Samuel French Fall/Winter 2017-2018 Journal of Plays and Musicals by Samuel French

Fall/Winter 2017-2018

SAMUEL FRENCH

CONTENTS

Journal of Plays and Musicals Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Recent Acquisitions

Welcome to the latest issue of our curated collection of plays and musicals now available to license. We're pleased to share our most popular titles, and the newest from Broadway, Off-Broadway, and regional theatre. Throughout the journal you'll discover a selection of critically-acclaimed works, classic titles, and a few hidden gems, complemented by articles from Breaking Character Magazine providing insight into our plays and authors.

Plays 12 Musicals 68 Resources 100 Index 102 Contact Us

Making the Connection:

We were no less busy in-house this year: introducing audiences to new writers in the 42nd Off Off Broadway Short Play Festival, and celebrating the work of acclaimed theatre artists at our second annual Samuel French Awards. In the 2017-2018 theatre season, the tireless efforts of our licensing team truly paid off. We're thrilled to have six of our titles in Theatre Communication Group's Top Ten Most-Produced Plays of the Season, including Shakespeare in Love, Fun Home, Skeleton Crew, and Marjorie Prime.

by Garrett Anderson

We look forward to helping you find your next production. â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Samuel French, Inc.

A Chat with Samuel French's Social Media Manager

Expanding upon the Canon of Latinx Plays

On Happy Endings

A New Kind of Epic:

by Sarah Ruhl

A Chat with Mac Rogers by Rebecca Schlossberg

Chris Miller and Nathan Tysen: 76 Fugitives

by Kent Nicholson

Everything Old Is New Again: 86 Costume Design with Paloma Young by Rebecca Schlossberg

Making Theatre More Accessible Back Cover: Lynda Gravatt and Wendell B. Franklin in the world premiere of Skeleton Crew at Atlantic Theater Company, 2016 (Ahron R. Foster).

by Chris Kam

Pittsburgh Public Theatre: Front Cover: Corey Cott, Joe Carroll and Laura Osnes in Bandstand on Broadway, 2017 (Jeremy Daniel).

106

FEATURES

This past season, we were proud to be represented on Broadway with new shows like Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 and Significant Other, and revivals such as Falsettos, Present Laughter, and 2017's Best Play Revival, August Wilson's Jitney. Off-Broadway, Samuel French titles such as A Life, Marie and Rosetta, and the Pulitzer-nominated The Wolves received rave reviews.

In 2018, we're planning to share some exciting new ways we'll be communicating with you and helping you to find your next production. Meanwhile, as you plan your season and discover new titles, we hope you find this journal to be a useful tool. Please share your thoughts with your Licensing Representative, or leave a comment along with your licensing request.

by Margie Romero

MAKING THE CONNECTION

A chat with Samuel French's social media manager

Social media is a key part to any company’s marketing strategy and Samuel French is no exception. Chris Kam, our Marketing Manager of Media & Promotions, sat down with fellow teammate Courtney Kochuba, Marketing Manager of Social Media & Community, to chat all things social, nationwide collaboration with theaters, and how we want to work with you in the future. Chris Kam: So let me start by saying that I definitely have an advantage to interviewing you, since we work so closely together on the marketing team.

strategy? It’s all about fitting into a larger marketing plan, as well as collaboration with smart, creative colleagues. Chris: Obviously, since you’re talking about me, I’ll take that compliment. But, for our readers, could you give a brief introduction into what we focus on in the marketing department? Courtney: Our marketing team feels that we have three major directives. First, to promote our titles and authors. Second, we market Samuel French as a company and brand. Beyond licensing titles and selling scripts, there’s so much that we do with arts advocacy, education, and programs like the OOB Festival and Playwrights Welcome. Our job is to get the word out. Finally, the third component is to celebrate

everybody who makes theatre happen. Chris: “Make theatre happen” is Samuel French’s unofficial motto. So, this third area covers things happening outside of our company, right? Sharing and talking about what’s happening in the industry at large, in the full community. Courtney: Exactly, and all of that fits in perfectly with social media. Chris: Referring to social media, what specific platforms are you talking about?

A COUPLE OF NOTES:

Courtney Kochuba: Absolutely! I think you may already know a lot of my strategies and secrets. Actually, can I kick us off by saying that working well with teammates is key to a social media

Courtney: Our main platforms are Twitter, Instagram and Facebook (@SamuelFrenchNYC). We also use Snapchat and Pinterest. Truthfully, Snapchat is mainly for the teenagers at our conferences, but you can get fun insights

Behind the Scenes with Samuel French’s Music Supervisor Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

into Samuel French there, too. It’s definitely our most relaxed channel, which makes it really fun.

not to mention responding with an array of ever-evolving emojis.

Chris: And we have a lot of marketing channels that we use to promote our titles and Samuel French activity. How do these social media-specific platforms fit into that? Let me rephrase that, is there something different or unique that these platforms allow us to do?

The point of social media, for us at least, is to create a dialogue. Much of our strategy focuses on how to engage directly with our customers, theaters, authors, and artists.

Courtney: Definitely. The main difference is the immediacy of it. There’s nothing better than when you tweet something and within five minutes you’re having a conversation with a customer halfway across the country. That’s another unique aspect, too. The dialogue that is spurred on by social media engagement. The thing is, social media won’t work if you treat it as a shout box. Posting multiple things every day all day will ultimately backfire, because nobody has the time to sift through and read everything. Content needs to created, vetted and shared with a thoughtfulness behind it. The point of social media, for us at least, is to create a dialogue. Much of our strategy focuses on how to engage directly with our customers, theaters, authors, and artists. Chris: So when you’re thinking of social strategy and this direct outreach, how are you determining what social media platform to share something on? Courtney: Well, let me say this: every day, it seems that people are reinventing the uses for each social media outlet. For us, Instagram is about insight. Providing a look — quite literally — into a company, a project, a lifestyle. Twitter is about conversation, and Facebook is about engagement. You can have people sharing and commenting,

Chris: You’re probably considering the audience you’ll reach as well? The demographics? Courtney: Exactly. Instagram is slightly skewed towards high school and college age, though we have a growing number of community and professional theaters joining in. Twitter is definitely more twenty-something followers. Part of our strategy is figuring out what triggers engagement with these audiences. Chris: Okay, then talking about strategy and promotional activity, what are some of the ways that you’ve used social media to promote a specific title that we license? Courtney: It really varies, as you know, depending on what we feel the needs of a specific title are. Also, what we have to share or what assets are available to us. Chris: Can you give an example? Maybe with something that I know has had a lot of success, Heathers the Musical? Courtney: Well, we’ve done quite a lot with that title. We were able to announce the original acquisition and then the creation of Heathers the Musical: High School Edition via social media, and both campaigns remain some of our

most popular. This past summer, we had a Heathers Vocal Selections book giveaway contest. We asked people to comment with their favorite song to be entered to win. The comments turned into small essays about their love for the musical and it was just terrific. This show also has a huge following on social media, largely due to the actual Heathers Twitter account. Kevin [Murphy] and Larry [O’Keefe] who created the show are really active on social media as well, so we’ve been able to do a lot with them. Chris: So you collaborate with Samuel French authors? Courtney: Yes as much as possible. One of my favorite anecdotes is about a Twitter chat we held a few years ago. Through the chat, we ended up introducing a theater in Louisiana to our playwright Stephen Dolginoff, the writer and composer of Flames and Monster Makers. Whoever was running the theater’s Twitter handle hit it off with Stephen, and the theater ended up producing Flames a few months later. You can't have that connection anywhere else unless you're physically in a room with someone. So, it's really exciting to provide a platform for all of these conversations to happen. Chris: With theaters being active on social, are there specific ways that you’ve found to engage with them? Courtney: Every week, we see which theaters are opening Samuel French plays and musicals, and which are active on social media. Then we try to connect with as many of them as we can via social media posts, wishing them "break a leg” and so on. It’s a nice way to let them know we’re supporting them post license request. It also might give them a bit more

attention beyond their own marketing activities. Chris: Do you find that it’s reciprocal? Do theaters tag us? Courtney: Yes! It’s great whenever a theater or school tags us in photos or status updates. There are a couple of companies — some professional, but mainly community theaters and definitely high schools — who consistently tag us in everything they share from their auditions to rehearsals to opening night. And it's exciting for us, because we’re able to see a show unfold in Illinois or Texas or California, and really connect to it. Chris: Have you ever joined forces with a theater, and collaborated on social posts? Courtney: Absolutely, we love working with the theaters. A big campaign that we've started doing are social takeovers. We’ve done this with several of our professional theater partners like Playhouse on the Square in Memphis and Ray of Light Theatre in San Francisco. Also, with a few of our shows on Broadway. We let someone from the cast takeover our Instagram and Twitter accounts for the day. This gives our followers a behind-the-scenes look at performances, as well as allows us to put the spotlight on a specific theater. Chris: How do you find these theaters to work with? Courtney: Truthfully, a lot depends on what show they are producing. But sometimes, these collaborations come because we see a theater creating amazing work on social media and I think, “There, that’s a theater we should be connecting with.” I would also definitely encourage theaters to reach out to us, so we

can continue to highlight the work that they're doing. Tag us in posts or even email me (ckochuba@ samuelfrench.com) to see if we could work together on social media promotions.

If you haven't started social media yet, pick the one outlet that you feel comfortable with and go deep into it.” Chris: Do you have any social media tips you’d be willing to share with producing organizations? Courtney: First and foremost: Create a hashtag. I know that sounds a little trite, but we live in a world of hashtags! They’re an important way to find your production or theater online, as well as an easy method to organize and collect the content you’re putting out there. Once you have the hashtag, don’t forget to tell everyone to use it. Again, this sounds simple, but it’s an easy step to forget. No one can use something if you don’t provide it. Give the hashtag to everyone in your cast and crew, print it on all marketing promotions, and so on. Another great aspect is that hashtags allow your production to live on post closing night and contribute to your theater’s profile on social media for years to come.

— and, ideally, one that most of your audience is already on, so you already have built-in followers. Chris: That's definitely worth mentioning. Finally, you've been doing social media at Samuel French for a few years. A lot of our acitivty has evolved and we have a really active following. What is it you love about doing this work? Courtney: One of the greatest parts of my job is getting to see art through the literal lens of these theaters. There are so may terrific Instagram Stories, for example, that give these snapshots of the production process. If you catch the Stories before they disappear, you feel like you’ve captured a little bit of that theatre magic. And then, even when the Stories are gone, you’re still left holding the emotion from it. Actually, it’s pretty similar to that moment when the curtain closes on a production. The live aspect is over, but the experience stays with you. Chris: Any final words before we wrap up? Courtney: Thank you, to all of these companies who are making theatre happen every day. We need art now more than ever, and at Samuel French, we feel honored to be supporting and sharing your work. So keep making theatre happen, keep telling your stories — and we’ll keep telling the world about it.

Chris: Any other advice? Courtney: Know your audience. I think the best advice I once got from someone was, “If you haven't started social media yet, pick the one outlet that you feel comfortable with and go deep into it.” Don't feel that you have to be active on every channel. Go with the platform where you feel most comfortable and confident

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Photo, Page 2: Samuel French’s Marketing Manager for Social Media and Community, Courtney Kochuba (Ahron R. Foster)

RECENT ACQUISITIONS Our newest plays and musicals acquired over the past six months. You’ll find more throughout the journal. Some of these titles are so new, they may be restricted or not yet available. Contact your Licensing Representative if you have questions about a specific title.

Man in Snow by Israel Horovitz

Rancho Viejo by Dan LeFranc

“In exploring the pain of loss, the possibility of reconciliation, and the random — or perhaps not so random — workings of fate, Man In Snow goes to some raw and primal places, especially in its haunting finale.” — The Boston Globe

CRITIC'S PICK! “Sweet, hypnotic, and very funny...Mr. LeFranc is fast positioning himself as a new-fashioned bard of an old-fashioned American genre, in which small, homey lives are played out against the backdrop of a cosmic infinity.” — The New York Times

David has returned to Mt. Denali to lead a group of Japanese tourists who hope to conceive children under the Northern Lights. He carries a bit of baggage about his own son, who died in a motorcycle accident. His trip up the mountain sends his mind careening through memories of his family's past, both happy and haunting.

Set in the fictional suburb of Rancho Viejo, a couple can't bear the thought of their son and daughter-in-law's marriage troubles. No more than they can bear their awkward neighbors, or life in general. Dan LeFranc's anxious comedy ponders life's big questions while his characters try to avoid existential exhaustion.

4m, 2f | 90 minutes | Drama

5m, 4f | More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Blacktop Sky by Christina Anderson

The Cake by Bekah Brunstetter

“Serves as a mirror for issues in our society surrounding homelessness, police violence, relationships and above all, empathy.” — San Diego Voice and Viewpoint

“Explores human conflict from an insightful, slightly offbeat perch with understanding, respect and compassion... and without dumbing down or sentimentalizing its characters.” — The Los Angeles Times

Klass, a homeless, young black man, sets up residence in the courtyard of the housing project where Ida Peters lives. Triggered by a confrontation between a local street vendor and the police, Klass and Ida quickly develop a precarious bond. An examination of the intersection of love, violence, and seduction inspired by the Greek myth of Leda and the Swan.

Della makes cakes, not judgment calls — those she leaves to her husband, Tim. But when the girl she helped raise comes back home to North Carolina to get married, and the fiancé is actually another fiancée, Della’s life gets turned upside down. She can’t really make a cake for such a wedding, can she? For the first time in her life, Della has to think for herself.

5m, 1f | 90 minutes | Drama

1m, 3f | Full Length Play | Dramatic Comedy

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Recent Acquisitions

The Secret Adversary by Agatha Christie adapted for the stage by Sarah Punshon and Johann Hari

Saving Jason by Peter Quilter “The play manages to tackle serious issues through the absurd and ridiculous due to quick wit and strong performances... It is a fantastic interpretation of an age old situation.” — The Upcoming Trevor and Linda have been struggling with their rebellious teenage son, Jason. In a moment of madness, they hatch a plan to create his own funeral in their living room, hoping he will be confronted by his own mortality and motivated to re-think his life. Jason's aunt and uncle join in but arrive loaded with their own baggage, and the whole scenario descends into chaos very quickly.

“A brilliant show not just for fans of Agatha Christie, but also for those who have never picked up one of her books… will send audiences out with a 1920s spring in their step.” — The Reviews Hub Christie's famous detective duo, Tommy and Tuppence, are introduced in this adaptation of their first mystery. Flat-broke and unemployed, they embark on a daring business scheme, "The Young Adventurers Limited." Their first assignment plunges them into more danger than they ever imagined, and they quickly find themselves sucked into a perilous world of political intrigue and criminal conspiracy. An inventive, fast-paced comedy peppered with murder, mayhem, and a dash of romance.

3m, 3f | 105 minutes | Comedy

All the Fine Boys by Erica Schmidt “Part romantic comedy, part thriller, with a little bit of an indie-drama vibe.” — The New York Times

4m, 4f | Full Length Play | Dark Comedy, Play with Music

Two 14-year-old best friends, Emily and Jenny, are interested in exploring everything from junk food to sex while living in suburban South Carolina in the 80s. Their explorations lead them to two older men; Emily to Adam, a high school senior in the school play, and Jenny to Joseph, her father's 28-year-old friend from church. All the Fine Boys takes a hard look at the often painful and confusing transition into adulthood.

