guard. The Regime impacts their lives and leaves them all changed forever.

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Victor Lodato
Motherhouse
Samuel french London:

The play follows an African-American family in a low-income neighborhood whose lives are ultimately ruined by their surroundings. Clive arrives unexpectedly at the house of his mother and his sister. He says that he is fleeing from the police - but perhaps it's another one of his delusions. Unbeknownst to him, he has shown up on a tragic anniversary. Three years prior, his sister's child was killed in a brutal shooting. As fate seems bent on shattering the walls, mother Mae valiantly attempts to keep house.

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David Mamet
School
Samuel french London:

School is a brief comic discourse on recycling, poster design and the transmission of information
- nytheatre.com

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Mark Saltzman
Rocket City, Alabam'
Samuel french London:

Based on the true story of Wernher Von Braun and his recruitment by the US Government to work on the U.S. Missile Program, where he eventually developed the Saturn V rocket used in the Apollo Program. Rocket City, Alabam' weaves Von Braun's real life in Huntsville, Alabama with a fictional plot in which a Jewish woman in Huntsville becomes aware of Von Braun's Nazi past and tries to inspire awareness and outrage among Huntsville's long-established Jewish community and the country at large.

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Joe Simonelli
Men are Dogs
Samuel french London:

Doctor Cecelia Monahan runs a support group for single and divorced women. She is not above employing some rather unorthodox methods in therapy and hires a young bartender/actor to interact with her group. Role playing, however, can be quite dangerous. It's only when she meets, the new substitute postal delivery person, that she must learn to practice what she preaches
Press Release

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Mark Waldrop
Luck! A Musical
Samuel french London:

In this fractured folk tale based on a story by Isaac Bashevis Singer, Mazel and Shlimazel, the spirits of Good Luck and Bad Luck, make a bet to determine who is the more powerful. The terms: Mazel will take a hapless young man named Tam under her wing for one year, at the end of which Shlimazel will attempt to undo everything she's done in one second. That's the point at which Tam and the princess with whom he's fallen in love have to rely upon their own ingenuity to save the kingdom and keep Tam's neck out of the hangman's noose. Along the way, matters are complicated by a crafty prime minister, a superstitious nurse, and a lion on the loose!

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Ken Weitzman
Arrangements
Samuel french London:

In the dank basement of a flower shop, when a college dropout meets a morbidly obese woman twice his age, chaos ensues. What follows is a beautiful and troubling romance in which the couple plots to unravel the tightly wound lives of all those around them. A biting, comic tale of obsession and repression, abstinence and consumption, expression and repression.

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Arthur Giron
Moving Bodies
Samuel french London:

Moving Bodies is about Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman as he explores nature, science, sex, anti-Semitism, and the world around him. This epic, comic journey portrays Feynman as an iconoclastic young man, a physicist with the Manhattan Project and confronting the mystery of the Challenger disaster.

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Shirley Lauro
Clarence Darrow's Last Trial
Samuel french London:

This courtroom story, based on fact, takes place in 1932, the last time Clarence Darrow pleads in a criminal court of law. Set in various places in Chicago and Hawaii, Darrow with his wife, Ruby, travels to Honolulu to defend a white Pearl Harbor Naval Lieutenant accused of killing a Hawaiian who allegedly led a gang rape on the Lieutenant's wife. More than a courtroom drama, however, the play is a psychological study of the great but aging Darrow as he fights to establish the plea of insanity against his rich and powerful clients'wishes. The drama plays out against a backdrop when Hawaii was a Territory of the United States, ruled heavily by our military and by rich white pineapple and sugar plantation owners. A territory where native and other Asian peoples were subjugated by this ruling class. It is the first time Darrow has defended a white man against a man of color.

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Shirley Lauro
Speckled Birds
Samuel french London:

A play about growing up in our "have and have-not" society, and discovering what "family" really is. Though Angie, an adolescent, lives in a wealthy town, she is poor. Deserted at birth by her mother, her father killed in War, she lives in a trailer with her ailing but loving Grandma. Though a gifted athlete, Angie's afraid to compete at her preppie school, feeling she's "Trailer Trash". While terrified a disliked aunt will soon take her away to live with her and put Grandma in a Facility, Angie meets a boy, Theo, at school. Brilliant, wealthy but an awkward loner, Theo's parents have no time for him and schoolmates taunt him, his only friends being his computer and his bird. Finally as Angie and Theo form a unique bond as soulmates, they gain the courage to begin their journeys toward adulthood. . .resolving family problems, and taking actions to utilize their talents at school.

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Jahanna Beecham
Dog Park
Samuel french London:

Follow Daisy the sassy Westie through her dating adventures with Itchy, Champ and Bogie at the hippest, hottest place in town: Central Bark, where every dog has his day, and love conquers all. Daisy has promised her BFF (Best Friend Forever) she'd give the dating scene one more chance. She meets Champ the Collie, a charming but full of himself show dog; Itchy, a humperactive Jack Russell terrier; and Bogie, the darkly mysterious Lab/mutt who sticks his neck out for no one. This unusual quartet make their way through the day's scheduled events which include Singles With Friends, Agility Class, Speed Mating, Yappy Hour and Lovers with Leashes, which is when they pair up and leave the park. Daisy comes to the conclusion that Champ only has eyes for himself, Itchy can only be a friend, and Bogie is the dog for her. But when Daisy makes her desires known to Bogie, she gets a rude awakening; we learn that Bogie, a stray, has been living at the Dogpark for six months. Bogie confesses his love for Daisy just as Animal Control arrives to take him away. Will Bogie and Daisy ever be reunited? Fresh off its sold-out run at Milwaukee Rep comes Dogpark: The Musical, created by the team behind the hit Chaps! and Chaps! A Jingle Jangle Christmas!

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Andrea Green
On the Other Side of the Fence
Samuel french London:

On the Other Side of the Fence is a story about two farms separated by a big, strong fence. The fence was put up because of a long standing feud between Farmer Franklin and Farmer Fred. Because of their differences, they have forbidden the animals on their individual farms to have anything to do with the animals on the other side. One day over by the fence, the two pigs, Ham and Bacon, develop a special friendship. The farmers warn them that this is unacceptable, but the pigs and many of the animals wonder why this has to be. The animals look to each other for answers. Finally, out of desperation, Ham and Bacon escape their farms together. The animals on both sides of the fence are saddened by their absence and discover, in their shared concern, that they share many of the same feelings. The animals prevail upon the farmers to end their feud and make peace with one another. A vote is taken and unanimously the decision is made to take the fence away. The farmers begin to see each other in a new way  the animals are jubilant  the pigs return  and acceptance, friendship and understanding are the result.

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Andrea Green
Return of Halley's Comet, The
Samuel french London:

In the year 1910, a friendship was born in the town of Centuryville, between non-verbal, bizarre-looking aliens, Halien beings, and a young girl, Jenny Pontillo. Seventy-five years later, the Haliens return, looking for their friend. Prejudice and intolerance, in the town, promoted by Mayor Maggie Banks, forces the capture of the Haliens, with plans to sell them to the circus. Maggies daughter Nelly, the Professor, and others, try to find a way to understand and communicate with the Haliens. They come to believe the Haliens are peaceful and acutely sensitive to human feelings. The courtroom trial unfolds, revealing the mystery of the Haliens, who eventually return to the sky, transforming the town of Centuryville, positively, forever.

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David Mamet
November
Samuel french London:

David Mamet's new Oval Office satire depicts one day in the life of a beleaguered American commander-in-chief. It's November in a Presidential election year, and incumbent Charles Smith's chances for reelection are looking grim. Approval ratings are down, his money's running out, and nuclear war might be imminent. Though his staff has thrown in the towel and his wife has begun to prepare for her post-White House life, Chuck isn't ready to give up just yet. Amidst the biggest fight of his political career, the President has to find time to pardon a couple of turkeys - saving them from the slaughter before Thanksgiving - and this simple PR event inspires Smith to risk it all in attempt to win back public support. With Mamet's characteristic no-holds-barred style, November is a scathingly hilarious take on the state of America today and the lengths to which people will go to win.

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Octavio Solis
Lydia
Samuel french London:

A 1970s Mexican immigrant family is mired in grief, rage and guilt over a daughter's debilitating accident on the eve of her quinceañera. When the undocumented Lydia arrives in El Paso from Mexico to work as a maid for the family, her nearly miraculous bond with the brain-damaged girl elates, then angers, and finally threatens to destroy the troubled family-and Lydia herself.

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Steven Yockey
Subculture
Samuel french London:

Two men at the end of the world, a woman who believes she turns children to stone, some college students with alcohol and a sledgehammer, the perpetrator of a hit-and-run accident, a man obsessed with asphyxiation, and a roadside elephant in India. The very broken characters that inhabit this collection of shorts wander through a dimly lit, over stimulated and paranoia-fueled world that exists just underneath the dominant popular culture. From the darkly comic to the starkly distressing, these uneasy little plays are tightly wound, structurally adventurous glimpses into some of the most simultaneously intimate and harrowing moments of everyday life.

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Bekah Brunstetter
Oohrah!
Samuel french London:

In Fayetteville, North Carolina, home to one of the South's largest military bases, practically everybody has somebody 'Over There'. Sara is relieved when her husband Ron returns home from an uneventful tour in Iraq, but he's finding it difficult to settle back into the domestic bliss that is 'home improvement'and 'Rachael Ray's 30-minute meals'. Sara's sister Abby has set herself up for an uneventful life with a civilian fiance who's more interested in PlayStation than the battlefield. But when a hot, mysterious Marine walks into their lives, all bets on stability are off

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Jeff Hochhauser
Anne and Gilbert - The Musical
Samuel french London:

Based on the sequel novels to Anne of Green Gables, this new Canadian musical continues the story of Anne Shirleys life. Set in the village of Avonlea and at Redmond College in Halifax, Anne and Gilbert follows Anne's journey to young adulthood and her romance with high school academic rival, Gilbert Blythe. Gilbert is in love with Anne, but she seems to be immune to his declarations of love. In the end, Anne realizes what everyone else already knows: that Gilbert is the love of her life.