Taking Charlie by Neil Warhurst “The script is clever and laugh-out-loud funny.” — Manchester Evening News A dark comic fantasy based on the real life, very bad idea of two unemployed auto-mechanics who kidnapped and ransomed the body of Charlie Chaplin. They, along with the audience, learn two very useful life lessons: don’t dig up dead comedians, and when you’re face to face with a powerful idiot there’s only one thing to do...laugh.

2m, 2f | 105 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Bunny by Hannah Moscovitch

2m, 1f | Full Length Play | Dark Comedy

“The dialogue is masterfully written. It’s snappy and smart and music to the contemporary ear.”— The Stratford Beacon Herald

That Which Isn't by Matthew Freeman

Sorrel doesn’t fit the strict societal norms of her smalltown high school. She enters college as a self-proclaimed loser with no friends until she meets Maggie, whose support, loyalty, and unwavering friendship bring forward Sorrel’s moral questions and sexuality. As the two women grow older, Maggie is diagnosed with cancer, and Sorrel must choose between raw feeling and devotion.

“A graceful psychodrama, clear-eyed writing, savvy.” — The Village Voice Helen meets with James in a quiet field somewhere far from the city. Years later, she meets with Marcus in a crowded restaurant in Los Angeles. These two goodbyes explore the process of losing the people we love, and how we remember the people we don't.

3m, 4f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy, Romantic Comedy

2m, 1f, Flexible Casting | 105 minutes | Drama Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

The Anarchist by David Mamet

Marian, or The True Tale of Robin Hood by Adam Szymkowicz

“Mr. Mamet has always been preoccupied with words both as power tools and as camouflage. That’s true whether the language is lowdown or high-flown” — The New York Times

“Szymkowicz has delivered a swashbuckling story of what it takes to make change, and the networks and chosen families that keep that revolutionary spirit alive.” — New York Theatre Review

Cathy, who murdered two police officers 35 years ago as a member of a Weather Underground-type movement, must convince her parole officer she deserves to be released from prison. With a nod to his mentor, Harold Pinter, Mamet once again employs his signature verbal jousting in this battle of two women over freedom, power, money, religion and the lack thereof.

Robin Hood is (and has always been) Maid Marian in disguise, and leads a motley group of Merry Men (few of whom are actually men) against the greedy Prince John. As the poor get poorer and the rich get richer, who will stand for the vulnerable if not Robin? What is the cost of revealing your true self in a time of trouble?

2f | 75 minutes | Drama

4m, 4f, 6m or f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Comedy, Adventure

Tomorrow in the Battle by Kieron Barry

To Die For by Caroline Smith

“A solemn erotic lyricism I haven’t encountered since Damage.” — The New York Times

“Harlequin meets Frankenstein: romance and creepiness.” — The Richmond Review

Simon, a heart surgeon, takes increasing risks with his health, marriage, and career as he pursues a desperate relationship. Meanwhile, his wife, Anna, a scientist at the Ministry of Defense, contrives a deception of her own in the renewal of the country’s nuclear arsenal. Tomorrow in the Battle paints a searing portrait of loyalty and lust, honor and honesty, and duty and desire.

Best-selling historical romance writer Carla Woods lives in a Gothic mansion and enjoys playing dangerous mind games with her secretaries. One dark and stormy night, a man shows up at her door. Could this be payback from a disgruntled employee, or could it be love's destiny? A twisting, turning comedy-thriller with two very intelligent and charismatic female combatants. And one devastatingly handsome man.

1m, 2f | Full Length Play | Drama

1m, 2f | Full Length Play | Comedy, Thriller

The Untold Yippie Project by Becca Schlossberg

Beyond the Pole by Neil Warhurst and Paul Barnhill

“Fascinating and provocative…The Untold Yippie Project is fast-moving, exciting and truly fascinating.” — The Huffington Post

“It's ridiculous and zany, and a brilliant demonstration of how unemployment can infantilise people.” — Liverpool Echo

On August 6, 1970, a group of Yippies planned an invasion of Disneyland and forced the park to close early. But who were the Yippies? How did they leave such a mark on Disney history? In this docudrama-style retelling, Shirley Bowlby, a research historian, documents Terry Altman, a wild but weary leader of the Yippies, as he organizes the protest in Disneyland. 3m, 1f, 5m or f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy, Docudrama/Historic

Mark Bark-Jones and Brian Tongue are two ordinary men who want to do extraordinary things despite a few tiny problems: debt, failed relationships, frightened partners, boredom, blind ambition, awful beards, ghost fathers, polar bears, frostbite, brilliant Norwegian rivals, shotguns, lunacy, and the constant life-threatening challenges of the Pole. 5m, 3f | Full Length Play | Comedy

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Recent Acquisitions

Cagney the Musical book by Peter Colley music & lyrics by Christopher McGovern and Robert Creighton

26 Pebbles by Eric Ulloa “A new play that explores the power of community in the face of unimaginable tragedy.” — Playbill On December 14, 2012, Adam Lanza walked into Sandy Hook Elementary School and killed twenty-six innocent souls before taking his own life. These deaths, like pebbles thrown into a pond, created ripples that were felt far beyond the initial rings. Similar to the style of The Laramie Project, playwright Eric Ulloa conducted interviews with members of the community in Newtown and crafted them into an exploration of the effects of this horrible event and issues of gun violence.

“Nothing but joy and plenty of it! Full of vitality, swirling feet, crowd-pleasing songs and dances.” — New York Observer A dramatic new musical that follows the life of the legendary James Cagney from the streets of New York to his rise as one of the brightest stars of Hollywood, from a vaudeville song-and-dance man to the cinema’s original tough guy. Featuring George M. Cohen favorites "Give My Regards To Broadway", "Grand Old Flag", and "Yankee Doodle Dandy."

2m, 4f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Drama, Docudrama/Historic

Peter by Stacy Sobieski

4m, 2f | Full Length Musical | Dramatic Comedy

“An elegant depiction of the impact of 15 minutes of fame in a pre-tabloid world.” — The Reviews Hub

Tinned Goods by Fiona Whitelaw

Peter Llewelyn Davies was just an infant when he served as the inspiration for J.M. Barrie's most famous creation, Peter Pan. With the story proving to be a smash hit, a reluctant Peter was thrust into the spotlight. Then one day, Peter did the unthinkable: he grew up. As he enters adulthood, Peter struggles to separate himself from the "terrible masterpiece" and spirals into a deep depression. Based on a true story, Peter presents another side to one of the world's most beloved tales.

“Whitelaw explains why it is so important to tell this tale of the miners' strike from the perspective of the miners' wives.” — Female Arts Sue and Rachel have not spoken since the miners walked out. Under the strain of politics, pickets, and principles, can the women find a voice to save their relationships and their way of life?

3m, 4f, 3b | Full Length Play | Drama, Biography

5f | Full Length Play | Drama

East of Berlin by Hannah Moscovitch Swimmers by Rachel Bonds “Her examination of the relationship between the children of victims of the Holocaust and the children of those who victimized them is astonishingly complex, as well as sexy, funny and suspenseful.” — Toronto Star

“Bonds has a terrific feel for the painful absurdities of personal relationships — whether collegial or would-be romantic — and the inanities of the surface camaraderie of the modern open workplace.” — San Francisco Chronicle

As a teenager, Rudi discovers that his father was a doctor at Auschwitz. Questioning redemption, love, guilt and the sins of his father, East of Berlin follows Rudi's emotional upheaval as he confronts and comes to terms with a frightening past that was never his own.

Coyotes evading police. Billboards predicting the end of the world. It’s been a strange day at the office, and it’s only 9am. Moving floor by floor from the basement up to the roof, scenes in a corporate office between employees explore the angst-ridden relationships between those that people often take most advantage of: their coworkers.

2m, 1f | 90 minutes | Drama

7m, 4f | 105 minutes | Dramatic Comedy Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Seven Spots on the Sun The Penitent by Martín Zimmerman by David Mamet “Startling and visceral, Martín Zimmerman’s fablelike play...explores the brutalities of war and the confusions of recovery.” — The New Yorker

“The language is both casual and formal and the result can be wonderful - like Schubert scoring a boxing match.” — The New York Times

The village of San Isidro has been without its doctor for eighteen months. Moisés has remained a recluse, refusing to even look at a patient since the army took his wife away during the civil war. When a mysterious plague begins to ravage the countryside, the local parish priest convinces Moisés to take action, and he discovers the miraculous power to heal this plague with the touch of his hand. But among the thousands of pilgrims who flock to San Isidro, Moisés is forced to confront his past and the violence that tore San Isidro apart.

A renowned psychologist, Charles, is asked to testify on behalf of one of his former patients who has committed a shooting. At first he is hesitant, and as his lawyer and his wife begin to tell him how he should handle the situation, Charles clings more fervently to his morals and his ethics. However, the tighter he clings, the more his reputation and career hang in the balance, especially as more truths are revealed about his relationship to his patient. 3m, 1f | 90 minutes | Drama

3m, 2f, 3m or f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Drama

Bull in a China Shop by Bryna Turner

Five Mile Lake by Rachel Bonds

“A pugnacious, tender and gloriously funny new play. Bryna Turner makes an immensely auspicious professional playwriting debut." — The New York Times

“...understated yet touching...Ms. Bonds makes artful use of commonplace language and nonverbal vocal intonations like ummm and gaaahhh." — The New York Times

Inspired by the real letters between Mary Woolley and Jeannette Marks spanning from 1899 to 1937, a fastpaced comedy asking: What is revolution? What does it mean to be at odds with the world? How do we fulfill our potential? And how the hell do we grow old together?

Marie and Jamie are stuck in Scranton, Pennsylvania as Mary is working at a bakery while taking care of her brother, and Jamie is taking care of his ill mother. When Jamie's brother, Rufus, comes to visit with his girlfriend, desires of lives passing by are brought to the surface. A tender, realistic portrayal of relationships between those who leave to the city, those who stay home, and those who feel trapped in their surroundings.

5f | 90 minutes | Comedy, Biography

Here We Go by Caryl Churchill

3m, 2f | 90 minutes | Drama

Sideways by Rex Pickett

“A striking memento mori for an age without faith.” —The Guardian A trio of pieces examining the topics of aging and death. In the first part of the play, friends gather at a funeral and discuss, without much feeling, the passing of a friend. The second part is a monologue about the afterlife, and in the third section, a dying man is dressed and undressed by a loving caregiver.

“Pickett’s dialogue sparkles with wit." — The San Diego Union Tribune When a neurotic author, who is writing his way into a midlife-crisis, and an actor, who is marrying his way out of his, head out to Santa Barbara for a week of wine tastings, they find out that there’s more to be savored in California than a few new bottles. A stage adaptation by the writer of the acclaimed novel, turned into the 2004 Oscar-winning screenplay.

3-8m or f | 45 minutes | Drama

3m, 4f | Full Length Play | Dramatic Comedy

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Recent Acquisitions

Escaped Alone by Caryl Churchill “Caryl Churchill follows Beckett and Pinter into the field of fertile minimalism…This is Churchill at her best, observing with wry compassion how people actually talk.” — The Guardian Three old friends and a neighbor. A summer of afternoons in the backyard. Lingering sunshine and inevitable darkness. 4f | 50 minutes | Drama

Rights of Passage by Ed Decker and Robert Leone “Nuanced, engrossing, riveting... the impact is undeniable.” — San Francisco Chronicle Wayan is a young, gay Hindu man who lives on the island of Bali in Indonesia. Wayan searches for a way to reconcile who he is with what his family and community expect of him. Mixing traditional forms of storytelling, including puppetry, mask, and dance, with modern devices such as digital media, the play nimbly explores the struggle that each of us faces in establishing our identity, and living in a way that is true to ourselves. 3m, 3f | 120 minutes | Drama

This is War by Hannah Moscovitch “...a fine piece of writing and notable for its clear-eyed look at the realities of modern military service…” — The Chicago Tribune Master Corporal Tanya Young, Sergeant Stephen Hughes, Private Jonny Henderson, and Sergeant Chris Anders have lived through an atrocity while holding one of the most volatile regions in Afghanistan. As each of them is interviewed by an unseen broadcasting organization, they recount their version of events leading up to the horrific incident with painful, relenting replies. What begins to form is a picture of the effects of guilt and the psychological toll of violence in a war where the enemy is sometimes indiscernible.

Tess of the D'Urbervilles from the novel by Thomas Hardy a musical by Alex Loveless “…superbly conceived and realised …there is so much to admire in this production… the fusion of the Victorian Novel and Musical Theatre is remarkable.” — Broadway World Set against the beautiful background of nineteenth century Wessex, Thomas Hardy’s masterpiece is brought thrillingly to the stage in a new full length musical incorporating a range of musical styles, from folk and church music to operetta. Full of drama, color, and passion, the story of a farm girl and what happens after she discovers the truth about her family’s illustrious heritage, explores timeless themes of faith, fanaticism, and nobility. 6m, 6f, Flexible Casting | More than 120 minutes | Drama Medium Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Folk, Operetta

LMNOP music by Paul Loesel book & lyrics by Scott Burkell Chaos arises when letters begin to fall from a town monument and government officials ban them one by one. The community depends on the strength of a determined teenage girl to fight for their freedom of speech. Adapted from Mark Dunn’s 2001 award-winning debut novel Ella Minnow Pea, this unique musical is part romance, part clever word game, and part adult fable that reminds us of how precious our liberties are and how important it is to have the courage to stand up for what we believe. 6m, 7f | Full Length Musical | Comedy, Satire

3m, 1f | 90 minutes | Drama, Docudrama/Historic

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Frontières On the Exhale by Martín Zimmerman Sans Frontières by Phillip Howze

“A carefully wrought study of a mother undone by loss...; On the Exhale approaches the subject of American gun violence from a startlingly original perspective.” — The New York Times When a senseless act of violence changes her life forever, a liberal college professor finds herself inexplicably drawn to the very weapon used to perpetrate the crime—and to the irresistible feeling of power that comes from holding life and death in her hands. Peering down the barrel of a uniquely American crisis, she begins to suspect that when it comes to gun violence, we’re all part of the problem.

“Intelligent, unruly...there is much beauty in this abundance, and something deeply unsettling, too.” — The New York Times At the corner of a country that feels both foreign and familiar, three orphaned, stateless youth have built a simple life out of recreation and mischief-making. Their world is suddenly rocked as a parade of immodest strangers slowly invade, offering gifts of language, medicine, art, and commerce. As the lure of development blurs their beliefs, life and landscape mutate, threatening their long-held values, community, and humanity.

1f | 90 minutes | Drama

4m, 4f, Flexible Casting | 120 Minutes | Satire, Experimental

How to Survive an Apocalypse by Jordan Hall

The Light Years by Hannah Bos and Paul Thureen developed by Oliver Butler

“Disaster prep is the new porn supplement for this generation, and Hall has tapped into a powerful modern undercurrent.” — Daily Hive Vancouver A young and successful urban couple become convinced that their lifestyle is coming to an end. They become ‘preppers’, hoarding supplies and learning to hunt. But their obsession takes its toll, and they are both forced to imagine the apocalypse without the love of their life. A romantic comedy about the end of days, showcasing the talents of our fifth Flying Start playwright.

“A theatrical cabinet of wonders. A wistful, cockeyed play that celebrates American dreamers.” — Time Out New York Behold the Spectatorium: an audacious, visionary 12,000-seat theater designed for the Chicago World's Fair of 1893 by Steele MacKaye, the now-forgotten theatrical impresario around whom this haunted, 40-year love story spins. An epic, intimate tale of two families struggling to meet their future, and a spectacular tribute to man's indomitable spirit of invention.

2m, 2f | 120 minutes | Dark Comedy

China Doll by David Mamet

4m, 1f, 1b | 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

“Much of the language is sublime and there are great one liners along the way.” — The Wrap A very wealthy businessman purchases a plane to carry his fiancée, a non-US citizen, into Canada. However, an unexpected landing prompts an investigation into the man's affairs based on his tax payment history, revealing catastrophic secrets thought to be untraceable. As the investigation deepens, the businessman's future is greatly jeopardized. 2m | 120 minutes | Dark Comedy

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Recent Acquisitions

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

PLAYS

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Phillip James Brannon, Josh Charles, Josh Hamilton, Danny Mastrogiorgio, Danny McCarthy, Emily Cass McDonnell, Brian Miskell, and Will Patton in The Antipodes at Signature Theatre, 2017 (Joan Marcus). Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

THE ANTIPODES by Annie Baker

“In-all-ways fabulous...Ms. Baker delivers a complete and confident narrative... The Antipodes is also deeply funny, but it’s naturally funny, and if it’s a satire, it’s an organic one. This playwright doesn’t need to exaggerate to elicit what’s absurd in the human condition.”

— The New York Times

A play about people telling stories about telling stories. The latest play from MacArthur Genius and Pulitzer Prizewinner, Annie Baker, who the New York Times calls, “one of the freshest and most talented dramatists to emerge Off Broadway in the past decade.” The Antipodes dissects that most ancient of arts forms and dares to ponder if there are any stories left to tell.

7m, 2f | 120 minutes | Dark Comedy

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Colossal The Tomb of King Tot by Andrew Hinderaker by Olivia Dufault “It truly is colossal … an exciting 65 minutes of innovative theatre.” — Talkin’ Broadway The beauty and brutality of football seduce Mike to stray from the path his father had mapped out for him, but when a snap decision results in a career-ending injury, Mike must tackle the past and make peace with the man he dreamed he would be. Played in four quarters with a half-time show, dance company, and a drumline, Colossal’s explosive theatrical storytelling and full-contact physicality carries this unmissable summer event all the way to the end zone. 15m, Flexible Casting | 75 minutes | Drama

“Sweet and spiky new tragicomedy…this production makes a case for whimsy as a filter both for shutting out and eventually coming to terms with an unforgiving world and one’s unforgivable self.” — The New York Times Jane Haley is the punny voice of the comic strip King Tot, a three-panel strip about a nine-year-old pharaoh in ancient Egypt. All seems to be going well until bleak news strikes in the Haley household. As Jane tries to hide her coping by working extensively on her comics, her art suffers as her main character tries to find their way through the Land of the Dead to find her “mummy.” 2m, 3f | 75 minutes | Dark Comedy

Yen by Anna Jordan “A terrific, breakneck new play…young, buzzy, smart, violent.” — New York Magazine Hench is 16, Bobbie is 13. They live alone with their dog Taliban, playing Playstation, watching porn, surviving. Sometimes their chaotic mum Maggie visits, occasionally she passes out on the front lawn. But when Jenny knocks on the door the boys discover a world far beyond what they know, a world full of love, possibility, and danger. 2m, 2f | 120 minutes | Drama

A Life by Adam Bock “Exquisite in detail and throws a jaw-dropping curveball.” — Time Out New York Nate Martin is hopelessly single. When his most recent breakup, another in a lifelong string of ill-fated matches, casts him into a funk, he turns to the only source of wisdom he trusts: the stars. In this disarming new play, the answer he receives, when it comes, is shockingly obvious —and totally unpredictable. 2m, 3f | 85 minutes | Dark Comedy

The Roommate by Jen Silverman “Tugs at the heartstrings as much as it tickles the funny bone.” — Louisville.com Sharon, in her mid-50s, is newly divorced and needs a roommate to share her Iowa home. Robyn, also in her mid-50s, needs a place to hide and a chance to start over. But as Sharon begins to uncover Robyn’s secrets, they encourage her own deep-seated desire to transform her life. A dark comedy about what it takes to re-route your life and what happens when the wheels come off. 2f | 105 minutes | Dark Comedy

Nice Fish by Mark Rylance and Louis Jenkins “Mr. Jenkins’s seemingly modest writing, attuned to close observation of everyday experience, contains, beneath its homely surfaces, larger meanings that glide softly into your mind and heart, like those elusive fish swimming beneath the ice.” — The New York Times On a frozen Minnesota lake, the ice is beginning to creak and groan. It’s the end of the fishing season, and two old friends are out on the ice, angling for something big; something down there that is pure need. Something that might just swallow them whole. 4m, 1f | 90 minutes | Drama/Experimental

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

MARIE AND ROSETTA by George Brant

“It is so rare for a play about the inner lives of black women to center on their intimacy and not world politics or degradation that the very fact of George Brant’s loving two-character script is refreshing.” — The New Yorker Sister Rosetta Tharpe was a legend in her time, bringing fierce guitar playing and swing to gospel music. Tharpe was the queen of “race records” in the 30s and 40s, performing mornings at churches and evenings at the Cotton Club. This celebratory and thoughtful work imagines her first rehearsal with young protégée Marie Knight, as they prepare for a tour that would establish them as one of the great duet teams in musical history. 2f | 90 minutes | Historical Drama, Play with Music Kecia Lewis in the world premiere of Marie and Rosetta at Atlantic Theater Company, 2016 (Ahron R. Foster). Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

WAKEY, WAKEY by Will Eno

“Glowingly dark, profoundly moving...Wakey, Wakey retains a Beckettian sense of human existence as an absurdist vaudeville, a slapstick of failing and falling, despite all aspirations to dignity.” — The New York Times “Is it now? I thought I had more time.” These first words in Will Eno’s play are spoken by Guy, a man who knows he is about to die. The play questions why we are here and the journeys that everyone takes to eventually get to the same place. Eno challenges what is worth celebrating in life and what is worth treasuring in this funny and touching play. 1m, 1f | 75 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Michael Emerson in Wakey, Wakey at Signature Theatre, 2017 (Joan Marcus).

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Homos, or Everyone in America by Jordan Seavey

The Healing by Samuel D. Hunter “A moving, beautifully acted new drama… Mr. Hunter writes with lively humor and grace.” — The New York Times

“A daringly frank, funny and affecting new play… Mr. Seavey’s portrait of young gay New Yorkers negotiating the sometimes thorny nature of love and intimacy has an arresting, even bruising honesty.” — The New York Times

25 years ago, a group of kids met at a summer camp where the head counselor taught them that their disabilities could be “cured” through the power of prayer. Today, the old friends gather to mourn the untimely passing of one of their circle. Over the course of the night, old wounds are uncovered, friendships tested, and a troubling truth about their late friend becomes clear. The Healing features a cast of mostly differently abled actors.

“Love is love” — but is navigating it any less complicated today? Told through interweaving glimpses into the life of an everyday couple unexpectedly confronted by a vicious crime, this is a fearless, funny, heart-on-its-sleeve examination of the moments that can bring two people together — or pull them apart.

2m, 5f | 90 minutes | Drama

3m, 1f | 105 minutes | Drama

This Much (or An Act of

Summerland by Arlitia Jones

Violence Towards the Institution of Marriage)

by John Fitzpatrick

“An engaging and cerebral thriller. But why leave it at that? Allow yourself to get caught up in some of its deeper reflections and you’ll find a tale about the pursuit of faith and truth, about our willingness to accept senses that reach beyond science and logic.” — Cincinnati Enquirer

“A probing piece comfortable in the ambiguities it raises.” — Fest

In 1869, William H. Mumler, a spirit photographer famous for capturing haunting images of the dead from the world beyond, was at the height of his game. Now Mumbler is being investigated by Chief Marshall Joseph Tooker for fraud, and Tooker is uncovering much more than he bargained for in his search for truth.

Gar can’t decide between the man who plays games and the man on one knee with a ring. In fact, Gar can’t decide on anything because every choice seems like a compromise. Everyone wants answers but nothing lives up to the image he has in his head. Facades start crumbling as his world implodes around him but Gar just wants to dance with his friends.

2m, 1f | 120 minutes | Drama

3m, 3m or f | 75 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Samsara by Lauren Yee

Amelia by Alex Webb

“There’s a throbbing play here with a bleeding heart and a laudable awareness of how we sometimes only get one shot at happiness or escape…” — Chicago Tribune

“An ingenious tale… The narrative is historical yet relevantly feminist, emotionally brutal yet romantic, and constantly upsetting yet amusing.” — Backstage

Katie and Craig are having a baby…with a surrogate…who lives in India. A month before the baby’s due date, Craig reluctantly travels to the subcontinent, where he meets Suraiya, their young, less-than-thrilled surrogate. As all three “parents” anxiously wait for the baby to be born, flights of fancy attack them from all sides, in the form of an unctuous Frenchman and a smart-mouthed fetus. A whimsical take on modern-day colonialism.

A heroic Civil War tale of one woman’s search for her husband across the battlefields of America. The story culminates at the gates of the notorious Andersonville Prison Camp. In its two-hander form, this vivid docudrama celebrates the inherent theatricality of two bodies on stage creating an epic and vast world. 1m, 1f | 90 minutes | Historical Drama

3m, 2f | 90 minutes | Comedy Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Plays

“...should be a sought-after title for other venues looking for a theatrical hug in turbulent times.”

— Variety

TINY BEAUTIFUL THINGS by Nia Vardalos

When a struggling writer is asked to take over the unpaid anonymous position of an advice columnist, her inherent empathy helps those seeking guidance for obstacles both large and small. A play about reaching when you’re stuck, healing when you’re broken, and finding the courage to take on the questions which have no answer. Based on the best-selling book by Cheryl Strayed.

2m, 2f | 75 minutes Dramatic Comedy, Adaptation

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Phillip James Brannon and Nia Vardalos in Tiny Beautiful Things at the Public Theater, 2017 (Joan Marcus).

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Dot by Colman Domingo

Marjorie Prime by Jordan Harrison

“A thoroughly entertaining comedy-drama! … An impressive advance for Colman Domingo.” — The New York Times

“Jordan Harrison’s elegant drama keeps developing in your head, like a photographic negative, long after you have seen it.” — The New York Times

The holidays are always a wild family affair at the Shealy house. This year, Dotty and her three grown children gather with more than exchanging presents on their minds. As Dotty struggles to hold on to her memory, her children must fight to balance care for their mother and care for themselves. This twisted and hilarious new play grapples unflinchingly with aging parents, midlife crises, and the heart of a West Philly neighborhood.

85-year-old Marjorie — a jumble of disparate, fading memories — has a handsome new companion who’s programmed to feed the story of her life back to her. What would we remember, and what would we forget, if given the chance? A spare and wondrous exploration of the mysteries of human identity and the limits of what technology can replace. 2m, 2f | 90 minutes | Drama

4m, 3f | 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

August Wilson’s How I Learned What I Learned co-conceived by Todd Kreidler

Erma Bombeck: At Wit’s End by Allison Engel and Margaret Engel “Allison and Margaret Engel’s script is beautifully structured…a loving tribute.” — DC Theatre Scene From the writers of Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins comes a comic look at one of our country’s most beloved voices, who captured the frustrations of her generation by asking, “If life is a bowl of cherries, what am I doing in the pits?” Discover the story of the humorist who championed women’s lives with wit that sprang from the most unexpected place of all: the truth. 1f | 90 minutes | Comedy, Biography

Muckrakers by Zayd Dohrn

“Wilson’s pride, humor, eloquence, anger, storytelling gifts, and general eagerness to soak up experience: It’s all there.” — The Boston Globe From Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright August Wilson comes a one-man show that chronicles his life as a black artist in the Hill District of Pittsburgh. From stories about first jobs and first loves to his experiences with racism, Wilson recants his life from his roots to the completion of the American Century Cycle. How I Learned What I Learned gives an inside look into one of the most celebrated playwriting voices of the 20th century. 1m | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy, Biography

“A fervent and attention-getting play…ultra relevant… acute, absorbing, topically vital theater.” — Talkin’ Broadway

You Got Older by Clare Barron WINNER! 2015 Obie Awards for Playwriting and Performance

A young female activist brings an older man — a famous political hacker/journalist — home to her Brooklyn apartment to spend the night. But as they start to expose each other’s secrets, personal and political desires collide, testing the limits of privacy in the modern world.

Mae returns home to help take care of Dad (and maybe a little herself ). A tender and darkly comic new play about family, illness, cowboys, and how to remain standing when everything comes crashing down around you.

1m, 1f | 75 minutes | Drama

4m, 3f | 90 minutes | Dark Comedy Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Plays

How to Get Into Buildings by Trish Harnetiaux

Important Hats of the Twentieth Century by Nick Jones

“Harnetiaux does some quite sophisticated structural work here, slipstreaming her events in space …and a constantly somersaulting timeline.” — Time Out New York

“Part sci-fi parody, part Ayn Rand spoof and 100% screwball comedy, Important Hats…leaves no punchline unpunched.” — The Wall Street Journal

Roger and Lucy meet at a convention. Daphne and Nick break down at a diner. Ethan continues to read compulsively from his new book, The Car Accident. It’s soon apparent that reality is slippery and time is shifting. We join our characters’ struggles with their own discoveries about love, opportunity, and a desire to pause with trepidation.

Sam Greevy is the toast of 1920s women’s apparel, until the maverick fashion designer Sam Roms springs his radical creations on the world: The Sweatshirt, The Track Suit, and Skater Pants. The clothes he comes up with are as if from another dimension, and maybe they are. As Greevy tries to adapt to rapidly changing fashions, a parallel drama unfolds in Albany, circa 1998: a teenage stoner keeps losing articles of clothing, and a man keeps bursting out of his closet and taking them.