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Jane Milmore
You've Got Hate Mail
Samuel french London:

A farce about the end of a marriage, told entirely in e-mail

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Adam Rapp
Kindness
Samuel french London:

In Kindness, an ailing mother and her teenaged son flee Illinois and a crumbling marriage for the relative calm and safety of a midtown Manhattan hotel. Mom holds tickets to a popular musical about love among bohemians. Her son isnt interested. So Mom takes the kindly cabdriver instead, while the boy entertains an enigmatic, potentially dangerous young woman from down the hall.
- nytheatre.com

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Buddy Thomas
Devil Boys from Beyond
Samuel french London:

Flying saucers! Backstabbing bitches! Muscle hunks and men in pumps! Wake up and smell the alien invasion in this outrageously insane comedy by a multi-award winning artistic team including Ridiculous Theatre Company's Everett Quinton.

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Daniel Abrahamson
Funny Business - The Musical
Samuel french London:

When low morale threatens the Toronto branch of Chime Communications Canada, five ordinary office workers must mount a team-building talent show to savetheir jobs. Meet Stuart, the lovable yet inappropriate office manager, Marcus, the smooth talking sales rep, Diane, the tough as nails marketing manager, Brie, the perky and scheming receptionist, and Jack, the awkward guitar-playing intern. Together, they must use their hidden talents to sing, dance and manipulate their way through the talent show, which ultimately degenerates into a every-man-for-themselves battle of office skills, where only one will walk away without a pink slip. Featuring a sales versus marketing salsa, a fowl-mouthed printer puppet, and more office backstabbing than HR can handle, the team must learn to keep it together without tearing each other apart. This fast-paced, comedic romp through office culture features a catchy, original pop-musical score, and five unforgettable characters that you're bound to recognize from around the water cooler. An exciting and fun new musical, Funny Business is the perfect production for cubicle dwellers and blue collars alike.

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Rachel Brittain
Funny Business - The Musical
Samuel french London:

When low morale threatens the Toronto branch of Chime Communications Canada, five ordinary office workers must mount a team-building talent show to savetheir jobs. Meet Stuart, the lovable yet inappropriate office manager, Marcus, the smooth talking sales rep, Diane, the tough as nails marketing manager, Brie, the perky and scheming receptionist, and Jack, the awkward guitar-playing intern. Together, they must use their hidden talents to sing, dance and manipulate their way through the talent show, which ultimately degenerates into a every-man-for-themselves battle of office skills, where only one will walk away without a pink slip. Featuring a sales versus marketing salsa, a fowl-mouthed printer puppet, and more office backstabbing than HR can handle, the team must learn to keep it together without tearing each other apart. This fast-paced, comedic romp through office culture features a catchy, original pop-musical score, and five unforgettable characters that you're bound to recognize from around the water cooler. An exciting and fun new musical, Funny Business is the perfect production for cubicle dwellers and blue collars alike.

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Nanci Christopher
And Baby Makes Two
Samuel french London:

A single womans desire to experience motherhood without a husband at her side sends her through the world of adoption. Her path leads her through an array of characters and situations rife with drama. Settling on private adoption through an attorney she suffers an unfathomable heartbreak at the death of her newborn son. She is somehow able to rise out of despair to try again and meets Elizabeth who is looking for someone to adopt her unborn child. A new family is forged through the courage of two very brave women. The running time is one hour.

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Daniel Falk
Funny Business - The Musical
Samuel french London:

When low morale threatens the Toronto branch of Chime Communications Canada, five ordinary office workers must mount a team-building talent show to savetheir jobs. Meet Stuart, the lovable yet inappropriate office manager, Marcus, the smooth talking sales rep, Diane, the tough as nails marketing manager, Brie, the perky and scheming receptionist, and Jack, the awkward guitar-playing intern. Together, they must use their hidden talents to sing, dance and manipulate their way through the talent show, which ultimately degenerates into a every-man-for-themselves battle of office skills, where only one will walk away without a pink slip. Featuring a sales versus marketing salsa, a fowl-mouthed printer puppet, and more office backstabbing than HR can handle, the team must learn to keep it together without tearing each other apart. This fast-paced, comedic romp through office culture features a catchy, original pop-musical score, and five unforgettable characters that you're bound to recognize from around the water cooler. An exciting and fun new musical, Funny Business is the perfect production for cubicle dwellers and blue collars alike.

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Kristin Anna Froberg
Make Believe
Samuel french London:

Natasha Lisenko is twenty-two years old. Shes clever, creative, can describe the plot of every episode of Battlestar Galactica, and hasnt left the house in five years. Her sister, Lena, is an energetic, popular, occasionally cruel high-school cheerleaderor was, the last time Natasha saw her. As Natasha works her way through delayed adolescence and a strangely evolving relationship with her tutor, her family works to move forward without a sister, without a daughter, and without answers to the questions surrounding her disappearance. When the case is suddenly re-opened, Natasha is forced to make a decision. Reality or imagination? Make believe or truth? Or can sheas shes been doing for the past five yearsgo on existing someplace in between?

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Mary Hall Surface
Tales of Custard the Dragon, The
Samuel french London:

Join Custard the Dragon and his friends as they embark on a musical journey in which a most unlikely hero finds true courage. Based on the whimsical stories by Ogden Nash, this musical tale follows the exploits of young Belinda and her three boastfully brave pets, Mustard the Dog, Ink the Cat, and Blink the Mouse, and one not-so-brave dragon, Custard. Yet when Belinda is confronted first by a fearsome pirate and then a wicked knight, its Cowardly Custard who comes to the rescue. Audiences will treasure Custards discovery that you can be brave, even when you are afraid -- Real courage comes from love. Audiences ages 5 and above will delight in this family musica

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Neena Beber
Common Vision, A
Samuel french London:

Six lives collide around a transcendent vision in a night sky. Dolores' private anguish becomes a matter of public debate when a respected psychologist convinces her she was abducted by aliens. And to think she thought it was all because she got dumped by some guy. A Common Vision chronicles Dolores' journey when her personal crisis of faith dovetails with a larger cultural phenomenon.

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Neena Beber
Tomorrowland
Samuel french London:

Anna has left graduate school to join the real world, as a writer on a childrens television show in Orlando, Florida, she finds that world to be more surreal and absurd than anything shes left behind. Tomorrowland takes a darkly comic look at death, Disney, and the search for meaning in a world that worships the young and the fake.

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Sheila Callaghan
Crawl, Fade To White
Samuel french London:

A scream is heard throughout the stratosphere. It is the voice of the lamp. Louise is selling this expensive family heirloom to keep her daughter April in school and cease her more sordid "consultant" profession. April rushes home with lover in tow to halt the proceedings and save the lamp, but it has been intercepted by a quiet and bizarre middle-aged couple with a haunting secret. Attempts to reclaim the lamp are made, as a misplaced father slowly fades to white in the background.

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Sheila Callaghan
Scab
Samuel french London:

Anima's sphere of desperation and self-destruction is invaded by the arrival of her perky new roommate, Christa. Moved by a particularly malevolent statue of the Virgin Mary and a houseplant named Susan, Anima and Christa soon enter into a profound and intimate friendship that incurs traumatic results

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Sheila Callaghan
We Are Not These Hands
Samuel french London:

Ever since their school blew up, Moth and Belly have taken to stalking an illegal internet café in the hopes of one day being allowed in. They take particular interest in Leather, a skittish older man doing research in the café. He is a self-proclaimed "freelance scholar" from a foreign land with a sketchy past and a sticky secret. Leather begins to fall head over heals in love with Moth& but what about Belly? This play explores the effects of rampant capitalism on a country that is ill-prepared for it.

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Bridget Carpenter
Faculty Room, The
Samuel french London:

The new teacher at the High School is shown the ropes by two old hands

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Hal Corley
Easter Monday
Samuel french London:

An eccentric widower, Mack has been a stay-at-home dad for twenty years, his daily existence revolving around his son Billy. Not only can't he let go, Mack's convinced he's more needed than ever. First up is pulling Billy from a dead-end copy shop job and enrollment in culinary schoolafter all, he was a finalist in the Pillsbury Bake-off. Then Mack discovers that Billy, adopted from infancy, has contacted his birthmother, a Washington, DC secretary about to make a first trip to New York City. Panicky Mack spends a sleepless three days coaching his son, determined to impress Adela with Billy's upbringingand their indestructible father-son bond. Over a snowy Easter weekend, these three square off. Confronting timid Adela, Billy's romanticized ideas about his identity are turned inside out, as Mack's deepest insecurities surface. Mack is convinced the woman will psychologically lay claim to the child she gave up two decad

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Hal Corley
Mama and Jack Carew
Samuel french London:

In the summer of 1969, Beau Stanley's last hurrah before heading off to study architecture in college, doting Mama Lillian vows to help him finally lose his baby fat. Armed with a supply of diet pills and a food-free regimen that includes tearing down a family room wall, 3 a.m. trips to Dulles Airport and blazing, amphetamine-fueled days on the beach, mother and son spend a memorable vacation together. But Beau's weight loss isn't restless Lillian's only project, and in an unguarded moment, she reveals her just-begun affair with a travelling defense contractor, Jack Carew. Once Lillian introduces son and lover, Beau's caught in the oedipal crossfire of a covert and explosive new alliance, forced to cover his Mama's many absences from home. Over the next decade, Jack's repeated pledge to end his own loveless marriage and sweep Lillian away proves a hollow promise. As increasingly beleaguered Beau sacrifices his own independence to help his mother confront her disillusionment and finally, betrayal, parent-child roles are turned upside down. Mama and Jack Carew is a harrowing, oftentimes black-comedic portrait of an unlikely triangle.

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Barbara Eda-Young
Lillian Yuralia
Samuel french London:

set on the Lower East Side in 1930. Lillian, a former star of the Yiddish Theater (or so she says) has lived for many years with her lover Jake in a top floor flat of a brownstone. Across the hall, Levy, a refugee from the Russian Pale, lives in a room alone and isolated. All of his family lost in a pogrom, he has shut himself off from the world. When the play begins Lillian stands in her empty front room. With the sudden death of Jake, who has failed to make any provision for them, she now finds herself and their teenage son, Yidl, destitute. Obliged to live off the charity of distant relatives, they are about to leave the only home they've known. Church bells begin to ring the hour. Desperately playing for time she makes tea for her son, and in her cup, she pours an overdose of laudanum. Soon Yidl will begin a frantic pounding on Levy's door. A door he has never opened to anyone. The play, then, is how the mother and son's visit opens the door to the old man's heart and how the boy, silently suffering from his mother's tragic turn of events, finds his voice

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Adrienne Kennedy
Mom, How Did You Meet The Beatles?
Samuel french London:

about Adrienne Kennedy's search for fame and fortune in 1960s London, where she encountered Laurence Olivier, James Baldwin, Ricki Huston, various British writers and, of course, The Beatles.
- nytheatre.com

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Eduardo Machado
Crocodile Eyes
Samuel french London:

Inspired by Federico Garcia Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba, Eduardo Machado's drama Crocodile Eyes portrays the world talked about but never seen in Lorca's play. As Lorca's famous widow traps her daughters in their house to mourn their father, Machado shows us what's happening just outside those doors. The local men, led by the charismatic Pepe, linger waiting for a glimpse of the enigmatic daughters or some viable work. Set during the Spanish Civil War, the men get caught up in the empty promises of Franco's fascism, while Pepe's involvement with two of Bernarda's daughters escalates to its tragic conclusion.