3m, 3f, Flexible Casting | 75 minutes | Dark Comedy, Experimental

8m, 1f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Comedy

Grand Concourse by Heidi Schreck

“Heidi Schreck’s beautiful tragicomedy of life…reminds you of why you go to the theater in the first place.” — Chicago Sun Times Having dedicated her life to religious service, Shelley runs a Bronx soup kitchen with unsentimental efficiency, but lately her heart’s not quite in it. Her brisk nature masks an unsettling fear that her efforts are meaningless. When Emma, an idealistic but confused college dropout, arrives to volunteer, her reckless mix of generosity and selfinvolvement pushes Shelley to the breaking point. 2m, 2f | 90 minutes | Drama

Hannah and the Dread Gazebo by Jiehae Park “If you’re keen to have your mind expanded by an evening of theater that is not going to be comparable to anything you’ll see anytime soon, Hannah and the Dread Gazebo is a good place to start.” — Mail Tribune Inside the FedEx box are two things: a 100% bona-fideheart’s-desire-level wish and a suicide note. Hannah tracks the package back to Korea, where her grandmother recently jumped from the roof of the Sunrise Dewdrop Apartment City for Senior Living onto the wrong side of the Demilitarized Zone. Oops.

End of the Rainbow by Peter Quilter “Sensational — in every sense of the word.” — The New York Times With a six-week booking at London’s Talk of the Town, it looks like Judy Garland is set firmly on the comeback trail. At 46 and with new flame Mickey Deans at her side, she seems determined to carry it off and recapture her magic. But lasting happiness always eludes some people, and there was never any answer to the question with which Judy ended every show, “If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow, why, oh, why, can’t I?” 3m, 1f | 120 minutes | Drama, Biography, Play with Music

Antlia Pneumatica by Anne Washburn “A sheer joy, elegantly weird and wonderfully vivid with ghost stories and songs!” — Time Out New York In a ranch house deep in Texas Hill Country, a once tight-knit group of friends reunites to bury one of their own. When they look backward through their lives, it becomes clear they’ve lost more than just an old pal. In this haunting play, the boundaries between then and now grow disarmingly blurry as these friends must confront a slippery past. 2m, 4f | 105 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

2m, 2f | 90 minutes | Comedy

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

THE WOLVES by Sarah DeLappe

“DeLappe has created an ensemble of distinct female characters without leaning on romantic partners or traditional feminine tropes to define them.” — TheatreMania NOMINEE! 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Drama Left quad. Right quad. Lunge. A girls indoor soccer team warms up. From the safety of their suburban stretch circle, the team navigates big questions and wages tiny battles with all the vim and vigor of a pack of adolescent warriors. A portrait of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for nine American girls who just want to score some goals. 10f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy The cast of The Wolves at The Playwrights Realm, 2016 (Daniel J. Vasquez).

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EXPANDING UPON THE CANON OF LATINX PLAYS Spotlight on Tanya Saracho by Garrett Anderson Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

f you’re looking for a word that can describe playwright Tanya Saracho, she would offer the term teatrista. She’ll even spell it for you, with a chuckle: “I know you’re going to ask how to spell it.” For those not necessarily entrenched in the Latinx community, she’s a hyphenate; a theatre-maker who started her career by doing a little bit of everything for a Latinx company in Chicago, Teatro Luna. Everything from acting to producing to running the box office and, you know, she wrote some plays, too. “I started writing a lot of the plays, like the single-author plays, and big theaters like Steppenwolf and the Goodman started coming to see the stuff and they started taking notice… So all of a sudden the Goodman gave me an award and a commission, and they were like ‘Here, write us something.’” As Tanya wrote more plays, most of her other duties fell by the wayside. It’s a fault that many theatre-makers can agree is a downside to the industry the further you advance in your career. “Sometimes [producers] only want you to be one thing, especially in the American theatre. You know, when you come as a visitor and as a playwright, they do your play and then you go away. I was used to this Chicago ensemble aesthetic, but that’s not how the regional theatre movement works. So all of a sudden that washed all of my other titles away, then I was just a playwright.” But being a playwright does have its perks. “I like having control. You have

more control as a writer. Actors don’t have a lot of control.”

“You know how Jill Soloway is talking about the female gaze? I’m interested in the Latina gaze for the foreseeable future.” With that control comes the voice that Saracho has crafted into a very specific niche that audiences don’t often see; a non-stereotypical representation of the Latinx community. “You know how Jill Soloway is talking about the female gaze? I’m interested in the Latina gaze for the foreseeable future.” Saracho has written plays that expand upon the canon of Latinx plays. In her play Mala Hierba, she introduces us to Liliana, trophy wife to a wealthy man, who is torn between her desire to live a comfortable life while supporting her parents and wanting to leave it all for her old flame Maritza. Looking for a comedy? Try Enfrascada, an exploration of magic and love featuring a group of ladies trying to mend their friend’s broken heart by experimenting with different forms of magic, including Santería, hoodoo, and brujería. Prefer the classics? Take a look at El Nogalar, a Latinx adaptation of Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard that explores class and family bonds along the Mexican border. New Yorkers will be most familiar with Tanya’s most recent play, Fade, which peers into systemic racism within the television industry and even within the Latinx community.

“I’m really interested in exploring gender, class, and even nationality. Immigrant identities are not your stereotype identities that we’re used to seeing. We’ve been seeing our grandparents’ narrative of how we got here, and I’m really interested in that millennial narrative.” Saracho’s desire for diversity of representation began early in high school in McAllen, Texas, where she and her best friend, Raul, used to go through the catalogs and order scripts, especially if they were by fellow Latinx writers. “We didn’t have that many in the canon. [Latinx playwrights] were writing plays, but they were not being published, so anything we could get our hands on was sacred. We had dog-eared copies of José Rivera, Milcha Sanchez-Scott, and Octavio Solis that we would order together and read them to ourselves and borrow them and write in them. We couldn’t get our hands on Latino playwrights in school because they weren’t teaching them, so we had to order them from Samuel French.” You can’t just place Saracho’s influences into one niche, though. Some of the most formative writers for her came from the Chicago stages. “August Wilson was a big influence. Just because I watched the whole Cycle on the Goodman stage, you know? It just did something to me. Lynn Nottage and Lydia Diamond were early influences when I was forging my identity as a Chicago artist.” Much like her character in Fade, Saracho’s work has recently shifted toward writing for television. She has written for shows like

Plays by

TANYA SARACHO Fade

El Nogalar

When Lucia, a Mexican-born novelist, gets her first TV writing job, she feels a bit out of place on the white male-dominated set. Lucia quickly becomes friends with the only other Latino around, a janitor named Abel. As Abel shares his stories with Lucia, similar plots begin to find their way into the TV scripts that Lucia writes. Fade is a play about class and race within the Latino community, as well as at large, and how status does not change who you are at your core.

Set in modern day Northern Mexico, the Galvan family, led by Matriarch Maite, have come back to their pecan orchard to reclaim their land after Maite has squandered away their money. In the time they’ve been away, however, the Mexico they once knew has slowly been taken over by a drug war. Will these women choose to adapt to the world around them or get left behind? 1m, 4f | 105 minutes | Drama

1m, 1f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Enfrascada

Mala Hierba

When Alicia finds out that her boyfriend of nine years has been cheating on her, she is devastated beyond belief. Luckily her friends are ready to help her — by any means necessary. They urge Alicia to experiment with brujería, hoodoo, and santería magic; not only to heal her broken heart, but to help get her man back.

Liliana has a sparkle few can deny and fewer still can resist. The trophy wife of a border magnate living in Texas, she’s seemingly impeccable. But beneath that polished exterior lies a fierce determination to survive at any cost. When Liliana’s true desires break the surface, she’ll have to decide between the value of obligation and the price of freedom.

5f | 90 minutes | Dark Comedy

4f | 90 minutes | Drama

How to Get Away with Murder and Looking, and is currently showrunner on a series in development for Starz called Pour Vida. “It’s kind of like a full circle thing because I started with Teatro Luna and I was a producer. And now, show running is a lot of the same skills.” Yet, whether writing for TV or theatre, Saracho won’t stray from

her ultimate goal: telling stories about Latinas. “Thematically it’s the same stuff from 2000 when I was starting to write; Latinas at the center, women of color, just a feminist Latina take. Like the Gloria Anzaldúa take, intersectional, you know? I think that’s just my mission and that’s not going to change. People ask me sometimes, ‘Do you want to keep limiting yourself being

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

a Latina playwright?’ I find that so offensive. How is that limiting? There are boundless unlimited stories and points of view. I support a lot of my Latinx playwright contemporaries that don’t want to write about identity. That’s fine, but I do. And I don’t think I’ll ever run out of ideas.”

This article originally appeared on Breaking Character Magazine in October, 2017.

Future Thinking by Eliza Clark “What begins as a play about how people’s fantasies can get in the way of their reality turns into a play in which people’s reality can also screw up their fantasies.” — OCweekly.com Middle-aged super fan Peter finds himself in a makeshift interrogation room at the mercy of Comic Con security. Meanwhile, spoiled starlet Chiara is holed up in a hotel suite with her stage mom and bodyguard. And Peter is determined to fulfill his destiny: to deliver an important and mysterious message. Everyone has a fantasy, and soon they’ll collide with each other, and with reality. 3m, 3f | 120 minutes | Comedy

Kingdom Come by Jenny Rachel Weiner

The Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World by Suzan-Lori Parks “A smart, poignant and often funny play that sets you up to watch a typically post-modern, woman-centered romantic comedy, only then to subvert and satirize many of the elements of that genre.” — Chicago Tribune A woman tries to feed her husband a fried drumstick. Dragons roam a flat earth. The last black man in the whole entire world dies again. And again. Careening through memory and language, archetypes of Black America are explored and explode with piercing insight and raucous comedy. A riotous theatrical event that hums with the heartbeat of improvisational jazz. 6m, 5f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Fish Eye by Lucas Kavner

“Funny, affecting and sensitively drawn, with surprising twists… This unconventional romantic comedy is a testament to playwright Jenny Rachel Weiner’s inventiveness.” — The Hollywood Reporter

“A keen observer of human behavior… his dialogue is so true to life, it’s like eavesdropping on real people.” — New York Daily News

Samantha is lonely and confined to bed. Layne is shy and too afraid of the world to journey out. But when these two thirty-somethings connect through an online dating site, they fall for each other fast and hard. What could go wrong? Considering that they’re both pretending to be someone else: everything. The new, digital world is upended in this blisteringly funny play.

At a bar across from a falafel place, Max and Anna meet again, or is it for the first time? A funny and emotionally raw portrait of a couple struggling to hold on to one another without losing themselves, Fish Eye explodes the traditional chronology of romance and offers a modern take on the exhilaration of love: when nothing means everything and everything means nothing, and the entire world can shrink down to a single moment.

1m, 4f | 105 minutes | Comedy

2m, 2f | 90 minutes | Romantic Comedy

Pocatello by Samuel D. Hunter “Hunter evokes a world in which identity itself has come to seem confusingly mass-produced.” — The New York Times Eddie manages an Italian chain restaurant in Pocatello — a small, unexceptional American city that is slowly being paved over with strip malls and franchises. But he can’t serve enough Soup, Salad & Breadstick Specials to make his hometown feel like home. Against the harsh backdrop of Samuel D. Hunter’s Idaho, this heartbreaking comedy is a cry for connection in a lonely American landscape. 5m, 5f | 90 minutes | Drama

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Vérité by Nick Jones “Mr. Jones deftly satirizes the mania for memoirs.” — The New York Times Struggling writer Jo has been given the opportunity to write her own memoir. Her publishers explicitly ask only that she write about her life truthfully and that it be as exciting as possible. Forced to re-examine her rather dull life, strange events begin to occur, and Jo has to decide if her life is worth writing about or worth living. 4m, 2f, 1b | 90 minutes | Dark Comedy

Plays

The Open House by Will Eno

3C by David Adjmi

“Will Eno’s work combines studied banality, sneaky weirdness and formal ingenuity.” — Time Out New York

“Adjmi’s script, quick-cutting from dopey to deranged in seconds, is intensely funny and unnerving in equal measure.” — Time Out New York

People have been born into families since people started getting born at all. Playwrights have been trying to write Family Plays for a long time, too. And typically these plays try to answer endlessly complicated questions of blood and duty and inheritance and responsibility. They try to answer the question, “Can things really change?” People have been trying nobly for years and years to have plays solve in two hours what hasn’t been solved in many lifetimes. This has to stop.

The war in Vietnam is over and Brad, an ex-serviceman, lands in L.A. to start a new life. When he winds up trashed in Connie and Linda’s kitchen after a party, the three figure out a living arrangement that has hilarious and devastating consequences. Inspired by 1970s sitcoms, 1950s existentialist comedy, Chekhov, and Disco anthems, 3C is a terrifying yet amusing look at a culture that likes to amuse itself, even as it teeters on the brink of ruin.

3m, 2f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

3m, 3f | 90 minutes | Satire

Friend Art by Sofia Alvarez

Shoot/Get Treasure/ Repeat by Mark Ravenhill

“You won’t struggle to find complimentary things to say about this very funny, almost painfully astute play.” — The New York Times Molly and Kevin are engaged, they have “normal” jobs. Kevin and Nate have known each other since they were kids. Nate just broke up with Lil, who does performance art, and she used to work with Molly, who wanted to be an actress a long time ago. These relationships come to a head when Kevin decides he no longer wants the regular life he convinced Molly to live with him. 2m, 2f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

The Mystery of Love & Sex by Bathsheba Doran “It is tender, funny, packed with humanity and brimming with surprising revelations. Bathsheba Doran has written a play with such compassion and wry wisdom.” — The New York Times Deep in the American South, Charlotte and Jonny have been best friends since they were nine. She’s Jewish, he’s Christian; he’s black, she’s white. Their differences intensify their connection until sexual desire complicates everything in surprising ways. An unexpected love story about souls meeting and the consequences of growing up. 3m, 2f | More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

“Ravenhill writes tales that hold a gun to your heart and shoot you in the soul, but leave you alive so you can feel every last drop of pain.” — The Austin Chronicle An epic cycle of 16 short plays examining the personal and political effect of war on modern life. A child talks to a headless man; a woman is afflicted with mysterious intestinal pain; a couple talks about their garden bench; a soldier demands love from a woman whose country he has liberated. Each new play is a fragment of suffering, and a fierce, sardonic attack on the war on terror. Though lightly connected, the scenes can be performed in any combination or order. Flexible Casting | Sketches | Satire

The Substance of Bliss by Tony Glazer “A sympathetic study of suburban despair…” — The New York Times Paul and Donna wait during the late night for their troubled 15-year-old son to come home. As they wait for him, they keep their minds occupied by cleaning and discussing potential renovations to the house, and the conversation slowly veers toward their decision to marry and have a child that is causing them so much angst. 1m, 1f | 90 minutes | Drama

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

“Deeply moving. You feel an intense desire for more scenes, more time in your seat, a deeper dive into the life, times and fate of the protagonist you are watching.”

— Chicago Tribune

Mary Page Marlowe leads an unremarkable life. As an accountant in Ohio with two children, few would expect her life to be inordinately intricate or moving. However, it is choices, both mundane and gripping, and where those choices have taken her, that make her life so intimate and surprisingly complicated. A piece about the fragility of a moment and its effects on one’s identity.

MARY PAGE MARLOWE by Tracy Letts

Carrie Coon and Gary Wilmes in Mary Page Marlowe at Steppenwolf, 2016 (Michael Brosilow).

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

6m, 11f, 1g | 90 minutes | Drama

Now available to license, we're proud to share the newest additions to the Agatha Christie Collection. These recently released dramatic titles from the Queen of Crime include radio plays, melodramas, lesser-known stage mysteries, and a rare Christie historical epic.

A Daughter's a Daughter

Ann Prentice falls in love with Richard Caulfield and hopes for a new life and happiness. But her daughter, Sarah, takes an instant dislike to him. Resentment slowly corrodes their relationship as each seeks comfort in the formidable and knowing Dame Laura Whitstable, who remarks, “The trouble with sacrifice is that once it’s made, it’s not over and done with.” 4m, 5f | More than 120 minutes | Melodrama

The Secret of Chimneys

A young drifter finds more than he bargained for when he agrees to deliver a parcel to an English country estate. A simple errand on behalf of a friend puts Anthony in the middle of a murderous international conspiracy. A political murder mystery, rife with diamonds, oil concessions, exiled royalty, an elusive master criminal, and the combined forces of Scotland Yard and the French Surete. 10m, 4f | More than 120 minutes | Melodrama, Mystery

Akhnaton

Regarded as one of her most extraordinary plays, this epic historical drama is unlike anything you have read of Christie’s before. An enlightened pharaoh falls foul of his conservative court when he attempts to unite the polytheist Egyptians under one god, forcing both the army and priesthood to turn against him. Undeterred, Akhnaton’s vision of a kingdom where people dwell in peace, truth, and love will ultimately destroy him and all those he holds dear. 12m, 4f | More than 120 minutes | Drama

AGATHA CHRISTIE Photo courtesy of the Christie Archive Trust.

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Find all plays in the Agatha Christie Collection at samuelfrench.com.

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Fiddlers Three

Trying to get their hands on more than a little inheritance, a group of young people hide the body of a dead tycoon. But what starts as a lark becomes all too serious when they discover the body is in fact a murder victim. A comedy about business and finance, with a strong undercurrent of criminal activity, intricate plotting, and a confounding murder. 8m, 3f | More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy, Melodrama

Yellow Iris

A distressed phone call from a mystery woman brings Hercule Poirot to the Hotel Jardin des Cygnes, where a man commemorates the four-year anniversary of his wife’s death. Gathered is everyone present on that fateful night. Now, Poirot must find a killer in the midst, before they strike again. 7m, 2f | 30 minutes | Radio Play, Melodrama

Part of the live radio triple bill Murder in the Studio and the one act collection A Poirot Double Bill.

Love from a Stranger with Frank Vosper

Cecily has led a staid and proper existence, but having won a large amount of money, she now yearns for a life of adventure. Enter Bruce Lovell, a handsome and charming stranger who sweeps her off her feet. She recklessly abandons her job, friends, and fiancé to settle in the remote and blissful surroundings of a country cottage. However, her newfound “love from a stranger” is not what it seems. Based on Christie's story, Philomel Cottage. 4m, 4f | More than 120 minutes | Drama, Mystery

The Stranger

Towards Zero

with Gerald Verner

When a house party gathers at Gull's Point, the seaside home of Lady Tressilian, Neville Strange finds himself caught between his old wife, Audrey, and his new flame, Kay. A nail-biting thriller, the play probes the psychology of jealousy in the shadow of a savage and brutal murder. 7m, 4f | More than 120 minutes | Melodrama, Mystery

A different stage version of this story set entirely in the outdoors is also available (8m, 5f).

The Wasp's Nest

Enid rejects her fiancé for newcomer Gerald, and moves to a remote cottage with him. There, his sinister intentions are revealed. A small cast, short version adaptation of the story, Philomel Cottage.

Hercule Poirot comes between a bitter triangle of lovers to prevent a murder before it can take place. 3m, 1f | 30 minutes | Melodrama

2m, 4f | 90 minutes | Melodrama, Mystery

Also available as part of the one act collections Rule of Thumb and A Poirot Double Bill.

Butter in a Lordly Dish

Sir Luke Enderby, eminent barrister and seasoned womanizer, bites off more than he can chew when the case of a serial killer comes back to haunt him. 3m, 5f | 30 minutes | Radio Play, Melodrama

Part of the live radio triple bill Murder in the Studio.

The Rats

Adulterous lovers Sandra and David are invited to the Torrances’ flat for evening drinks. However, no one is home. What first appears to be a simple mixup turns far more sinister when the pair are locked in and framed for murder. 2m, 2f | 30 minutes | Melodrama, Mystery

Personal Call

Also available as part the one act collections Rule of Thumb and The Rule of Three.

James Brent receives a chilling telephone call seemingly from beyond the grave. His dead wife, Fay, is waiting for him at the very place she met her grisly end. At his new wife’s insistence, they go to meet her as requested, only to discover a terrifying truth.

The Patient

Mrs. Wingfield has been horribly injured in a mysterious fall. As relatives gather at her hospital bed, an ingenious device helps Mrs. Wingfield convey a message that could reveal the truth of her accident.

9m, 5f | 30 minutes | Radio Play, Melodrama

Part of the live radio triple bill Murder in the Studio.

5m, 4f | 40 minutes | Melodrama, Mystery

Also available as part the one act collection Rule of Thumb and The Rule of Three.

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

SKELETON CREW

by Dominique Morisseau

“Clifford Odets’s dramas come to mind and so does the great Pittsburgh Cycle of August Wilson. But Skeleton Crew is squarely in the tradition of Arthur Miller... A deeply moral and deeply American play.”

— The New York Times

At the start of the Great Recession, one of the last auto stamping plants in Detroit is on shaky ground. Each of the workers has to make choices on how to move forward. Loyalties are tested and power dynamics shift as their manager, Reggie, is torn between doing right by his work family and by the red tape in his office. The third in Dominique Morisseau’s Detroit Cycle trilogy. 2m, 2f | 120 minutes | Drama

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Jason Dirden and Lynda Gravatt in the world premiere of Skeleton Crew at Atlantic Theater Company, 2016 (Ahron R. Foster).

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Familiar by Danai Gurira

Blood Play by Hannah Bos and Paul Thureen developed by Oliver Butler

“Ms. Gurira weaves issues of cultural identity and displacement, generational frictions, and other meaty matters into dialogue that flows utterly naturally.” — The New York Times A heartfelt and poignant look at the struggle to balance tradition and modernity. In the middle of a Minnesota winter, a Zimbabwean American family prepares for the wedding of their eldest daughter. When the bride invites her aunt to perform a traditional African marriage ritual, the family’s delicate balance of Zimbabwean culture and American lifestyle is put to the test.

“[A] theatrical cocktail, as tasty as it is esoteric. Fix us another round.” — The Village Voice A tranquil suburban evening in the early 1950s, where a string of coincidences leads to a spontaneous grownup party in the basement of a new ranch house. Exotic cocktails are imbibed, raucous games are played, and new friends are made, but much is happening that no one is talking about. Something is stirring underground. A darkly comic thriller created by New York’s criticallylauded The Debate Society.

3m, 5f | More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Dear Elizabeth by Sarah Ruhl

3m, 3f | 75 minutes | Dark Comedy

“The language in the piece often soars, with the writing of even routine missives achieving a, yes, poetic quality. — The Hollywood Reporter

Diverting Devotion by Mike O'Malley Three men, approaching 30 gather to attend a friend's wedding. One still adores an old love who is due to attend the wedding. Another arrives with his fiancé, both of them showing the stress of planning their own wedding. While the third member of the group finds a new romance. New love and an old secret emerge in this richly drawn sentimental comedy.

Based on the compiled letters between poets Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Bishop, Sarah Ruhl expresses the beauty in simple correspondence. Brought to life by reading Words in Air: The Complete Correspondence Between Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell, Ruhl maps the relationship of the two poets from first meeting to an abbreviated affair, and the turmoil of their lives in between. 1m, 1f, 1m or f | 105 minutes | Drama

3m, 4f | Full Length Play | Romantic Comedy

John by Annie Baker

10 Out of 12 by Anne Washburn “A strange and ecstatic vision…a wholly original love song to the maddening art of the theater.” — The New York Times An entertaining, eye-opening look into the daunting process of tech rehearsals. The audience is placed amongst sound designers who mix cues, stage managers who gossip about actors, and one director who struggles to pull it all together. A glimpse into life on the other side of the footlights.

“So good on so many levels that it casts a unique and brilliant light.” — The New Yorker The week after Thanksgiving. A bed & breakfast in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. A cheerful innkeeper. A young couple struggling to stay together. Thousands of inanimate objects, watching. In this quiet tale, Annie Baker’s hyperrealism meets the eerily supernatural, and actors and audiences alike delve into ideas of self, mortality, and the solitude of human experience. 1m, 3f | 120 minutes | Drama

8m, 6f | More than 120 minutes | Comedy/Experimental

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Plays

Wonderland Wives by Buddy Thomas

Charles Busch’s Cleopatra

“Playwright Thomas bends and turns with merry zaniness the familiar story as he transforms normally upstanding characters to create chaotic silliness.” — Curtain Up Phoenix

“…always smartly campy, often over-the-top, occasionally very raunchy, and always hilarious — with an infinite all-you-can-eat buffet of priceless lines and situations running throughout.” — The Huffington Post

Cinderella’s Prince Charming is serving ten years in the pen, Belle’s house is overrun with little monsters, Alice has been hitting the caterpillar’s pipe a little too hard lately, and Snow White’s husband has shacked up with the three little pigs. When Briar Rose comes home from rehab with the face of a beauty, and Charming returns from prison with the libido of a beast, the desperate housewives of the magical kingdom are forced to grapple with princely infidelity, poison apples, and Cindy’s appetite for creamy poofs and brutal revenge.

The turbulent life of Cleopatra is told through a comic lens, evoking both 1930s Hollywood epics and the grand nineteenth century romantic theatre. This version of the Egyptian queen’s life takes her from her teenage seduction of Julius Caesar through her volatile, tragic romance with Mark Antony and her untimely death.

1m, 5f, Flexible Casting | Full Length Play | Comedy, Fantasy

The Four of Us by Itamar Moses “Extremely clever and enjoyable study of friendship. Funny, touching, and wickedly smart.” — Time Out New York What if all your dreams came true...for your best friend? Ben’s first novel vaults him into literary stardom, and his friend David, a struggling playwright, is thrilled by Ben’s success...and crushed by it. From the dreams of aspiring youth to the realities of adulthood, this poignant two-man comedy explores friendship and memory, the gap between our hopes and our lives, and the struggles between our egos and our capacity to love. 2m | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Edward Albee’s Occupant “Occupant bows its head in awe and gratitude before the mysterious force of will that allows great artists to be.” — The New York Sun The public accomplishments and private conflicts of flamboyant sculptor Louise Nevelson are thoroughly examined by an unnamed interviewer who questions the posthumous artist with unabashed scrutiny. From her unique vantage point beyond the grave, Nevelson answers queries with a clarity born of the distance provided by death. A touching, humorous tribute to a woman who was a pioneer for free-thinking females everywhere.

5m, 3f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Comedy

Three Years from “Thirty” by Mike O’Malley Jessica Titus, a frustrated actress living in Boston, has become distraught over local job opportunities and is feeling trapped in her stagnant relationship with her boyfriend, Tom. She suddenly decides to pursue her dreams in New York City, not knowing Tom plans to propose the evening she has chosen to leave him. The conflict ripples through their lives and the lives of their friends, leaving all of them to reconsider their careers, the paths of their souls, and the definition of commitment. 4m, 3f | Full Length Play | Comedy

Noël Coward’s Present Laughter “Sharpness and wit...in each succeeding act.” — New York Post NOMINEE! 2017 Tony Award for Best Play Revival At the center of his own universe sits matinee idol Garry Essendine: suave, hedonistic, and too old to be having numerous affairs. Amid a series of farcical events, Garry has to deal with the women who want to seduce him, placate his long-suffering secretary, cope with a crazed young playwright, and overcome his impending mid-life crisis. And just before he can escape it all on a theatrical tour to Africa, all hell breaks loose. 5m, 6f | More than 120 minutes | Comedy

1m, 1f | 75 minutes | Dramatic Comedy, Biography Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE based on the screenplay by Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard adapted for the stage by Lee Hall

“Funny, often genuinely moving, and generates a glow you could warm your hands by.” — Daily Telegraph “An absolute joy from beginning to end!” — Daily Express Young Will Shakespeare has writer’s block. The deadline for his new play is fast approaching. He’s in desperate need of inspiration. And then he finds his muse, Viola. This beautiful young woman is Will’s greatest admirer and will stop at nothing — including breaking the law — to appear in his next play. Against a bustling background of mistaken identity, ruthless scheming, and backstage theatrics, Will’s love for Viola quickly blossoms and inspires him to write his greatest masterpiece.

18m, 6f, Flexible Casting More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Original West End cast, Shakespeare In Love (Johan Persson).

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Revolt. She said. Revolt again. by Alice Birch

HANSOL JUNG

“A series of fragments that recall the form-bending virtuosity of Caryl Churchill…Ms. Birch’s work finds the theatrical exhilaration in civil disobedience.” — The New York Times A wildly experimental and inventive new play that does not behave. Playwright Alice Birch has put together a grouping of vignettes that ask how to revolutionize language, relationships, work, and life in general while bursting at the seams of conformity. Flexible Casting | 75 minutes | Experimental

Cardboard Piano

Northern Uganda on the eve of the millennium: The daughter of American missionaries and a local teenage girl steal into a darkened church to seal their love in a secret, makeshift wedding ceremony. But when the surrounding war zone encroaches on their fragile union, they cannot escape its reach. Confronting the religious and cultural roots of intolerance, Cardboard Piano explores violence and its aftermath, as well as the human capacity for hatred, forgiveness, and love. 2m, 2f | 105 minutes | Drama

Among the Dead

Ana is a Korean American who travels to Seoul in 1975 to retrieve her deceased father’s ashes. Luke is a young American soldier fighting in the jungles of Myanmar in 1944. Number Four is the name of a Korean comfort woman camping out on a bridge in Seoul in 1950, waiting for the return of the young American soldier who fathered her daughter. Three separate time periods collide in a small hotel room in Korea. A dark comedy about a family finding each other through SPAM, journals, and Jesus. 1m, 2f, 1m or f | 90 minutes | Drama

No More Sad Things

A girl catches a last-minute flight to Maui. A boy finds girl on the shores of Ka’anapali. Something strange and something familiar pulls them closer. They have sex on the beach. They are surprised. They spend the week together. Eventually girl catches the flight back home to Akron, Ohio. The girl is 32. The boy is 15. 2m, 1f | 75 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Doris to Darlene by Jordan Harrison “Mr. Harrison’s play has an affectionate, music-loving heart.” — The New York Times In the 1960s, biracial schoolgirl Doris is molded into pop star Darlene by a whiz-kid record producer who culls a top-ten hit out of Richard Wagner’s “Liebestod.” Rewind to the 1860s, where Wagner is writing the melody that will become Darlene’s hit song. Fast-forward to the present, where a teenager obsesses over Darlene’s music — and his music teacher. Dissonant decades merge into an unlikely harmony in this time-jumping pop fairy tale. 4m, 2f | 105 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Everything You Touch by Sheila Callaghan “A brash, even commercial, elaboration of [Callaghan’s] universal themes in their most complex and daredevil manifestations yet.” — The Hollywood Reporter Victor is a ruthless fashion designer in the 1970s at the top of his game. Esme, his glamorous protégé and muse, is pushed aside when an ordinary Midwestern woman inspires Victor to make his artistry accessible to the masses. A generation later, a woman grappling with a healthy dose of self-loathing must wrestle her own family demons to find her way through the world of fashion that won’t give a woman her size a second look. 2m, 6f | 120 minutes | Dark Comedy

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

HOW TO TRANSCEND A HAPPY MARRIAGE by Sarah Ruhl

“A subversive enchantment. It is part absurd domestic serio-comedy, part erotic magic realism, unflinching about taboos and about questioning that, just maybe, monogamy isn’t enough.” — Newsday At a dinner party in New Jersey, two couples discuss polyamory as brought up by the introduction of a new temp, Pip, in George’s office. When they invite Pip and her two male partners, discussion turns to action, and the exploration of unexplored desire turns animalistic. In Sarah Ruhl’s signature poetic and magical style, How to Transcend... explores the boundaries of relationships and monogamy, and examines the connections made between friends, lovers, and strangers. 4m, 4f | 120 minutes | Comedy Marisa Tomei and Lena Hall in How To Transcend a Happy Marriage at Lincoln Center Theater, 2017 (Kyle Froman). Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

ON HAPPY ENDINGS by Sarah Ruhl

appy endings are not in vogue.