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Dano Madden
In the Sawtooths
Samuel french London:

As Oby, Nellie and Darin prepare for their annual backpacking trip in the mountains of Idaho, their bond is unexpectedly shattered by tragedy. What will become of their longtime friendship as they navigate through an immense and unexpected wilderness?

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C W Munger
Beasley's Christmas Party
Samuel french London:

Based on a story by Booth Tarkington. A journalist new to a Midwestern state capitol circa 1900 notices there is something funny going on at the charming house next door. Turns out gubernatorial candidate David Beasley lives there with his young ward, an orphan who has a menagerie of imaginary friends. Beasleys nemesis Simeon Peck plans to ruin Beasleys chances at the statehouse, but everyone learns something at Beasleys Christmas Party -- including the pretty Miss Applethwaite, who Mr. Beasley spurned years before. Conceived for three actors to play multiple roles (but playable in many configurations), this 75-minute holiday play is a heartwarming fable of imagination and celebration.

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Adriana Sevahn Nichols
Taking Flight
Samuel french London:

First there was Mary and Rhoda, then Thelma and Louise, and now Adriana and Rhonda, two loveable and unforgettable friends. One, searching for the goddess and her shamanic roots, the other, planning her epic Godfather meets the Mists of Avalon wedding, until 9/11 changes everything, leaving one in a hospital bed and the other intent on doing whatever it takes to save her friend. In this award winning play, Sevan joins the ranks of the best, (SD Union Tribune) as she takes you on a deeply moving, hilarious, and courageous journey into the depth of friendship, the challenge of care-giving, and the resilience of the human spirit.

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Don Nigro
Gorgons
Samuel french London:

Ruth and Mildred are aging movie stars in the 1960s. They have in their time (the thirties and forties) been goddesses of the screen, but now both are on the skids and desperate for work. Mildred is doing obscure theatre under spartan conditions when Ruth comes to her with a film script she wants them to star in. It's a horror movie called Gorgons, about two insane and homicidal sisters. Ruth needs another big name like Mildred to get the funding. They have always been bitter rivals who've fought over roles and men. Ruth has slept her way to the top, while Mildred has taken the high road and paid for it, and they loathe each other. But both long to be famous again, so they agree to do the movie, which involves a human head bouncing down a staircase, wheel chair torture, and the dismemberment of an unfortunate servant. They fight, scream, throw fits, throw heads, seriously injure one another, and at some point come to the conclusion that they must stop the war and work together if this disastrous movie is not going to end up being their inglorious and humiliating epitaph in Hollywood. Then come the Oscars. Look out. Imagine Joan Crawford and Bette Davis doing their best to refrain from murdering each other while holding severed heads and axes. This ice pick sharp, insane asylum funny, dark as a tomb riotous all out struggle between two legendary titans of the screen is a joyous playground for two mature actresses who can play every note on the emotional keyboard, from heartbreak to homicide, and really go all out. No holds barred, non-stop, wicked, sympathetic, murderous, and wildly funny

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Don Nigro
Rat Wives
Samuel french London:

In this very funny longer one act, four legendary actresses: Mrs Patrick Campbell, Florence Farr, Janet Achurch and Elizabeth Robins, wait backstage on a blustery night in the year 1896 to perform in a famous production of Ibsen's Little Eyolf. They are having some serious personal problems, they're drinking before the show, there is treachery afoot, and everybody raise their hands who's slept with George Bernard Shaw. A wonderful showcase for four strong, smart actresses.

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Don Nigro
Widdershins
Samuel french London:

Inspector Ruffing returns in this baffling mystery that was an audience favorite at the First International Mystery Festival in 2007. . .In a peaceful house near the Welsh border, an entire family has vanished suddenly without a trace one evening with supper on the table and no apparent violence. Ruffing's attempt to understand what's happened to a couple and their two daughters leads him deep into his own dark soul. The only clue is a piece of paper left on a desk with the word 'Widdershins' written on it. Beautiful women, dark secrets, the Impressionists and the Druids all figure in this unusual and thought provoking play

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Sheilah Rae
Funny, You Don't Look Like a Grandmother
Samuel french London:

A humorous, heart-warming musical revue that looks at modern grandmothers in a whole new light. These are the women who have thrown away the granny glasses, shapeless black dresses and Red Cross shoes and replaced them with cute little tennis dresses, skis and a condo in Florida. The show celebrates these changes with skits and songs about everything from what to name the grandmother to her availability as baby sitter, her job, her friends, her activities, her new interest in shopping, but most of all, her relationship to that incredible new baby and its parents. Whether you are a grandparent or a grandchild, every generation of your family will love this show!

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Jenny Schwartz
God's Ear
Samuel french London:

Mel and Ted have lost their young son. Now, wherever Ted goes, he meets people with dead sons. And whatever Mel touches falls apart. Mel and Ted try to continue their way through the world, guided by their young daughter Lanie, and the Tooth Fairy and G.I. Joe.
- Press Release

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Joe Simonelli
Heaven Help Me
Samuel french London:

The three Holloway bothers have a real problem. Their string of casual restaurants is failing, youngest, black sheep brother Rollie owes money to every bookie in town, and they need to sell the family beach house to recapitalize the business. The only problem is that their deceased fourth brother Fred is haunting the place and won't vacate!

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Ed Simpson
Elephant Sighs
Samuel french London:

Not long after moving to the small town of Randolphsburg, PA, uptight lawyer Joel Bixby is invited by Leo Applegate, an avuncular fast food connoisseur, to join a group of townsmen who meet in a ramshackle room at the edge of town. Leo has chosen Joel as a replacement for the late - and greatly beloved  Walter Deagon. Despite protesting that he's just not an organizational man, Joel finds himself mesmerized by Leo's ebullient manner and agrees to drop by - without ever asking just what exactly it is the group actually does. Determining that the meeting will at least help him network with potential clients, Joel arrives, hoping that the group's purpose will eventually become clear. Joel's confusion only increases as, one by one, he meets the group's surviving members who includes Dink, a perpetually gleeful little man who deeply loves his bald-headed wife and who is "in touch with his feminine side"; insurance man Perry, a former minister in the midst of a painful crisis of faith; and Nick, a volatile contractor who has recently lost his job and family and is desperately looking for some kind of miracle. As an increasingly anxious Joel is swept up in the strange lives of the guys, he struggles to figure out exactly why they've all come together. The more time he spends with them, the more apparent it becomes that each of them are just as lost as Joel. As the evening progresses, however, the regulars - and newcomer Joel - grapple with their own disappointments, offer comfort to each other, and, in the process, finally reveal the mysterious reason for their gathering. A group of delightful characters highlight this comedy about loss, loneliness, and the healing power of friendship

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Robert Waldman
Funny, You Don't Look Like a Grandmother
Samuel french London:

A humorous, heart-warming musical revue that looks at modern grandmothers in a whole new light. These are the women who have thrown away the granny glasses, shapeless black dresses and Red Cross shoes and replaced them with cute little tennis dresses, skis and a condo in Florida. The show celebrates these changes with skits and songs about everything from what to name the grandmother to her availability as baby sitter, her job, her friends, her activities, her new interest in shopping, but most of all, her relationship to that incredible new baby and its parents. Whether you are a grandparent or a grandchild, every generation of your family will love this show!

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Danny Whitman
Tales of Custard the Dragon, The
Samuel french London:

Join Custard the Dragon and his friends as they embark on a musical journey in which a most unlikely hero finds true courage. Based on the whimsical stories by Ogden Nash, this musical tale follows the exploits of young Belinda and her three boastfully brave pets, Mustard the Dog, Ink the Cat, and Blink the Mouse, and one not-so-brave dragon, Custard. Yet when Belinda is confronted first by a fearsome pirate and then a wicked knight, its Cowardly Custard who comes to the rescue. Audiences will treasure Custards discovery that you can be brave, even when you are afraid -- Real courage comes from love. Audiences ages 5 and above will delight in this family musica

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Lois Wyse
Funny, You Don't Look Like a Grandmother
Samuel french London:

A humorous, heart-warming musical revue that looks at modern grandmothers in a whole new light. These are the women who have thrown away the granny glasses, shapeless black dresses and Red Cross shoes and replaced them with cute little tennis dresses, skis and a condo in Florida. The show celebrates these changes with skits and songs about everything from what to name the grandmother to her availability as baby sitter, her job, her friends, her activities, her new interest in shopping, but most of all, her relationship to that incredible new baby and its parents. Whether you are a grandparent or a grandchild, every generation of your family will love this show!

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William Missouri Downs
Cockeyed
Samuel french London:

Phil, an average nice guy, is madly in love with the beautiful Sophia. The only problem is that shes unaware of his existence. He tries to introduce himself but she looks right through him. When Phil discovers Sophia has a glass eye, he thinks that might be the problem, but soon realizes that she really cant see him. Perhaps he is caught in a philosophical hyperspace or dualistic reality or perhaps beautiful women are just unaware of nice guys. Armed only with a B.A. in philosophy, Phil sets out to prove his existence and win Sophias heart

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William Missouri Downs
Kosher Lutherans
Samuel french London:

Kosher Lutherans centers on Hanna and Franklyn, the seemingly perfect couple who desperately want to have a child of their own, but are unable to do so. As the couple begins to wonder if they'll ever become parents, they have a chance encounter with a God-fearing pregnant girl from Iowa who offers to let the couple adopt her out-of-wedlock baby. Just before the adoption papers are signed, Hanna and Franklyn discover the girl is unaware that they are Jewish. Knowing the revelation could throw a ratchet into the whole works, the couple poses as Lutherans to appeal to the girl's apparent Midwestern sensibilities. But how far are they willing to go to have a family?