I have noticed that ambivalent endings are in vogue — the equivalent of a character hopping on one foot as the lights go down. Playwrights might be wary of happy endings because these are not happy times. Or maybe we are wary of happy endings because we are wary in the contemporary theatre of unmixed genres — a full-out comedy, or a full-on tragedy. In Shakespeare, comedies end happily with a marriage, and tragedies end with a body pileup. But unmixed genres are now the province of Hollywood, not theatre. Our American stages are more full of dramas than they are of comedies and tragedies. So what of a title like How to Transcend a Happy Marriage? That seems fairly bold given the climate. It implies a happy beginning, possibly a happy middle, and a happy ending. Or perhaps it implies irony all the way through.

Playwrights might be wary of happy endings because these are not happy times. Or maybe we are wary of happy endings because we are wary in the contemporary theatre of unmixed genres — a full-out comedy, or a full-on tragedy. *** Is the search for happiness stageworthy? Aristotle talked of eudaimonia, the good life. This is a search for the good for its own sake. The search for a flourishing, happy life. That seems a worthy topic for philosophy, but is it a worthy topic for drama: how to live? Certainly every play — comedy, tragedy, or drama — seems to contain some small message about how to live. But to tackle existential questions head-

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

on — like, how do we increase our happiness and our love for our fellow humans? — is tricky and full of dramaturgical dangers. Being married and having children does not end anyone’s searching, though it implies an end in many narrative structures. Can a play start at the happy middle and go forward? I teach a class at Yale called “Ovid and his Influence." We read Ovid’s Metamorphoses, and we read plays that seem influenced by Ovid’s wild flights of transformation. I ask my students to write a play that includes at least one sudden transformation, one song, and one non-human. When I set out to write How to Transcend a Happy Marriage, I decided it was only fair to set myself the same task. So you will find all those Ovidian ingredients in the play. How to Transcend a Happy Marriage is about two happily married couples — such close friends as to be almost family — who meet a polyamorous woman in her twenties, and her two male lovers. Some wildness ensues. The

wildness turns out not to be an end in itself, but a means of loving more fully, more widely. How do we love bigger? Is a question that has always dogged me, and it thrums through the play. In ancient Greek there are three words for love. Eros is sexual, “an intermediary between gods and humans”; agape is a full empathetic love of humanity — which is similar to the Latin word caritas, from charity. And storge is affection between parents and children. How to Transcend a Happy Marriage is ultimately a meditation on those three kinds of love. *** I have friends that are like family, and that challenge the notion that a nuclear family is complete unto itself. Perhaps nowhere more than in America do we persist in the fiction that we can get absolutely everything we need from the nuclear family and from our spouses; our great-aunts unknown— our parents flung across the country— our neighbors

who we have never met. When one tries to raise children in that cloistered, closed environment, something frays, and I believe that something is often the mother. Plays with motherhood at the center, written by mothers, are quite new. We’ve only had them for the last twenty or thirty years. Our first woman playwright in the English language — Aphra Behn — a poet, a playwright, and a spy — did not have children. Lorraine Hansberry was the god-mother to Nina Simone’s daughter, but did not have her own children. Lillian Hellman — no children. After Aphra Behn’s death in 1689 we would have to wait almost three hundred years to read plays by women who happen to have children — among the first were Tina Howe, Adrienne Kennedy, and Marsha Norman. e had to wait even longer to hear from women critics with children writing about plays written by women with children. We must be unembarrassed and unashamed to write from our experience,

knowing that we are reaching each other without sometimes ever speaking to one another. It could be that I wrote more happy endings once I had children. I was looking less at the afterlife and more at the ground. Tolstoy said, “All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” And so Tolstoy furthered the myth of unhappiness as a marker of uniqueness. What if happy endings are also unique unto themselves; and each search to find them as rare and singular as the proverbial snowflake.

Omar Metwally, Marisa Tomei, Lena Hall, Austin Smith, and David McElwee in How to Transcend a Happy Marriage at Lincoln Center Theater, 2017 (Kyle Froman). This article originally appeared on Breaking Character Magazine in October, 2017.

“A transport of delight! So vividly written …it keeps you steadily amused, concerned and moved.”

August Wilson’s

JITNEY

— New York Magazine

WINNER! 2017 Tony Award for Best Play Revival Set in the early 1970s in Pittsburgh’s Hill District, this richly textured piece follows a group of men trying to eke out a living by driving unlicensed cabs, or jitneys. When the city threatens to board up the business and the boss’ son returns from prison, tempers flare, potent secrets are revealed, and the fragile threads binding these people together may come undone at last.

8m, 1f | More than 120 minutes | Drama

Anthony Chisholm in August Wilson’s Jitney on Broadway, 2017 (Joan Marcus).

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Father Comes Home From The Wars

Loot by Joe Orton

(Parts 1, 2 & 3)

“Seethes with black, baleful mirth. Cudgels traditional morality.” — Associated Press

by Suzan-Lori Parks

Dennis works for an undertaker. Hal’s old Mum has just died. They rob the bank next door to the funeral parlor and find just the right place to hide the loot: Mum’s coffin. Now there’s no place for Mum, whose body keeps re-appearing at the most inopportune times. When Inspector Truscott turns up, the already thickened plot goes topsy-turvy.

FINALIST! 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Drama “The finest work from this gifted writer. At once an epic poem, a moving personal drama about one man’s soul struggle, and a seriocomic meditation on liberty, loyalty, and identity.” — The New York Times

5m, 1f | Full Length Play | Dark Comedy

Offered his freedom if he joins his master in the ranks of the Confederacy, Hero, a slave, must choose to leave the woman and people he loves for what may be yet another empty promise. Filled with music, wit, and great lyricism, this is a dramatic exploration of the mess of war, the cost of freedom, and the heartbreak of love.

Se Llama Cristina by Octavio Solis

8m, 2f | More than 120 minutes | Drama

"Solis’s ear for details, for the small things that make one broken romance unlike another, make the dialogue pop.” — San Jose Mercury News, A man and woman awake from an apparent drugging night to find their baby missing. They relive their history in order to remember the way back to their child and to try and set things right. This haunting, poetic journey moves through time from past to present to future, and from darkness and doubt to a glimmer of light.

House Rules by A. Rey Pamatmat “Mr. Pamatmat has compelling ideas about human psychology and dramatic structure… flashes of surprising truth, particularly in the sibling interactions.” — The New York Times

2m, 2f | 90 minutes | Drama

Rod thinks the game is fixed. Momo’s still learning the rules. Twee doesn’t think winning is enough. JJ hates his hand. And why the hell is Henry still playing? Two families (and some guy named Henry) panic with hilarious and heartbreaking results when they realize their parents won’t be around forever. Can anybody prepare for the inevitable moment when they’re the ones left holding all the cards?

The Play About My Dad by Boo Killebrew

4m, 3f | 105 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

“Memory, storytelling, playwriting and time travel intersect with a lovely kind of epic intimacy… Don’t be surprised if, by the end, your own emotional floodgates have been tested.” — Time Out New York A look at Larry Killebrew through the eyes of his playwright daughter, Boo. His words, his family, his job as an emergency room surgeon, his community of Gulfport, Mississippi — and Hurricane Katrina, which almost turned Gulfport into a coral reef. As Larry tries acting and Boo adds new scenes, they discover how hard it is to tell the story the true way. 4m, 4f, 1b | 90 minutes | Drama, Biography

The Moors by Jen Silverman

“Acerbic, funny…brilliant stuff. The Moors is first-rate entertainment.” — New Haven Review Two sisters and a dog live out their lives on the bleak English moors, and dream of love and power. The arrival of a hapless governess and a moorhen set all three on a strange and dangerous path. A dark comedy about love, desperation, and visibility. 1m, 5f | 105 minutes | Dark Comedy

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Plays

Mama’s Boy by Rob Urbinati

“[Mama’s Boy] finds in the past that which is human and timeless. The result is a moving and compassionate portrait of lives regularly flattened out and simplified by history’s narrative.” — New Jersey Star Ledger

The riveting story of Lee Harvey Oswald and his complex relationship with his overbearing mother Marguerite, Mama’s Boy follows Marguerite's reckless attempts to reunite her family, from Lee's return to the U.S. from Russia, through the assassination of Kennedy, to her son's own murder and her defense of his innocence in the months that follow. A fascinating examination of family dynamics and obsessive maternal devotion played out in the shadow of history 2m, 1f | 120 minutes | Drama

Native Son by Nambi E. Kelley adapted from the novel by Richard Wright “Stirring…strong, serious stuff, just as it should be.” — The Wall Street Journal Suffocating in rat-infested poverty on the South Side of Chicago in the 1930s, 20-year-old Bigger Thomas struggles to find a place for himself in a world whose prejudice has shut him out. After taking a job in a wealthy white man’s house, Bigger unwittingly unleashes a series of events that violently and irrevocably seal his fate. 5m, 4f | 90 minutes | Drama

Taking Care of Baby by Dennis Kelly

The Gulf by Audrey Cefaly

“A crafty little play… [Mr. Kelly] deftly scrambles both our sympathies for, and our trust in, this play’s characters.” — The New York Times

WINNER! 2016 Edgerton New American Play Award

This tale of a mother accused and convicted of the deaths of her two young babies is horrific yet powerful. By adopting a form commonly associated with verbatim theatre, the subject is imbued with a clarity that is at once both unrelenting and utterly engaging, as it slowly emerges that these events are not truth at all. What unfolds is a bleak yet tender exploration of grief, exploitation, and the innate hypocrisies of reportage. 7m, 6f, Flexible Casting | Full Length Play | Drama

The Royale by Marco Ramirez “A well-constructed drama that captures both the beautiful frenzy of boxing and the (sadly still relevant) volatile state of race relations in America.” — The Telegraph Jay “The Sport” Jackson dreams of being the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. But it’s 1905, and in the racially segregated world of boxing, his chances are as good as knocked out. Loosely based on real events, this is an explosive look at the sights and sounds of the early twentieth century boxing circuit, and the ultimate fight for a place in history.

The divide between Kendra and Betty mimics the very world that devours them: a vast and polarizing abyss. On a quiet summer evening down in the Alabama Delta, Kendra and Betty troll the flats looking for red fish. After Betty begins diagnosing Kendra’s dead-end life with career picks from What Color is Your Parachute, their routine fishing excursion takes a violent turn. The fulllength version of the 2015 OOB selected short play. 2f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Stage Kiss by Sarah Ruhl “Sarah Ruhl frothily whips together romantic comedy and backstage farce in this lively comedy.” — The New York Times Art imitates Life. Life imitates Art. When two actors with a history are thrown together as romantic leads in a forgotten 1930s melodrama, they quickly lose touch with reality as the story onstage follows them offstage. A charming tale about what happens when lovers share a stage kiss, or when actors share a real one. 4m, 3f | 120 minutes | Romantic Comedy

4m, 1f | 90 Minutes | Drama

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

BEN HUR

“Patrick Barlow’s small-scale take on this epic tale is a palpable hit.”

by Patrick Barlow

— Evening Standard

Based on one of the best-selling books of the nineteenth century, comes this stage adaptation with four actors. The story follows an amateur theatre troupe as they produce the massive tale of the fictional Jewish prince and merchant Judah Ben-Hur. He falls to galley slave and rises to champion charioteer within Jerusalem during the life of Jesus Christ, while the actors struggle along through the piece as rivalries form and offstage romances interfere. Complete with chariot race, sea battle, and stage combat, Patrick Barlow weaves his compressed style popularized by The 39 Steps into one of the largest stories ever told.

Alix Dunmore and John Hopkins in Ben Hur at the Tricycle Theatre, London, 2016 (Tristram Kenton). Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

3m, 1f | 105 minutes | Comedy, Parody

STEVE MARTIN

(Danny Clinch)

WASP

In the fractured landscape of 50s suburbia, a prototypical white protestant family exists in a dark limbo of expectation and routine. Mom is surrounded by people but deeply alone, Dad speaks in delicious platitudes, and the children fear anything new. The play vibrates with satire and dark, lyrical irony as the family meanders blindly toward catastrophe. 3m, 3f | 40 minutes | Comedy

The Underpants

adapted from the play by Carl Sternheim

A wild satire adapted from the classic German play. Louise and Theo Markes’s conservative existence is shattered when Louise’s bloomers fall down in public. Louise’s momentary display does not result in the feared public scandal but it does attract two infatuated men, each of whom wants to rent the spare room in the Markes’s home. Oblivious of their amorous objectives, Theo splits the room between them, happy to collect rent from both the foppish poet and the whiny hypochondriac. 5m, 2f | Full Length Play | Comedy

Picasso at the Lapin Agile

An absurdist comedy that places Einstein and Picasso in a Parisian cafe in 1904, just before the renowned scientist transformed physics with his theory of relativity and the celebrated painter set the art world afire with cubism. Bystanders, including Picasso’s agent, the bartender and his mistress, Picasso’s date, an elderly philosopher, and an idiot inventor introduce additional flourishes of humor. The final surprise patron to join the merriment is a charismatic dark-haired singer time-warped in from a later era. 7m, 2f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Comedy

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Three Sisters by Anton Chekhov a new version by Tracy Letts

Perfect Arrangement by Topher Payne “[A] clever canapé of a comedy…Mr. Payne is a deft and witty writer.” — The New York Times It’s 1950 and two State Department employees, Bob and Norma, have been tasked with identifying sexual deviants within their ranks. There’s just one problem: both are gay, and have married each other’s partners as a cover. Inspired by the earliest stirrings of the American gay rights movement, madcap classic sitcom-style laughs give way to provocative drama as two couples are forced to stare down the closet door.

based on dramaturgical translations by Charlotte Hobson and Dassia Posner

3m, 4f | 120 minutes | Comedy

“A speed and light, a sharpness and edgy heart that make it newly compelling.” — Chicago Sun-Times The Prozorov sisters pine for Moscow. Culture and life brim in the city center, while they live among the mundane of a crumbling army garrison after their father’s death. Though living with their brother, Andrey, nothing keeps them back but their own misfortune, decisions, and the negativity that continues to follow this family. 9m, 5f | More than 120 minutes | Drama

Extraordinary Chambers by David Wiener “Beautifully crafted… cleverly subversive, edgy drama that strikingly conveys the weight of history.” – LAist When Carter brings his wife on a business trip to Cambodia, he never imagines that the ghosts of this beautiful country will find a way to haunt them as they become entangled with Khmer Rouge victims and perpetrators, and must decide if the salvation of one life is worth sacrificing justice for many. Genocide, complicity, greed, and love collide in this play that shines a light on the human experience and asks how far are we willing to go to survive.

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency by James Goss and Arvind Ethan David based on the novel by Douglas Adams

3m, 2f | 120 minutes | Drama

Dirk Gently finds himself on the trail of a gruesome murderer who is somehow involved with the works of Coleridge, quantum physics, the enigmatic study of the Cambridge Professor of Chronology, and the fate of life on Earth. Confused? Don’t be — everything is connected.

Peerless by Jiehae Park “With its staccato rhythms, short scenes, and farcical characters...it’s hard to know how to characterize this play, except to say that it’s unexpectedly wonderful.” — The Arts Fuse Asian American twins M & L have given up everything to get into The College. So when D, a 1/16th Native American classmate, gets “their” spot instead, they figure they’ve got only one option: kill. A deliciously dark and funny take on Shakespeare’s Macbeth exploring the very ambitious and cut-throat world of high school during college admissions.

10m, 4f | Full Length Play | Comedy

2m, 3f | 90 minutes | Dark Comedy

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Plays

Calendar Girls by Tim Firth “It makes you laugh, it makes you cry, and it leaves you feeling better about life than you did when you entered the theatre.” — The Telegraph When Annie’s husband, John, dies of leukemia, she and best friend Chris resolve to raise money for a new settee in the local hospital waiting room. They manage to persuade four fellow WI members to pose nude with them for an “alternative” calendar, with a little help from hospital porter and amateur photographer Lawrence. The calendar is a success, but Chris and Annie’s friendship is put to the test under the strain of their new-found fame. 4m, 9f | 120 minutes | Comedy

Wonderful Tennessee by Brian Friel “This mythic journey into a world of ambiguous ritual, classical references and commonplace miseries has something of the magical, yes, almost wordless resonance of a Yeats poem.” — New York Post A haunting play by this celebrated Irish writer finds three couples on a deserted pier in Ballybeg, Ireland. There to celebrate Terry’s birthday, they are waiting for a boat that will take them to a mystical island, rumored to be the site of sacrificial rituals, which Terry claims to have bought. Drunken hilarity gives way to reflection as the couples play games, tell stories, and sing songs to pass the time. 3m, 3f | 120 minutes | Drama

The Oldest Boy:

a play in three ceremonies

by Sarah Ruhl

“Among the most easily accessible [dramas] from this poetic, venturesome playwright…marked by inquisitive intelligence, clean-lined eloquence and spiky humor.” — The New York Times An American mother and a Tibetan father have a three-year-old son believed to be the reincarnation of a Buddhist lama. When a Tibetan lama and a monk come to their home unexpectedly, asking to take their child away for a life of spiritual training, the parents must make a life-altering choice and test their strength, their marriage, and their hearts. 4m, 1f | 120 minutes | Drama

Six Rounds of Vengeance

by Qui Nguyen

“Overflowing with awesome stage combat and imaginative writing, this show packs a huge theatrical punch in just under 90 minutes.” — TheaterMania In a post-apocalyptic “Lost Vegas,” a young gunslinger named Jess December enlists the help of a mysterious samurai cowboy to help avenge the murder of her sister. However, the gang they’ll be going against has powers that go way beyond just gunpowder and steel. To get revenge, they may have to become just as bloodthirsty as the monsters they’re facing. 3m, 2f, Flexible Casting| 90 minutes | Dark Comedy

Blood at the Root by Dominique Morisseau “Morisseau knows where the truth lies, and it is rarely on solid ground.” — The New York Times A striking new ensemble drama based on the Jena Six, six black students who were initially charged with attempted murder for a school fight after being provoked with nooses hanging from a tree on campus. 3m, 3f | 105 minutes | Drama

August Wilson’s Radio Golf “The final play in August Wilson’s magnificent cycle has crackling comedy, engaging snap, and theatrical zest. In Mr. Wilson’s world, the song, it seems, hasn’t ended after all.” — The New York Times Fast-paced, dynamic, and wonderfully funny work about the world today and the dreams we have for the future. Set in Pittsburgh in the late 1990s, it’s the story of a successful entrepreneur who aspires to become the city’s first black mayor. But when the past begins to catch up with him, secrets get revealed that could be his undoing. 4m, 1f | More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

“Ruhl expertly weaves heavy topics with elements of childhood whimsy to touching effect.”

— WFPL

Playing Peter Pan at her hometown children’s theater is one of Ann’s fondest memories. Now, 50 years later, Neverland calls again, casting her and her siblings back to this faraway dreamscape where the refusal to grow up confronts the inevitability of growing old.

FOR PETER PAN ON HER 70TH BIRTHDAY

Written as a gift for her mother, Sarah Ruhl’s For Peter Pan..is a tender and loving look at a family contending with death, life, and the allure of never growing up.

by Sarah Ruhl

Kathleen Chalfant in For Peter Pan on Her 70th Birthday at the 2016 Humana Festival, Actors Theatre of Louisville (Bill Brymer). Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

4m, 2f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

LYDIA R. DIAMOND

Smart People

It is the eve of Obama’s first election. Four of Harvard University’s brightest — a surgeon, an actress, a psychologist, and a neuro-psychiatrist are all interested in different aspects of the brain, particularly how it responds to race. But like all smart people, they are also searching for love, success, and identity in their own lives. Lydia Diamond brings these characters together in this sharp, witty play about social and sexual politics. 2m, 2f | More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Stick Fly

The affluent, African-American LeVay family is gathering at their Martha’s Vineyard home for the weekend, and brothers Kent and Flip have each brought their respective ladies home to meet the parents for the first time. Kent’s fiancée, Taylor, an academic whose absent father was a prominent author, struggles to fit into the LeVay’s upper-crust lifestyle. Kimber, on the other hand, a self-described WASP who works with inner-city school children, fits in more easily with the family. Joining these two couples are the demanding LeVay patriarch, Joe, and Cheryl, the daughter of the family’s longtime housekeeper. As the two newcomers butt heads over issues of race and privilege, long-standing family tensions bubble under the surface and reach a boiling point when secrets are revealed. 3m, 3f | More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Harriet Jacobs

inspired by Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs

In her book, Harriet Jacobs describes the brutal hardships she endures under slavery. To survive, she escapes into her imagination, and through writing, discovers hope for a better life. Accompanied by the rich musical traditions of slave spirituals, this is an inspiring look at a young woman’s fascinating journey from slavery to freedom. 4m, 4f, 1b, 1g | Full Length Play | Historical Drama

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

The Realistic Joneses by Will Eno

The Captain’s Tiger by Athol Fugard

“Mr. Eno’s voice may be the most singular of his generation, but it’s humane, literate and slyly hilarious.” — The New York Times

“A sweetly autobiographical memory play… Probing into his past with illuminating insight, the playwright has crafted a reflective journey, laced with flights of fantasy, poetic imagery and a bracing touch of humor.” — Variety

Bob and Jennifer, and their new neighbors John and Pony, are two suburban couples who have even more in common than their identical homes and their shared last names. As their relationships begin to irrevocably intertwine, the Joneses must decide between their idyllic fantasies and their imperfect realities.

Onboard the SS Graigaur, a young sailor pens his first novel. Assisted by his muse, a portrait of his mother come to life, and supported by the illiterate ship’s mechanic, he struggles to balance romance and reality. This most personal of Athol Fugard’s works is strictly autobiographical; at 20 he abandoned his education, hitchhiked up Africa and ended up on a tramp steamer.

2m, 2f | 90 Minutes | Dramatic Comedy

2m, 1f | 90 minutes | Drama, Biography

The Flick by Annie Baker WINNER! 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Drama In a run-down movie theater in central Massachusetts, three underpaid employees mop the floors and attend to one of the last 35mm film projectors in the state. Their tiny battles and not-so-tiny heartbreaks play out in the empty aisles, becoming more gripping than the lackluster, secondrun movies on screen. With keen insight and a finely-tuned comic eye, The Flick is a hilarious and heartrending cry for authenticity in a fast-changing world. 3m, 1f | More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Jacuzzi by Hannah Bos and Paul Thureen developed by Oliver Butler

“Leaves you happily word-drunk! Gorgeously and inventively wrought. Haunting and often fiercely funny.” — The New York Times Behold the newest nobody of the funniest century yet. He’s almost Christ-like, from a distance, in terms of height and weight. Listen closely or drift off uncontrollably, as he speaks to you directly about the notion of home, about the notion of the world. All of it delivered with the authority that is the special province of the unsure and the un-homed, which is a word he made up accidentally. A stunning monologue that is a haunting and often fiercely funny meditation on life as a state of permanent exile 1m | 75 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

The Happy Ones by Julie Marie Myatt WINNER! 2009 Ted Schmitt Award for the World Premiere of an Outstanding New Play

“A slow, killing pace appropriate to a Japanese horror movie. The tension is off the charts!” — Variety

Orange County, California, 1975. For Walter Wells, it’s the happiest place on earth, until fate strikes a devastating blow, leaving Walter with no reason to put the pieces of his life back together. He resists 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.

The newest play from The Debate Society. In the Marshall family’s peacefully remote Colorado ski chalet, Erik and Helene are making themselves very much at home. So at home, they just might stay for good. At the edge of civilization, the lifestyles of the rich collide with the lifestyles of the aimless in the bubbling waters of a hot tub. 3m, 1f | 90 minutes | Dark Comedy/Thriller

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Title and Deed by Will Eno

3m, 1f | 105 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Plays

Morocco Omari and Namir Smallwood in Pipeline at Lincoln Center Theater, 2017 (Jeremy Froman). Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

PIPELINE

by Dominique Morisseau

“Pipeline confirms Dominique Morisseau’s reputation as a playwright of piercing eloquence.”

— The New York Times

Nya, an inner-city public high school teacher, is committed to her students but desperate to give her only son, Omari, opportunities they’ll never have. When a controversial incident at his upstate private school threatens to get him expelled, Nya must confront his rage and her own choices as a parent. But will she be able to reach him before a world beyond her control pulls him away? With profound compassion and lyricism, Pipeline brings an urgent conversation powerfully to the fore. Morisseau pens a deeply moving story of a mother’s fight to give her son a future without turning her back on the community that made him who he is.

3m, 3f | 90 minutes | Drama

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

SIGNIFICANT OTHER by Joshua Harmon

“A tenderly unromantic romantic comedy, as richly funny as it is ultimately heart-stirring.” — The New York Times A modern comedy that exquisitely captures the joys and anxieties of growing up, and the shifting grounds of friendship when marriage enters into the equation. Jordan is a single, gay man in his late twenties, and finding Mr. Right is easier said than done. When his three best girlfriends each get married, Jordan becomes increasingly aware of — and desperate about — being single. 3m, 4f | 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Gideon Glick and Lindsay Mendez in Significant Other on Broadway, 2017 (Joan Marcus).

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea by Nathan Alan Davis CRITIC’S PICK “A mesmerizing blend of magical realism and poetic social comment…” — The Los Angeles Times Eighteen-year-old Dontrell Jones III decides that it is his duty and destiny to venture into the Atlantic Ocean in search of an ancestor lost during the Middle Passage. But his family is not at all ready to abandon its prized son to the waters of a mysterious and haunting past. Blending poetry, humor, wordplay, and ritual, Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea is a present-day hero’s quest exploring the lengths and depths we must go to redeem history’s wrongs.

CUSI CRAM

3m, 4f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Fuente

Romance Novels for Dummies by Boo Killebrew

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. Anything is possible in Fuente, an almost-real town, somewhere between where North America ends and South America begins. A magically-real comedy about love, revenge, escape, and the perilous powers of Aquanet hairspray. 4m, 2f | Full Length Play | Dramatic Comedy

“Irreverent sense of humor spiked with a dollop of Southern sass.” — The Boston Globe Southern sisters Bernie and Liz are different in a number of ways. Liz is a stay-at-home mother, while her sister, Bernie, enjoys every bit of life and vice of New York City. When Liz’s husband dies, she goes to live with Bernie and adjusts accordingly. After going on a series of internet dates, Bernie challenges what makes Liz’s idea of the perfect life perfect. 2m, 3f, 1g | 105 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Dusty and the Big Bad World

Based on an actual incident that happened in 2005, Dusty and the Big Bad World is a very funny, no-holds-barred yet even-handed look at PBS, government bias, gay marriage, the right to privacy, children’s allergies, and the ability to survive in a small-minded world. 1m, 3f, 1g | 120 minutes | Comedy

Gnit by Will Eno

A Lifetime Burning

If you had the power to revise your past, what would you change? Who would you be? 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,” 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?

“Gnit is wickedly funny, relentlessly intelligent and very well-executed.” — WFPL Watch closely as Peter, a funny-enough but so-so specimen of humanity, makes a lifetime of bad decisions on the search for his True Self. A rollicking and very cautionary tale about, among other things, how the opposite of love is laziness. A faithful, unfaithful, and willfully American misreading of Henrik Ibsen’s Peer Gynt, a 19th Century Norwegian play which is famous for all the wrong reasons, written by someone who has never stepped foot in Norway.