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Steven Fechter
Woodsman, The
Samuel french London:

Richard Ings plays Walter, a gentle and reserved man stringing out his meagre existence in a sparsely-furnished apartment across the road from a grade school. Walter is just out from a 12-year prison sentence for molesting several girls aged 10 to 12. So the school is an issue. But more than that, it is people's assumptions of what the view from his window means - or their doubts or suspicions, and attempts to suppress them - that provide the play's charge. Walter's therapist Rosen tells him to write a journal of this thoughts. Meanwhile they engage in cat-and-mouse games of question and answer, Rosen refusing either to voice any judgments, reveal his own feelings, or offer any advice. In a way Walter is as frustrated as anybody at society's inability to pin him down. Is he capable of redemption, or (a major theme) normality? What is normality anyway, and who then are the misfits? So he starts to write: not his feelings, but his observations of an unknown man who has started hanging around the school gates. Casting another villain in the piece knocks our perspective out. On the one hand, Walter knows more than most the psyche of this man - while not exactly empathising or encouraging, he understands. On the other hand this makes him feel a heavy responsibility to do something to prevent it if he can. Twice more the play raises the possibility that a child is being abused, and Walter is compelled to try and stop it. He is written as a man who, despite his past crimes, cannot bear the thought of causing any pain. He also - somewhat child-like himself - genuinely seems to understand children's points of view. We hear a little about his past crimes: in his report two of his victims in fact lied about their ages so as to fall within the desired 10-12 bracket.
- Corinne Salisbury, British Theatre Guide

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Tina Howe
Shrinking Violets and Towering Tiger Lillies
Samuel french London:

Seven Brief Plays About Women in Distress. To go through life as a woman is to be in distress most of the time, so these short plays alight on situations that are inherently distressing -- doctor visits, photo shoots, looking for the right dress and navigating around swimming pools. Since were blessed with uncanny reserves of strength and imagination, we tend to emerge triumphant. One way or another these are comedies about transformation.

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Dan LeFranc
Sixty Miles To Silver Lake
Samuel french London:

A moving car. A father and son. The father drives. The son's face is pressed against the rolled up window. A lifetime can pass in the sixty miles between a boy's soccer practice and his father's new apartment

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Adam Szymkowicz
Pretty Theft
Samuel french London:

After losing her father, Allegra falls under the wing of bad girl Suzy, only to find an unexpected friendship with Joe, an autistic savant. When things between them take a violent turn, Allegra and Suzy escape on a cross-country trip. The girls end up befriending Marco, a mysterious thief who claims he cannot be caught.
- press release

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Rob Urbinati
Hazelwood Jr High
Samuel french London:

Based on a true story, a lesbian love triangle at a junior high in Indiana goes horribly wrong. When Shanda, the new girl at school, catches Amanda's eye, Amanda's girlfriend Melinda is furious. Melinda enlists the aid of a disturbed "goth" girl and her friends, and they set out to teach Shanda a lesson.

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Charles Busch
Third Story, The
Samuel french London:

A mother and son screenwriting team hunker down in Omaha after fleeing Commie-obsessed 1940s Hollywood. A romantically-inclined but socially-inept princess makes a deal with an ancient witch. And tommy guns meet test tubes as a way-too-well-dressed first lady of the mob forms a desperate alliance with a cloning scientist whose experiments have had, um, less-than-consistent results. Gangster flicks, fairy tales and B-movie sci-fi collide in this epic comic fable from the sick and silly imagination of Charles Busch.
- press release

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Hal Corley
ODD
Samuel french London:

Anna Marie has raised her surly, contentious son Micah alone. Though Micah has long been pharmaceutically treated for his O.D.D.  Oppositional Defiance Disorder  she's desperate to introduce a paternal influence. Anna Marie hires Joe Eskin, an itinerant waiter with a vague past and take-no-prisoners tutoring style. Over one critical autumn Joe brings focus and structure to Micah's daily life. But as he opens incurious Micah's eyes to a world outside his sleepy New Jersey suburb, Joe ingratiates himself into the family and inadvertently stirs in Anna Marie dormant romantic longing. In a revelatory battle royal, Micah realizes that equally combative Joe is a kindred spirit  likely "O.D.D." himself. When Micah attracts the brilliant but volatile Ilona, Joe's Cyrano-like coaching to help Micah romance the older girl segues into near obsession. Though smitten Anna Marie remains oblivious, Ilona slowly realizes that Joe's emotional investment in Micah is invasive and threatening. During a Halloween trip into rain-drenched New York City, Ilona ends Joe's control by confronting him in front of Micah, with life-altering results. Exploring the challenges of teen isolation, single parenting, and our dependence on drug therapy as a panacea, ODD illuminates the terror and heartbreak that bind a unique quartet.

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Cusi Cram
Lucy And The Conquest
Samuel french London:

Pill popping Lucy Santiago heads to her family home in Bolivia after being fired from the syndicated hit "Beach Detectives". All she wants to do is forget her troubles but her wildly eccentric family and a mysterious spirit that lives under Simon Bolivars campaign bed wont let her. Lucy is forced to confront her own troubled history as well as the history of a conquered people.

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Robin Hawdon
Night in Provence, A
Samuel french London:

Ah Provence! The French Riviera. Where the well-to-do rent luxury villas for exorbitant sums in order to get their annual fix of sun, sea, and haute cuisine. However, imagine the crisis if one such sumptuous place was double booked. Worse  imagine it triple booked! By a French couple, an English couple, and heaven forbid, an Irish/American couple. Marriages have foundered on less. Add the ingredients of copious champagne, heightened sexual impulses, and ingrained cultural differences, and the European Union could well implode!

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Judy Klass
Cell
Samuel french London:

Cell is a murder mystery - to about the same extent that Sophocles Oedipus Rex is a murder mystery. Lieutenant Rodriguez questions Dennis Kadman about his older brother Michael, who has ODd on heroin in Dennis apartment. Dennis wants to know: who gave Michael the drugs? Michael was a cunning, manipulative addict. But he was a diabetic double amputee, placed in his brothers care by the courts  and Dennis tried to keep him alive and drug-free. Through flashbacks, we see the fractious relationship between the brothers, and how they interacted with other suspects, including Edith, the Jamaican nurse who believed Michael should be allowed to choose to die; Julie, Dennis fiancée who hated what Michael was doing to Dennis and to their relationship; and Byron, Michaels homeless friend with whom he had lived on the streets. Like Oedipus, while looking for the culprit, Dennis learns far too much about himself.

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Joyce Carol Oates
Wild Nights! and Grandpa Clemens & Angel fish 1906
Samuel french London:

The famously reclusive poetess appears as an uncannily life-like computerized mannequin brought home by a childless, affluent suburban couple in the hope that their disaffected lives will be "enhanced" by a poet-genius in their household. Soon, like generations of literary critics and biographers, the Krims find themselves obsessed by the wraithlike Emily. They spy on her writing her riddlesome poems-they become infatuated with her, in very different ways. Mysterious, cunning, provocative, this "Emily Dickinson" is also very funny, at the expense of her hosts. After an erotic interlude of shocking-and comic-crudeness, Wild Nights! ends on a startling and unexpected romantic note

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Ron Osborne
Ruby's Story
Samuel french London:

June 1944, and the world is at war. On a small Appalachian truck farm far away from the front lines, a war of another kind rages: one of prejudice, self-loathing, delusion and fear. And at its core is a long held secret that can destroy teenage Ruby and her family, as they await news of their loved ones overseas. D-Day speeds the dissolution process and Ruby must come to grips with a family falling apart at the seams.
- press release

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Lisa Soland
Truth Be Told
Samuel french London:

Truth Be Told is a full-length play that consists of eleven, one-person stories shared by a variety of personalities, all focused on getting at the truth.

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Edmund White
Terre Haute
Samuel french London:

Shortly before his execution for the Oklahoma bombing,Timothy McVeigh was in correspondence with the celebrated American writet; Gore Vidal. From death row in Terre Haute prison, the award-winning novelist, Edmund White, imagines what would have happened had they ever met face to face.This is a powerful portrait of two fundamentally different men.As the clock ticks on death row, the bond between them grows. Edmund White is the author of the classic novel of gay American life, A Boy's Own Story.

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Edward Albee
Occupant
Samuel french London:

Unapologetically flamboyant, New York sculptor Louise Nevelsons life was one marked by intrepid artistic triumphs as well as deep inner turmoil. In Edward Albees Occupant, both her public accomplishments and private emotional conflicts are thoroughly examined by an unnamed interviewer who questions the posthumous Nevelson with an unabashed scrutiny. From her unique vantage point beyond the grave, Nevelson answers his queries with a clarity born of the distance provided by death. The result is a touching, humorous, and honest tribute to a woman who was a pioneer for free-thinking females everywhere, but also stood strongly on her own as one of the 20th centurys greatest artistic minds. Edward Albees Occupant is a testament of will, internal strength, and the cryptic force that continues to drive great artists.

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Ludmilla Bollow
Saving America and other plays
Samuel french London:

Strangers are brought together in mysterious gathering to Save America, with savage finale.

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Sheila Callaghan
That Pretty Pretty; or, The Rape Play
Samuel french London:

A pair of radical feminist ex-strippers scour the country on a murderous rampage against right-wing pro-lifers, blogging about their exploits in gruesome detail. Meanwhile, a scruffy screenwriter named Owen tries to bang out his magnum opus in a hotel room as his best friend Rodney ("The Rod") pontificates on rape and other manly enterprises. When Owen decides to incorporate the strippers into his screenplay, the boundaries of reality begin to blur, and only a visit from Jane Fonda can help keep worlds from blowing apart. Sheila Callaghan's That Pretty Pretty; or, The Rape Play is a violently funny and disturbing excavation of the dirty corners of our imaginations.
- press release

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Tom Frye
Mosley Street Melodramas, Vol 3
Samuel french London:

his new collection of campy, sassy melodramas from our beloved Mosley Street series will have audience booin, hissin and knee-slappin! Four all new plays in the Melodrama tradition, complete with audience participation. A riotous time for any theatre! Contains: Booze and Kisses, Crouching Santa, Hidden Reindeer, My Daze in Doo Dah, and Villain in My School.

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Israel Horovitz
Israel Horovitz's New Shorts
Samuel french London:

This brilliant collection of Horovitzs newest one-act plays can be mixed and matched to form several theme evenings. For example, nine of these plays formed the highly-successful off-Broadway show Israel Horovitzs New Shorts: The Bridal Dance, Affection In Time (The Prologue), The Fat Guy Gets The Girl, Beirut Rocks, The Audition Play, The Hotel Play, Cat-Lady, Inconsolable and The Race Play . Additionally, six of these plays were joined to create an evening called 6 Hotels: Fiddleheads and Lovers, Speaking of Tushy, Beirut Rocks, (intermission), The Audition Play, The Hotel Play, 2nd Violin. Recently, an off-Broadway show was created by Barefoot Theatre Company entitled The Middle-East (in pieces), comprised of A Mothers Love *, Security *, Beirut Rocks, and What Strong Fences Make*. (*also available from Samuel French, Inc.)

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Luigi Jannuzzi
All The King's Women
Samuel french London:

The story of Elvis Presley told through the eyes of 17 Women! Some Enthralled! Some Appalled, ALL OBSESSED! A fast paced series of 5 comedic plays and 3 monologues based on the Life of Elvis Presley. From Tupelo Mississippi where 11 year old Elvis wanted a BB Gun instead of a guitar, to The Steve Allen Show, from President Richard Nixons office, to Andy Warhols studio, from Cadillac Salesmen, to Graceland guards, this is a touching, bring-the-family comedy with a heart that captures the effects that fame, generosity & just being a nice guy can bring to others!

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Matthew Lopez
Whipping Man, The
Samuel french London:

It is April, 1865. The Civil War is over and throughout the south, slaves are being freed, soldiers are returning home and in Jewish homes, the annual celebration of Passover is being celebrated. Into the chaos of war-torn Richmond comes Caleb DeLeon, a young Confederate officer who has been severely wounded. He finds his familys home in ruins and abandoned, save for two former slaves, Simon and John, who wait in the empty house for the family's return. As the three men wait for signs of life to return to the city, they wrestle with their shared past, the bitter irony of Jewish slave-owning and the reality of the new world in which they find themselves. The sun sets on the last night of Passover and Simon - having adopted the religion of his masters - prepares a humble Seder to observe the ancient celebration of the freeing of the Hebrew slaves from Egypt, noting with particular satisfaction the parallels to their current situation. But the pain of their enslavement will not be soothed by this tradition, and deep-buried secrets from the past refuse to be hidden forever as the play comes to its shocking climax. The Whipping Man is a play about redemption and forgiveness, about the lasting scars of slavery, and the responsibility that comes with freedom.

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Henry Meyerson
Secret Life of Seagulls, The
Samuel french London:

Anne and Don, married ten years, are on vacation in Florida. As the play begins, Anne is inanely chattering on about beaches, seagulls and garbage dumps. Don, fed up with Anne's incessant chatter, walks away leaving Anne, much to her surprise, sitting on the beach alone. Don has gone to visit his friend Jim, a man of little insight but great obsession about golf, to tell him that he has left Anne. Jim, in turn, has just returned from a golfing vacation to discover his wife, Sandy, has apparently left him. George, a seagull who lives a contented life with his wife, Ethel, on the Staten Island landfill, has just arrived on the Florida beach and meets Fred, a seagull without ties but with a dark past. The Secret Life Of Seagulls follows these four humans and Fred as they attempt to define themselves, their lives, relationships and values. George, the Staten Island seagull, however, is quite content being who he is.

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Richard Montoya
Water &;amp Power
Samuel french London:

A hard working immigrant father wants better for his sons, twins named Water and Power. He wants them to be like Mr. Mullholand - deciding where the water flows in this desert pueblo. From the Mother Ditch in Chinatown, to the arroyos and ravines that would become Dodgers Stadium, L.A. re-invents herself faster than a Hollywood soundstage. History is cemented over and stars fade in a blaze of glory, but Water and Power will always be remembered -- all will know how the eastside rolls! Everything the brothers stand for hangs in the balance as they meet in room #13 at the Motel Paradise on the eastern edge of Sunset Boulevard. That's a part of the boulevard you never want to find yourself in on a dark and rainy night. L.A.'s not for everybody. . .

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Phil Olson
Don't Hug Me County Fair, A
Samuel french London:

It's summer time and the Bunyan County Fair is approaching, the biggest thing that's happened in Bunyan Bay since the winter carnival snowplow parade. This year the Bunyan County Fair means one thing to Gunner and Clara Johnson, owners of a little bar called The Bunyan; The Miss Walleye Queen Competition. Bernice, the pretty waitress, sees this as her big chance to win Miss Walleye Queen, to be discovered, and more important, to have her face carved in butter at the Minnesota State Fair. The stakes have never been higher in Bunyan Bay. The trouble begins when Gunner's wife, Clara, decides she also wants to win Miss Walleye Queen. Bigger trouble arrives when Gunner's estranged twin sister, Trigger, (played by Gunner) shows up to try to win the beauty pageant. Featuring 18 original songs including, "My Campfire is Burnin'," "I'm a Bunyan Woman," "If I Could Win Miss Walleye Queen," "Pontoon Ladies,", "I'm Just a Pretty Forest Ranger," and "Our Butter Face Queen."

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Ron Osborne
Showtime At First Baptist
Samuel french London:

First Baptist of Ivy Gap's 100th anniversary was a smashing success, except for one little thing: a bolt of lightning that struck the sanctuary. To raise spirits and funds for rebuilding, six of the church's leading ladies plan a talent show. Change is in the air as these diverse women challenge institutions as well as each other. Along the way, there are laughs to be shared, battles to be fought, love to be won, relationships to be mended, and losses to be grieved

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Steven Peros
Karlaboy
Samuel french London:

Biographer Bill Lauder has penned a ruthless tell-all about Karla Daven, a long dead legendary 1950's starlet. As a result, he is summoned in the middle of the night to the dilapidated mansion of Karla's celebrity husband, Harold Bachman, a reclusive director who makes the outlandish claim that Karla's ghost has threatened to kill him this very night unless Bill calls off the publication of his tawdry book of lies. What follows is an intense evening where memory wrestles with myth in order to find the truth. As Harold gets deeper into exposing Bill's lies about Karla, he is forced to confront the lies he's told himself - lies about himself as a filmmaker, a husband, and as a man. Harold must not only save himself from Karla's ghost, but from the ghosts of an unrealized life.

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Cusi Cram
Fuente
Samuel french London:

Something is not right. There is a secret humidity in the air in a town where the breezes have been on strike for two hundred years. Soledad thinks she is Alexis Carrington from Dynasty and feels itchy. Chaparro cant seem to scratch her itch anymore. Esteban might just be the man for the job. And Adela watches it all unfold as if it were a soap opera on TV. Maybe it is? Anything is possible in Fuente, an almost-real town, somewhere between where North America ends and South America begins. Fuente is a magically-real comedy set in a remote desert town about love, revenge, escape, and the perilous powers of Aquanet hairspray.

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William P Johnson and Rosemary Willhide
Mosley Street Melodramas, vol II
Samuel french London:

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Jennifer Haley
Neighborhood 3: Requisition of Doom
Samuel french London:

In a suburban subdivision with identical houses, parents find their teenagers addicted to an online horror video game. The game setting? A subdivision with identical houses. The goal? Smash through an army of zombies to escape the neighborhood for good. But as the line blurs between virtual and reality, both parents and players realize that fear has a life of its own.

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John Clancy
Fatboy
Samuel french London:

John Clancy's satire on modern America's insatiable appetites, where the population gobbles pork chops, sex and consumer durables while the government gobbles up small nations, is big, broad and brash. The word "subtle" does not enter its theatrical vocabulary. This is a world where Fatboy is a great big bully who, like the US, takes "what I want" and destroys the rest. Played as a zany Punch and Judy show, a theatre within a theatre, the piece has some very nice touches, particularly in its play on theatrical conventions. The best moments come in a courtroom scene where Fatboy is on trial for war crimes. The justice system proves itself incapable of standing up to his bullying tactics, and he outlines his plans for world domination "leading a coalition of the weak and willing". - Guardian

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Jon Lonoff
Skin Deep
Samuel french London:

In Skin Deep, a large, lovable, lonely-heart, named Maureen Mulligan, gives romance one last shot on a blind-date with sweet awkward Joseph Spinelli; she's learned to pepper her speech with jokes to hide insecurities about her weight and appearance, while he's almost dangerously forthright, saying everything that comes to his mind. They both know they're perfect for each other, and in time they come to admit it. They were set up on the date by Maureen's sister Sheila and her husband Squire, who are having problems of their own: Sheila undergoes a non-stop series of cosmetic surgeries to hang onto the attractive and much-desired Squire, who may or may not have long ago held designs on Maureen, who introduced him to Sheila. With Maureen particularly vulnerable to both hurting and being hurt, the time is ripe for all these unspoken issues to bubble to the surface.

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Bryan Fogel and Sam Wolfson
Jewtopia
Samuel french London:

tells the story of two 30-year-old single men, Chris O'Connell and Adam Lipschitz. Chris, a gentile, wants to marry a "nice Jewish girl" so he'll never have to make another decision. After forming a secret pact, Adam promises to help Chris shed his gentile-ness and bring him undercover into the Jewish world.

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Christopher Durang
Adrift in Macao
Samuel french London:

Adrift in Macao is a madcap musical parody of glamorous films noirs, in which the leading lady can always get a job singing in nightclubs no matter how she sings, and the leading man is always mysterious and can't go home for murky reasons he won't explain. From the opium dens of China to the lowlife bars of New York, Durang and composer Melnick take us on a hilarious tour through the post-WWII years complete with intrigue, silliness, and a playfully melodic score.
Press Release

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Billy Goda
Dust
Samuel french London:

Dust is a power play. One man is an executive with money and a paunch. The other is an ex-con with street smarts and a minimum-wage position. One man says "jump." The other wont say "how high," but defiantly asks "why?". What starts off as a battle of wills over who will do the dusting escalates into a war for respect, the upper hand and survival. Who will be standing when the dust settles?
- nytheatre.com

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Doug Haverty
Could I Have This Dance?
Samuel french London:

Woodie Guthrie had it. Arlo may have it. It's usually hereditary, but not always passed on to every offspring. The symptoms do not normally appear until a person reaches their mid-forties. Referred to as 'The Dance of Death,' Huntington's Disease is a complete degeneration of the nervous system. Recently, medical researchers developed a blood test to determine if the disease is present in young people. The question is: Should we know? There are over 100,000 people in the U.S. that are currently 'at risk.' Of these people, only 500 have actually taken this test. Could I Have this Dance? is about two sisters in their 30's: Monica and Amanda. Their mother, Jeannette, has Huntington's and lives with her daughters. The action takes place in the Los Angeles office/home where the girls run a thriving public relations firm, Grapevine, which was started by their mother. During the course of the play, we come to understand the time bomb these two sisters live with. Their possible fate is dramatically evidenced in the characterization of Jeannette which is interpreted through dance. The effects of the disease are 'visible' to those onstage, but 'invisible' to the audience, except in a few rare instances where the actualization of the disease is revealed. The other characters in the play are the men in these women's lives. Jeannette's husband (and the girls' father), Hank, has come to accept his wife and still loves her very much. Both Monica and Amanda have shunned long-term romantic relationships because of their unknown fate; bitter Monica plays it safe and vibrant Amanda takes every chance with young, one-night-stands. Yet the girls and their father never lose their sense of humor. As the play unfolds, both women have met men they'd like to get serious with and the knowledge of the test both repels and attracts them: Amanda, desperate for the answer and Monica, in morbid fear of it. Could I Have this Dance? is ultimately about love and cherishing what life we are given. This is a deeply romantic play about difficult choices. As the once-murky medical crystal ball becomes clearer, the universal question remains: Are we better off not looking at what the future holds?

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Vince Melocchi
Lions
Samuel french London:

Its the 2007 NFL season and the Detroit Lions are on a winning streak  unfortunately out of work steelworker John Waite is not. With humor and humanity, playwright Vince Melocchi offers a glimpse into The Tenth Ward Club, where the patrons place their hopes on their team, and attempt to escape the creeping demise of their city and of their way of life.

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Kate Robin
Anon
Samuel french London:

Trip and Allison meet in a chance encounter when he hires her as a therapist for his morose, misbehaved cat. Little do they realize in their first meeting that they'll end up thrust into an intense relationship in which their desire to save each other and the need to save themselves may become mutually exclusive choices.
nytheatre.com

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Kate Robin
What They Have
Samuel french London:

Connie and Jonas are a successful industry couple. Their friends Suzanne, a struggling painter, and Matt, a struggling musician, cant afford to fix the roof. But stay tuned because in this funny, poignant and always truthful new play, lives can change in a heartbeat, and things arent necessarily what they seem.

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Samuel Shem and Janet Surrey
Bill W. and Dr. Bob
Samuel french London:

story of the men and their wives who pioneered Alcoholics Anonymous in the thirties

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Ken Stone
American Tales
Samuel french London:

Act I, The Loves of Alonzo Fitz Clarence and Rosannah Ethelton, is from Mark Twain's story of two people falling in love at a great distance with the aid of that brand-new invention, the telephone. Alonzo in Maine and Rosannah in California meet by the accident of crossed wires and each falls in love with an imagined ideal of the other. So complete is their self-deception that even when brought face to face they cannot recognize each other. Love is found, lost, and found again. Played as period melodrama, but the relevance to 21st century dating habits is clear. Act II, Bartleby, the Scrivener, is dramatized from Herman Melville's slyly funny but ultimately tragic story. Building on the theme of human connections made and missed, this act takes a darker turn, looking at people who occupy the closest of quarters and yet don't really communicate at all. Bartleby, employed as a copyist in a law office of the 1840s, inexplicably begins to refuse to work, forcing his colleagues to ask themselves the transforming question that ends the play: What do we owe to the people who come into our lives?

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Staci Swedeen
Goldman Project, The
Samuel french London:

This drama explores the lingering legacy of the Holocaust as an aging survivor is forced to confront the shattering secrets of her long buried pastsecrets that have kept her emotionally distant from her middle aged son and only child
- press release

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Jules Tasca
Balkan Women, The
Samuel french London:

meditation on the horror of war set in 1990 brings the spirit of Euripides to a Serbian detention camp for Muslim women

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Bridget Carpenter
Up (The Man In The Flying Lawn Chair)
Samuel french London:

Up invites us into the life of Walter Griffin, a failed inventor obsessed with Philippe Petits famed 1974 wire-walk between the twin World Trade Center towers. Walters greatest moment of glory  a flight on a lawn chair festooned with helium balloons  is now long behind him, though Walter dreams of inventing something wonderful once more. His wife, Helen, has become disillusioned and frustrated at being the familys only breadwinner. Their teenage son, Mikey, harbors dreams of his own: after befriending Maria, a pregnant girl in his class, Mikey becomes involved in her familys phone sales business, with surprising results. When Walter finally takes a job, Mike keeps his a secret, and Helen allows herself to dream of a more secure life. But when Helen discovers the truth about Walters employment, it becomes clear to this family that life itself is lived on a wire not unlike Petit's, this one strung between happiness and sadness.

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Ken Davenport
My First Time
Samuel french London:

My First Time features four actors in hysterical and heartbreaking stories about first sexual experiences written by real people. In 1998, a decade before blogging began, a website was created that allowed people to anonymously share their own true stories about their First Times. The website became an instant phenomenon as over 40,000 stories poured in from around the globe that were silly, sweet, absurd, funny, heterosexual, homosexual, shy, sexy and everything in between. And now, these true stories and all of the unique characters in them are brought to life by four actors in this acclaimed 90 minute play from Ken Davenport

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Anthony and Marcia Migrom Dodge
HATS! A Musical for the Rest of your Life
Samuel french London:

Hats! concerns a 49.999-year-old woman, MaryAnne, who reluctantly faces the inevitable 50th birthday. In the production, MaryAnne warms up to her 50th once she meets several remarkable women who show her about fun and friendship after 50.Hats! is based on the ideas of The Red Hat Society" and features songs by Doug Besterman, Susan Birkenhead, Michele Brourman, Pat Bunch, Gretchen Cryer, Anthony Dodge, Marcia Milgrom Dodge, Beth Falcone, David Friedman, Kathie Lee Gifford, Carol Hall, Henry Krieger, Stephen Lawrence, Melissa Manchester, Amanda McBroom, Pam Tillis and Sharon Vaughn.

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Tony Glazer
Stain
Samuel french London:

Stain follows 15-year-old Thomas through his quickly-crumbling life and the secrets his family tries to keep at bay. In this darkly comic piece about the complexities of family, Thomas is confronted with a choice that will either save or mark him forever.

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Steven Leigh Morris
Beachwood Drive
Samuel french London:

Beachwood Drive tells the story of Nadya, a Ukrainian woman brought to America and enslaved as part of a prostitution ring. In this compelling tale based on an actual police case, a single mother, Nadya becomes squeezed between her Russian Mafia protectors and the LAPD detective who arrests her in a sting operation
- nytheatre.com

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Itamar Moses
Back Back Back
Samuel french London:

Does greatness always come with a price? Can only someone with nothing to lose tell the whole truth? From Itamar Moses, the writer of The Four Of Us and Bach at Leipzig, comes a new drama about America's favorite pastime. Back Back Back follows the turbulent careers of three very different teammates in baseball's steroid era whose clubhouse secrets bring them under federal scrutiny
- press release

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Michael Parker
Sex Please We're Sixty!
Samuel french London:

Mrs. Stancliffe's Rose Cottage Bed & Breakfast has been successful for many years. Her Guests (nearly all women) return year after year. Her next door neighbor, the elderly, silver-tongued, Bud 'Bud the Stud' Davis believes they come to spend time with him in romantic liaisons. The prim and proper Mrs. Stancliffe steadfastly denies this, but really doesn't do anything to prevent it. She reluctantly accepts the fact that 'Bud the Stud' is, in fact, good for business. Her other neighbor and would-be suitor Henry Mitchell is a retired chemist who has developed a blue pill called 'Venusia,' after Venus the goddess of love, to increase the libido of menopausal women. The pill has not been tested. Add to the guest list three older women: Victoria Ambrose, a romance novelist whose personal life seems to be lacking in romance; Hillary Hudson a friend of Henry's who has agreed to test the Venusia: and Charmaine Beauregard, a 'Southern Belle' whose libido does not need to be increased! Bud gets his hands on some of the Venusia pills and the fun begins, as attempts to entertain all three women! The women mix up Bud's Viagra pills with the Venusia, and we soon discover that it has a strange effect on men: it gives them all the symptoms of menopausal women, complete with hot flashes, mood swings, weeping and irritability! When the mayham settles down, all the women find their lives moving in new and surprising directions.

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Marley Sims
Sunset Park
Samuel french London:

Sunset Park is a contemporary comedy/drama that takes place in Brooklyn, New York. The main character is Evelyn Horowitz, a widow in her seventies who lives by herself and is a part-time teacher. Her apartment building is going co-op, but she cant afford to buy in and cannot, by law, be asked to leave. When, her middle-aged children, Carol and Roger, hear about it, they realize that theres money to be made in the long run: a long-term tenant has to be offered the apartment at a below market-value price and, eventually, the place can be flipped for a sizable profit. And thats when the problems start  when money enters the picture, conflicts arise and old secrets come out.

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Catherine Trieschmann
Crooked
Samuel french London:

Coming-of-age drama with sideways glance at evangelical and Sapphic love. 'I mean, the fact that Jesus chose to turn the water into wine, rather than just decontaminating it, proves that drinking alcohol is not a sin.' Fourteen-year-old Laney arrives in Oxford, Mississippi, an outsider with a twisted back and only her writing to keep her company. When she befriends the hapless born-again Maribel, Laney's penchant for story-telling soon spirals out of control. A hilarious chain of events is set in motion, sparking a spiritual and sexual journey that infuriates her mother and threatens to tear their fragile world apart. A gloriously sideways glance at evangelical and Sapphic love way down south

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Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder
Gee's Bend
Samuel french London:

Gee's Bend depicts the turbulent history of African-Americans in the 20th century by focusing on a single family in the real community of Gee's Bend, AL, which is now famous for the beautiful quilts created by the women that grew up there. Gospel songs weave in and out of this hauntingly beautiful work

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Mark Brown
China - The Whole Enchilada
Samuel french London:

An irreverent slapstick race through 4000 years of Chinese history in 90 minutes. Three guys speed from Chairman Mao to infected fowl, the greatest wall to the largest mall, Genghis Khan to Fu Manchu-han. It's a musical of Olympic proportions. www.chinathewholeenchilada.com 2h 15m, Musical, Comedy
- http://www.fringenyc.org/

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Bridget Carpenter
Fall
Samuel french London:

Lydia and her parents are at a three week dance camp. Lydia is not interested in dancing at all until she notices Mr. Gonzales

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Lee Goldsmith
Abe
Samuel french London:

Abe is a new musical about the early life of Abraham Lincoln. The show explores his youth as a flatboat pilot on the Mississippi, his early love for Ann Rutledge, his troubled marriage to the difficult and mentally fragile Mary Todd, and his attempt to be a good father to his sons. The story follows Abe from his earliest attempts at self-improvement through the 1860 election which made him the 16th president of an already fracturing United States. The score is fully orchestrated and uses bold, melodic and traditional musical theatre styles that embrace the story's period and Americana roots. It can be produced fully staged or as a concert performance. The musical features a large cast and requires strong singers: baritone, soprano, mezzo-soprano, 3 adult male singing roles, 3 male children singing roles, male/female chorus with many speaking roles.

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Scott Martin
Scream Queens - The Musical
Samuel french London:

A hotel ballroom, 1998, and six voluptuous B-movie "Scream Queens" revive their fading acting careers by presenting a musical revue for their fans at a science fiction and horror film convention. From young newbie to seasoned grand dame, the Queens strut their stuff in song and dance to prove "I Got All of the Talent I Need." For 90 minutes of hilarious musical mayhem, they take the audience into the world of no-budget movies with awful scripts, fake monsters and gooey "Special FX." They even involve the audience in a screaming contest and zombie talent search. As each Queen reveals her personal story, we share their hopes and dreams, from Tonya's love of her idol "Fay Wray" to Alexis' advice that "Everybody Starts at the Bottom" to DeeDee's secrets of Scream Queen longevity: "Don't Open That Door." British screen veteran Nadine savors her joy of being "Still In Demand" while Bianca celebrates the lifetime achievements of "Roger Corman" and Richelle laments her own elusive "Happy Endings." They also screen original clips from their direct-to-video "scary movie" spoofs such as "Revenge of the Psycho Bimbos" and "Malibu Vampire Vixens," all hoping to attract the attention of a popular young horror film director lurking in the audience.

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Itamar Moses
Four Of Us, The
Samuel french London:

What happens when your biggest dreams come true. . .for your best friend? When Benjamin's first novel vaults him into the literary stratosphere, his friendship with David, a struggling playwright, is strained. Can Benjamin help David gain professional connections? Does career success coincide with personal happiness? Who should pay for lunch? A two-hander with a misleading title about success, jealousy, and growing up

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Elliot Schoenman
Sunset Park
Samuel french London:

Sunset Park is a contemporary comedy/drama that takes place in Brooklyn, New York. The main character is Evelyn Horowitz, a widow in her seventies who lives by herself and is a part-time teacher. Her apartment building is going co-op, but she cant afford to buy in and cannot, by law, be asked to leave. When, her middle-aged children, Carol and Roger, hear about it, they realize that theres money to be made in the long run: a long-term tenant has to be offered the apartment at a below market-value price and, eventually, the place can be flipped for a sizable profit. And thats when the problems start  when money enters the picture, conflicts arise and old secrets come out.

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Jason Wells
Men Of Tortuga
Samuel french London:

Negotiation, conspiracy, and assassination: four power-brokers will stop at nothing to wreck a historic meeting. But when one of them takes a young idealist under his wing, his long-dormant conscience begins to reawaken

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Alan Bailey
Wedding Belles
Samuel french London:

our garden-club ladies meet a young girl who has come to their little Texas town to marry an infantryman before he ships off for World War II. The women impulsively decide to throw the girl an elaborate wedding, and their lives and friendships are thrown into turmoil as they race to accomplish the nuptials in one frenzied afternoon.

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Roger Karshner
Who Killed The Sausage King?
Samuel french London:

The police are baffled after Wilbur Smith, The Sausage King, is strangled with a roll of his own sausage. After several months, the authorities, unable to unscramble the dilemma, call in the services of Farlow Cranston, ace private investigator and renowned solver or arcane cases. Cranston, with unflappable grandiloquence and fractured logic, unravels the mystery via a farcical route that leads to its conclusion. Expect the unexpected in this delightful melange.

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Deborah Zoe Laufer
Out of Sterno
Samuel french London:

Dotty's life in Sterno with her husband Hamel is absolutely perfect! It's a fairy tale, it really is. True, in their seven years of marriage Hamel has forbidden her to leave their tiny apartment or speak to anyone, but Dotty is so very happy to spend her days watching video re-enactments of the day they first met. When a phone call from a mysterious woman threatens to tear her world asunder, Dotty must venture out into the vast city of Sterno, and try to discover what it is to be a "real" woman. "Out of Sterno" is a coming-of-age play in an Alice in Wonderland world. It explores the triumph and heartbreak of growing up and the contradictory societal pressures women face just trying to make it across town

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Henry Meyerson
Proceed To Checkout
Samuel french London:

10 Death Affirming Plays, Sketches and Monologues. DOG YEARS (2, gender neutral) If dogs years are seven to one of Man. . .arf. COMRADES (2m) What are comrades for if not to try to cheer each other up in a time of distress? Dostoevsky would appreciate the irony. THE SUITCASE (2m, 2f) Bereavement maybe painful, but be sure to have your credit card. THE STRUGGLE (1m) The sound of the beeeeeeeeep means dinner is off. LUCKY MAN (2m, 1f) Mr. Smith might have been cured had he survived the autopsy. REHEARSAL (1m, 1f) A long rehearsal for a one shot performance. PUMPS (1, gender neutral) There are many kinds of pumps, but only one really matters. THE FINE PRINT (2m, 1f) Everything is on loan and you have to pay up when you go. SILENCE (2m, 1f) Could there be something worse than surviving the Holocaust? POP GOES THE WEASEL (4, gender neutral) Life may be a game, but be sure to hold on to your chair. "The best of Program A includes author Henry Meyerson's Silence, a touching essay about two Russians who survived the Holocaust and meet shortly after immigrating to New York following World War II." - South Florida Sun-Sentinel; "In Henry Meyerson's Silence, a deeply moving piece about elderly Holocaust survivors trying to make sense of the too-early death of their beloved only son. Fierce and heartbreaking." - Miami Herald; "Pop Goes the Weasel - -a sharp, very original piece uses musical chairs as a metaphor for the way we live now; it takes on a surprising added resonance in the aftermath of the World Trade Center attack&a smart and interesting work." - NYTheatre.com.

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Henry Meyerson
Shtick
Samuel french London:

Helen's life became complicated after her husband Murray's stroke and her sister Gladys's revelation, wanting to set the record straight in case Murray should die, that she and Murray had been having an affair. Helen suspected Murray was no angel when she married him. After all, as a stand-up comic he was always on the road and she knew comics could be loose cannons. Helen knew she was trading the risk Murray would bring to any relationship, let alone marriage, for the excitement of the gamble. While Helen might have been willing to adjust to Murray and his new stroke induced limits, the stakes were raised and the game was changed by Gladys's admission of the affair. So now Helen is left on the horns of dilemma: How can she be a nurturing caretaker for a man who has deceived her (with her own sister, yet) while knowing he is a snake with no visible conscience?

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Jim Wann
People vs. MONA, The
Samuel french London:

Set in Tippo, Georgia (population 8,000), The People vs. Mona is a love story, courtroom drama, musical comedy, and fate-of-a-small-town-hanging-in-the-balance all rolled into one. Mona Mae Katt, owner of the wildly popular musical hangout the Frog Pad, stands accused of killing her husband on their wedding day. If convicted, Mona will go to jail, and her beloved Frog Pad will be turned over to developers. Mona's fate (and the Frog Pad's) rests in the hands of everyman local defense attorney Jim Summerford, who has never won a case against charismatic prosecutor and majoral candidate Mavis Frye. . .who also happens to be his fiancée. As the trial unfolds amidst a rollicking Southern-roots score, the town's many secrets are revealed, and Jim and Mona recognize a budding attraction between them.
- press release

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Annie Baker
Body Awareness
Samuel french London:

It is 'Body Awareness Week' at bucolic Shirley State College in Vermont, and all must go according to plan. But when photographer Frank Bonitatibus shows up with his passel of photographs of naked women, things start to go awry.

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Ron Bernas
Little Murder Never Hurt Anybody, A
Samuel french London:

It-s New Year-s Eve at the Perry mansion, and Julia and Matthew Perry seem to have it all. But Matthew wants something more -- to be rid of his wife Julia so he can have some real fun! He resolves to murder Julia by the new year-s end, and tells her so. She vows to stay alive, and tells him so. And so the game begins -- a hilarious year-long match of wits and the witless. While Julia cleverly dodges Matthew-s devious murder attempts, the Perry friends and staff are dying off mysteriously. It seems Matthew is successful in murdering everyone but Julia. As the bodies are falling, dim-witted daughter Bunny contemplates calling off her wedding to unwitting Donald since all the intended gift-bearing guests are dying. Enter Detective Plotnik -- a Sam Spade reincarnation who suspects everyone, but hasn-t a clue. That is, not until Donald stumbles upon Julia and gentlemanly butler Buttram in what Donald mistakenly perceives as a compromising situation. Donald jumps to the conclusion that Julia is the murderer -- trying to murder Matthew!

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Gino Diiorio
Apostacy
Samuel french London:

A successful middle-aged businesswoman reaches a crossroads in her life leading her to question her faith and to turn to a charismatic evangelist for guidance. Her only daughter is greatly threatened by her mother's new relationship and abandonment of her previous way of life.

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Matthew Freeman
When is a Clock
Samuel french London:

When Gordons wife disappears, the only clue to her whereabouts is a dog-eared copy of an odd book called 'Traveling to Montpelier'. Pursued by police as a potential homicide suspect, and perpetually nagged by his smart-ass teenage son, Gordon takes off to a strange Pennsylvania town to search for his missing wife. Did Gordon commit an unspeakable crime? Or does this bizarre book, with its cult-like missives, have a hand in her disappearance
- press release

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Jason Grote
1001
Samuel french London:

1001 spins themes and variations from the classic 'A Thousand and One Arabian Nights' to explore the incarnations of love, sex, religion, cruelty and war from ancient Baghdad to the post-9/11 era. Playwright Jason Grote combines savage wit, political insight, Borgesian time-warping, and theatrical ingenuity in a dazzling tour de force that Sheherezade herself would envy.

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George Packer
Betrayed
Samuel french London:

In early 2007, The New Yorker writer George Packer published an article about the desperate situation of the Iraqis who had risked their lives to help the American effort in their country and were being hunted down as a result, with little or no U.S. protection. The article helped draw national attention to a humanitarian crisis and a moral scandal. Betrayed, Packer's first play, based on his interviews in Iraq and other countries, tells the story of three young Iraqistwo men and a womanwho are motivated by hope to go work for the Americans, until they begin to wonder who, if anyone, can be trusted
press release

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Steven Peros
Cat's Meow, The
Samuel french London:

Based on the true story of a mysterious Hollywood death, The Cat's Meow offers a fascinating cross section of Jazz Era characters who intersect for one notorious weekend on board William Randolph Hearst's yacht in 1924. The play was adapted for film in 2002, with a screenplay by the author, directed by Peter Bogdanovich, and starring Kirsten Dunst, Eddie Izzard, and Edward Herrmann. Weekend guests include: Charlie Chaplin, who has been carrying on with movie star Marion Davies, a secret known to Davies' paramour, the married - and much older -- Hearst; and movie mogul Thomas Ince, who is hoping to revive his flagging fortunes by forming a partnership with Hearst. Playing with fire, Ince tries to convince Hearst that he can handle both Marion's movie career& and her private life as well. During its 1997 Los Angeles premiere, audiences and critics were both entertained and moved by this darkly comic morality play, laced with clandestine romance, Hollywood excess, and steadily heating tensions, which erupt in a shocking act of violence.

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Jane Shepard
KickAss Plays For Women
Samuel french London:

Award-winning new playwright Jane Shepard comes to print with four powerful short plays for women. Edgy, original, and with a darkly funny humanity, here are four pieces that give new muscle to actresses, providing roles of exceptional range. All successfully produced on the New York stage, each play features two-woman casts, with age-open roles, in work that explores our tender, brave, and sometimes brutal search for meaning. Includes both comedy and drama, with a variety of settings and running times. An excellent introduction to the playwright, KickAss Plays For Women is a vital text for actresses of any age, or anyone hungry for compelling new plays. Nine (2f) Two women held in a life-threatening situation and the mind games they play to keep one another alive. Held in a cell and chained apart, their only currency is words, and balance of power is everything when a single word becomes the hanging point between life and death. Commencing (2f) The beautiful Kelli can-t wait for the blind date her friends have set her up on. Until it turns out to be one very disappointed lesbian named Arlin. Mutually appalled, yet appallingly intrigued, they proceed to pull the screws loose on both straight and gay women-s culture, to find the common ground beneath in the search for love & self. Friend of the Deceased (2f) An embittered widow lies in wait at her husband-s grave for the appearance his mistress, and encounters a soulful teen. Unable to extract a confession from the girl, the widow offers to buy one, and finds that she has purchased a deeper truth. The Last Nickel (2f and 2 pupeteers) Theatrical, funny & touching, It-s another long night for Jamie, with an obnoxious sister & a trio of sardonic puppets to keep her awake. Tinged with fun & sisterly nostalgia, the merriment comes inevitably to focus on the cause of Jamie-s self destruction, and the loss that has brought her to the edge.

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Del Shores
Trials and Tribulations of a Trailer Trash Housewife, The
Samuel french London:

Willi lives in a trailer park with her husband. One of her sons has died and the other is banned from visiting by her husband because he is gay. A new woman moves into the trailer park and Willi's husband starts an affair with her. Willi gets a job with the local Wall-Mart but her husband quotes the Bible saying a woman's place is at home and forbids her from taking up the job. He beats her nearly to death but she shoots him.

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Ron Blicq
Closure
Samuel french London:

Donald Barlow, who lives in Nottingham, England, decides to search for his father who, he has discovered, was a visiting Canadian serviceman during World War II. Following his mother's death, Donald engages a search agency to find his father (Gordon Devereaux) and establish contact. But when the agency does find Devereaux, the elderly man vehemently denies his involvement with Donald's mother and categorically refuses to meet the man who claims to be his son. Donald's journalist daughter Claire refuses to give up and, using her married name, flies to Canada to meet and interview Devereaux. She takes her nine-year-old son with her (who actually is Devereaux's great-grandson) and a unique and unexpected friendship develops between the crusty old man and the boy. Although Claire had not intended to reveal the connection between them, she now privately telephones her father and suggests he fly to Canada. Yet her secret plan is shattered when the boy tells Devereaux things about his family, from which the old man deduces the connection and recognizes he has been duped. This sets in motion a vicious and seemingly irreversible conflict between Claire and Devereaux. The two men do eventually face each other, but both are angry and unforgiving.

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Saviana Stanescu
Aliens with Extraordinary Skills
Samuel french London:

A dark comedy about a clown from the 'unhappiest country in the world', Moldova, who pins her hopes on a US work visa. Chased by Homeland Security, a deportation letter deflates Nadia's enthusiasm and a pair of spike heels might be all it takes to burst her American Dream (or turn it into a nightmare...). New York City, with its special energy, seems like the perfect solution for her problems, but is it really? Luckily, Nadia is not alone in her journey: A Russian illegal immigrant, Borat, her fellow clown, tries to find his own path in the Big Apple, by working as a cab driver. Lupita, her Latina roommate, an exotic dancer and wanna-be actress, shows Nadia the tough side of the city. Meanwhile, Bob, an American washed-up musician finds himself in the relationship with the Moldovan girl. Aliens with Extraordinary Skills is based on true stories of immigration explored and fictionalized by a playwright who tries to understand her own story. The moral of the 'fable' might be that - regardless our passport and native language - we are all 'aliens' in search for love, understanding and a place to call 'home'.

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Michael Taub
Masked
Samuel french London:

An explosive play about three Palestinian brothers, Masked tackles the cultural divide at the heart of the Middle East conflict. Masked depicts the tragedy of one family torn between obligations, kinship, principles and survival. It is the first play by an Israeli playwright about the Intifada (Palestianian uprising)
- press release

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Adam Bock
Drunken City, The
Samuel french London:

Off on the bar crawl to end all crawls, three twenty-something brides-to-be find their lives going topsy-turvy when one of them suddenly begins to question her future after a chance encounter with a recently jilted handsome stranger. The Drunken City is a wildly theatrical take on the mystique of marriage and the ever-shifting nature of love and identity in a city that never sleeps.
- press release

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Bekah Brunsletter et al
Samuel French Off-Off Broadway Short Play Festival, 33rd series
Samuel french London:

One of Manhattan's most established play festivals, the Samuel French Off-Off Broadway Short Play Festival fosters the work of young writers, giving them the exposure of publication and representation. The festival resulting in this collection was held July 15th-20th, 2008 at the Peter Jay Sharp Theatre on 42nd Street in New York City. From the initial submission pool, approximately 50 plays were chosen to be performed over a period of one week. A panel of judges comprised of New York area theater professionals, critics, and educators nominated one or more of each evening's plays as finalists. The final round was then held on the last day of the Festival. Out of these plays, six winners listed below were chosen by Samuel French, Inc. to receive publication and licensing contracts. Contents: F*cking Art ; Ayravana Flies or A Pretty Dish ; The Thread Men ; The Dying Breed ; The Grave ; Juniper; Jubilee

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Ken Davenport
Awesome '80s Prom, The
Samuel french London:

The Awesome 80s Prom is a brand new blast-from-the-past party in the style of Tony 'n Tina's Wedding and The Donkey Show set at Wanaget High's Senior Prom... in 1989! All your favorite characters from your favorite '80s movies are at THE PROM, from the Captain of the Football Team to the Asian Exchange Student, from the Geek to the hottie Head Cheerleader, and they're all competing for Prom King and Queen. And just like on "American Idol", the audience decides who wins! Come back in time and join the breakdance circle or just sit back and watch the '80s drama unfold.

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Bathsheba Doran
Living Room in Africa
Samuel french London:

UK transplants Edward and Marie relocate to remote African village, intent on opening an art museum. Weeks after arriving, they are stuck with the realization that they have settled in an area devastated by poverty and AIDS. In turn, questions about personal and political responsibilities surface and they are forced to confront what the experience in Africa means to them, and what they mean to each other

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David Mamet
Keep Your Pantheon
Samuel french London:

n Keep Your Pantheon, an impoverished acting company on the edge of eviction is offered a lucrative engagement. But through a series of riotous mishaps, the troupe finds its problems have actually multiplied, and that they are about to learn a new meaning for the term "dying on stage."

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Sam Marks
Nelson
Samuel french London:

Nelson is the story of a young man caught between two worlds. By day, he works as a low-level assistant to a film talent agent. By night, Nelson is the camera man for an underground, gang-related videotape series. As the videos become increasingly dangerous and popular, Nelson develops an overwhelming obsession with a C-List actress. Eventually, Nelsons two worlds collide with disturbing, unsettling results. The play is a darkly comic look at the guilt dream of a man trying to find something authentic in a world of two very different kinds of film.

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George Reinblatt
Evil Dead: The Musical
Samuel french London:

musical based on film director Sam Raimi's 1980s cult-classic horror movies of the same title. As the press release puts it: "Boy and his friends take a weekend getaway at abandoned cabin, boy expects to get lucky, boy unleashes anicent evil spirit, friends turn into Candarian Demons, boy fights until dawn to survive. As musical mayhem descends upon this sleepover in the woods, 'camp' takes on a whole new meaning in uproarious numbers like 'All the Men in My Life Keep Getting Killed by Candarian Demons,' 'Look Who's Evil Now,' and 'Do the Necronomicon.'"
nytheatre.com

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Carmen Rivera
La Gringa
Samuel french London:

La Gringa is about a young womans search for her identity. María Elena Garcia goes to visit her family in Puerto Rico during the Christmas holidays and arrives with plans to connect with her homeland. Although this is her first trip to Puerto Rico, she has had an intense love for the island and even majored in Puerto Rican Studies in college. Once María is in Puerto Rico, she realizes that Puerto Rico does not welcome her with open arms. The majority of the Puerto Ricans on the island consider her an American  a gringa -- and María considers this a betrayal. If shes a Puerto Rican in the United States and an American in Puerto Rico  María concludes that she is nobody everywhere. Her uncle, Manolo, spiritually teaches her that identity isnt based on superficial and external definitions, but rather is an essence that she has had all along in her heart. This play is published in a bilingual edition, if you are applying for licensing rights please state which version (English or Spanish) you wish to produce.

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Sarah Ruhl
Dead Man's Cell Phone
Samuel french London:

Gordon is dead, but his cell phone lives on. When Jean, an empathetic museum worker, answers his ringing phone beside her in a café, she is soon playing unwitting comforter and confessor to the mans grieving friends and family. Before she knows it, Jeans ensnarled in the underbelly of the dead mans bizarre life.
- press release

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