1m, 3f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

3m, 3f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Plays

Somewhere Fun by Jenny Schwartz

The Judas Kiss by David Hare

“Imperiously funny, talented and excellent! Ms. Schwartz pours forth dizzying streams of language that often delight with their quirky poetry and looping humor.” — The New York Times

“The dialogue is urbane, stylish and frequently imbued with Oscar-like flashes of humor and purplish poetic resonance. But the main thrust is for character and situation: a mood portrait of a fall from grace.” — New York Post

Rosemary and Evelyn met “a hundred thousand years ago” in Central Park when their children were barely born. Somewhere Fun reunites the two women 35 years later. With their children now grown and the world changing rapidly before (what’s left of ) their eyes, each finds herself face to face with the terrors, joys, and surprises of life and time. 2m, 5f, 1b, 1g | 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

Masked by Ilan Hatsor translated by Michael Taub “Provocative drama. An articulate calculus of loyalty and betrayal.” — The New Yorker An explosive Israeli play about three Palestinian brothers. Set during the Intifada with the Israeli-Arab struggle as its backdrop, Masked depicts the tragedy of one family torn between duty, kinship, principles, and survival. 3m | 90 minutes | Drama

The Old Neighborhood by David Mamet “This is Mamet unplugged. What we have, in essence, are three dialogues. And Mamet is, of course, a virtuoso of dialogue.” — New York Daily News In these three short plays, middle-aged Bobby Gould returns to the old neighborhood in a series of encounters with his past that, however briefly, open windows on his present: Bobby and an old buddy fantasize about finding themselves in a nostalgic shtetl paradise; Bobby’s sister Jolly unscrolls a list of childhood grievances that is at once painful and hilarious; and old girlfriend Deeny finds herself obsessively free-associating on gardening, sex, and subatomic particles. 3m, 2f | Full Length Play | Drama

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

A compelling depiction of Oscar Wilde just before and after his imprisonment. Act One captures him in 1895 on the eve of his arrest. In Act Two, Wilde is in Naples more than two years later, after his release from Reading Gaol. In exile, he is drawn to a reunion with his unworthy lover and a final betrayal. 6m, 1f | More than 120 minutes | Historical Drama

The Most Deserving by Catherine Trieschmann “Smart, hilarious, riveting!” — The New Yorker A small town arts council has $20,000 to award to a local artist with an “under-represented American voice.” Should they choose the teacher/painter of modest talent or the self-taught artist who creates religious figures out of trash? A comedy that explores how gossip, politics, and opinions of art can decide who is the most deserving. 3m, 3f | 90 Minutes | Comedy

The Village Bike by Penelope Skinner “Skinner is addressing a difficult theme head on, often with wit and verbal authenticity.” — Vulture Becky is pregnant and friskier than ever. But she can’t seem to get the attention of her husband, who is more interested in the baby manual than her new underwear. As her husband prepares for the baby’s months-away arrival, Becky takes matters into her own hands. In the heat of the summer, she sets out on an adventure that starts with the purchase of a used bike from a man in town and takes her further than she ever expected. 3m, 3f | 120 minutes | Dark Comedy

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

The Samuel French Off Off Broadway

SHORT PLAY FESTIVAL For over 40 years, the Off Off Broadway Short Play Festival has highlighted the best in short-form playwriting from emerging writers. These plays represent the best of our festival and are perfect for competitions, play festivals, and evenings of short plays. For more information about the festival, visit oobfestival.com.

Off Off Broadway Festival Plays, 41st Series (2016) Risen from the Dough

clarity

In a small, rustic Brooklyn bakery previously hit with several code violations, two sisters prepare for their next health inspection. As the two sisters bake and bicker, they eventually come to terms with grief, identity, and the complicated realities of immigrant life. 2f | Drama

Cameron enjoys rough sex. Which is fine. However, in the final moments leading up to his wedding, one particular sexual encounter with his fiancé demands he question his marriage, racial identity, and sexual preferences altogether. 1m | Drama

After a hate crime shocks their community, newly-instated Rabbi Gold tries to help Grandpa widen his world view. This ain’t gonna be easy. 2m | Comedy

Wedding Bash

The Cleaners

Monsoon Season

Lower East Side. Right now. It’s Rita and Jerry’s job to clean up the stuff no one else will: death. 1m, 1f | Comedy

It’s monsoon season in Phoenix, and Danny hasn’t had a decent night’s sleep in weeks. Between his recent divorce, his mind-numbing job in technical support, and the neon sign from the strip club that glows through his window all night, his grasp of reality is slipping. 1m | Drama

by France-Luce Benson

by Lindsey Kraft and Andrew Leeds

When a newly-married couple invites their two friends over for a post-wedding rehash, things get tense when it becomes clear that some people didn’t love the wedding as much as they said they did. 2m, 2f | Comedy

by Korde Arrington Tuttle

by Lindsay Joy

Plays from the 2017 Off Off Broadway Short Play Festival, coming soon...

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Grandpa and the Gay Rabbi

by Jonathan Josephson

by Lizzie Vieh

A NEW KIND OF EPIC A Chat with Mac Rogers by Rebecca Schlossberg

hen you think of American epics, great works like Father Comes Home From the Wars, Part 1, 2 & 3, Our Town, The Coast of Utopia, and Angels in America might come to mind. Plays of this sort usually carry with them a reputation for grandiosity, somehow enabling sweeping settings, huge casts, and big themes to be contained onstage, within a single evening. So, what does an epic look like in 2017? If you are Mac Rogers, it’s all this and more, adding an ingredient much-neglected in the American theatre canon: science fiction. I’ve always been intrigued by the genre myself and curious as to why our sci-fi-obsessed movie and TV culture hasn’t spilled over more into theatre. It was this hook that led me to marathon all three plays of The Honeycomb Trilogy (Part One, Part Two, and Part Three) at Judson’s Memorial Church during the winter of 2015. As we sat in the theater from early afternoon until well into the darkness of the evening, I became consumed by what Rogers had created, even weeping at crucial moments. “I’m

weeping at a sci-fi play,” I thought. These plays are unbelievably affecting. And while many dismiss sci-fi as being in a class below other forms of drama, Rogers finds no easy distinction. “I find in the entertainment versus art debate, it’s really not useful to think of those as opposites; entertainment is a delivery system for art.” The idea to write sci-fi plays emerged for Rogers after one particularly terrible encounter with an early play he had written and produced in New York. “The first play of mine I did was put together with some college friends and we were destroyed. The play was three hours long, and it was mostly direct address monologues, and I was also in it, and every night I would have to look out into the five people in the audience and see how bored they were.” Some time later, Rogers realized what had gone wrong: “The hard lesson was that I wouldn’t have gone to see that. And then I thought it’s crazy for me to be

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

writing plays that I wouldn’t attend. So then I reasoned, well, what do I like? I like sci-fi, I like horror, I like thrillers, I like dark comedies. Why should I be making plays that are not the things I consume?” After a few successful forays into the genre, like Hail Satan and the NYC Fringe hit Viral, Rogers and his fellow producers from Gideon Productions got together to discuss what their next project would be. “I had a list of ideas. The first idea I had was a trilogy of plays about an alien invasion of Earth – and I thought, there’s no way we can do this now. We’ll do it ten years. But I never got to the next idea on the list.” He credits his team, and Sean Williams in particular, with pushing the idea forward: “Sean is really good at getting us to take leaps. We wouldn’t have done anything if Sean hadn’t been completely and utterly fearless. When we were talking about it, he started changing the verb tense description of it from how

it would work to how it will work, and by shifting the language, he essentially forged a new reality.” Forward they marched, and together the team was able to accomplish what many New York producers perceive as impossible: the presentation of three plays in repertory with a cast of over twenty actors. In its development and production, such an endeavor caused obvious challenges, but Rogers continuously credits his production team for pushing the work to its truest potential, constantly directing him to refine what he had written. “What saved my bacon,” he says, “was that I was surrounded by a lot of people who were a lot more curious about world building than me because they needed to be in order to do their jobs.” One particularly memorable moment of collaboration occurred with his wife, Sandy, who was also the team’s set designer. “I was sitting in bed writing. Sandy is sitting in bed working on the set. She said to me, they talk a lot about the 51 [a group of people

who play an integral part of Sovereign, the last of the plays in the trilogy, even though they are never seen]. She said, I want to have a wall with the characters’ names on it so they can touch them whenever they want. And I was like, oh my god, that is SO GOOD! It made the script come alive. It’s really deadly to have a play in a single set with characters we never see.”

“I find in the entertainment versus art debate, it’s really not useful to think of those as opposites; entertainment is a delivery system for art.” And while it can be challenging, and all three plays do not need to be presented together, Rogers says the rewards of producing the trilogy outweigh the risks, as he reaffirms his belief in theatrical collaboration to potential

producers: “Make sure your ducks are in a row, big time,” he says, “Resources in place, the money, space, materials, sure, but even more than that you really need to put together a group of people that you are going to go through some bad times with, friendships that are not easily sundered by adversity. Essentially, people you’d go on a submarine with.” Or, perhaps, people you might band together with during an alien invasion.

Page 56: Hanna Cheek in Sovereign, Gideon Productions at The Secret Theater, 2012 (Deborah Alexander). This article originally appeared on Breaking Character Magazine in June, 2017

THE HONEYCOMB TRILOGY by Mac Rogers Part I: Advance Man

Part III: Sovereign

Astronaut Bill Cooke returns from the first manned mission to Mars, bearing secrets and illicit cargo. Now his wife and teenage children are all that stand between Bill and a shocking action that will alter not only their lives, but all of humanity.

The alien race that ruled the Earth has fallen. Ronnie is now the Governor of what used to be Florida, and her brother Abbie is the world’s greatest war criminal, now captured. As Ronnie grapples with an awful decision about what to do with her brother, Abbie makes one last desperate move, forcing a confrontation that will forever change the future of the human race.

5m, 5f | More than 120 minutes | Drama

Part II: Blast Radius

5m, 4f | More than 120 minutes | Drama

Twelve years after Advance Man, a sister and brother are at mortal odds on an Earth changed by alien occupation. Ronnie leads a desperate insurgency that may have finally found a weapon to turn the tide. Meanwhile, Abbie has allied with the conquering aliens and may have found a chilling solution to end the human resistance for good. 5m, 7f | More than 120 minutes | Drama

TORCH SONG TRILOGY by Harvey Fierstein

“A very funny, poignant, and unabashedly entertaining work that, so help me, is something for the whole family.” — Newsweek The life of Arnold Beckoff, a torch song-singing, Jewish drag queen living in New York City, is dramatized over the span of the late 1970s and 1980s, through Stonewall, the AIDS crisis, and other milestone moments in LGBT history. Told with a likeable, human voice, Arnold struggles through love, disease, and the challenges of child-rearing. A groundbreaking work of modern theatre, constructed of three plays told over three acts: International Stud, Fugue in a Nursery, and Widows and Children First! 4m, 2f | More than 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy Todd Lawson and Brandon Uranowitz in Torch Song Trilogy at Studio Theatre, Washington, DC, 2013 (Teddy Wolff ).

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

The City of Conversation by Anthony Giardina “A savvy depiction of social skill as political art, in a city that’s defined by political science.” — The Washington Post In this play spanning 30 years and eight presidential administrations, Hester Ferris throws Georgetown dinner parties that can change the course of Washington politics. When her son turns up with an ambitious Reaganite girlfriend and a new conservative worldview, Hester must choose between preserving her family and defending the causes she’s spent her whole life fighting for.

STEVE YOCKEY

4m, 4f, 1b, Flexible Casting | More than 120 minutes | Drama

Pluto

The Albatross 3rd & Main by Simon David Eden

In the wake of a local tragedy involving gun violence at a community college, single mother Elizabeth Miller and her withdrawn son, Bailey, try to jumpstart their relationship across the breakfast table. But with berserk appliances, shifting astronomy, and the talkative new family dog’s interruptions, Elizabeth might not be able to really “see” the person she needs to see most.

“An excellent comedy that is rich, dark, well designed and acted…loaded with wit, wisdom and the courage to examine some important themes.” — Fringe Review

2m, 3f | 90 minutes | Dark Comedy

Gene Lacy, a former lobster boat fisherman and proprietor of Lacy’s General Store, is down on his luck big time: he’s ducking creditors, huge gambling debts, and an ex-wife with very expensive tastes. So when Spider walks into his store with a golden lottery ticket in the shape of a rare and valuable dead bird, Gene has a choice to make. 3m | 90 minutes | Dark Comedy

On the Shore of the Wide World by Simon Stephens

Bellwether was a nice, safe place to live. Bad things didn’t happen there. That was until six-year-old Amy Draft went missing. As the investigation progresses, speculation in the media and the neighborhood turns on Amy’s parents, Alan and Jackie Draft. But the young girl’s disappearance is not what it seems, and it is only a glimpse of what lurks below the community’s perfection. 3m, 7f | 105 minutes | Drama

Disassembly

Evan is what you would call “accident-prone.” Having suffered from various injuries his entire life, he’s now been randomly stabbed. In his apartment, his twin sister and his fiancée are trying to help him recover while fending off a stream of visitors and a bitter neighbor with a thing for stuffed cats. Something isn’t quite adding up, though. As the morning descends into a buzz of secrets and lies, this dark farce quickly becomes a brutally funny commentary on how violence can take hold of just about anyone.

WINNER! 2006 Laurence Olivier Award for Best Play Something is about to happen that will change one family forever. Over the course of nine months, three generations of the Holmes family in Stockport, England examine the persistent dreams and struggles they each confront. An intimate and epic play about love, family, Roy Keane, and the vastness of the galaxy. 5m, 4f | Full Length Play | Drama

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Bellwether

3m, 4f | 75 minutes | Dark Comedy

Plays

BEKAH BRUNSTETTER (Katie McGehee)

Going to a Place Where You Already Are

Is there a heaven? Joe says no. His wife, Roberta, has always claimed to agree. Lately, she’s beginning to wonder, especially when they find themselves in church a lot, having reached the age when funerals are more frequent than weddings. Meanwhile, their granddaughter, Ellie, doesn’t have time to ponder the afterlife. When mortality confronts them, her grandmother’s claim to have gone to heaven and back doesn’t sound so crazy after all.

3m, 2f | 75 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

OOHRAH!

Ron is back from his final tour in Iraq, and his wife, Sara is excited to restart their life together. When a young marine visits the family, life is turned upside down. A disarmingly funny and candid drama that raises challenging questions about what it means when the military is woven into the fabric of a family and service is far more than just a job. 4m, 3f | 105 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

I Used to Write on Walls

Diane, Georgia, and Joanne are three modern women living very different lives. Unbeknownst to them, they are all pining after the same young man, Trevor: sexy, stoned, oblivious; a surfer on a rad, rad philosophical journey. When a beautiful eleven-year-old girl named Anna, and Mona (a sexy, widowed astronaut) are thrown into the crosswinds of these diverse romantic affairs, hearts will be broken, loves will be lost, and youthful cries of hope, anger, and sadness will be written on walls. 1m, 6f | Full Length Play | Drama

Be A Good Little Widow

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, what’s 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. 2m, 2f | Full Length Play | Comedy

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

The Waverly Gallery by Kenneth Lonergan

George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead™ Live written by Christopher Bond, Dale Boyer, and Trevor Martin created by Christopher Harrison and Phil Pattison

“Deftly presents senility as an exaggerated state of the natural human condition…Deeply theatrical and often deeply funny.” — The New York Times FINALIST! 2001 Pulitzer Prize for Drama Gladys, the elderly matriarch of the Green family, has run an art gallery in a small Greenwich Village hotel for years. The management wants to replace her less-than-thriving gallery with a coffee shop. Always irascible but now increasingly erratic, Gladys is a cause of concern to her daughter, her son-in-law, and her grandson, from whose point of view this poignant memory play is told. A wacky and heartrending look at the effect of senility on a family. 3m, 2f | More than 120 minutes | Comedy

“Spooky, sophisticated, and silly in equal measures…so recommended it hurts.” — Fangoria Magazine

The Hatmaker’s Wife by Lauren Yee

A comedic tribute to the historic 1968 film and the official authorized stage production of the film. The play lovingly examines the film, the period it was made in, and its undying influence on the horror genre. All the iconic moments from the film are hilariously re-visited, along with an entirely new journey for our beloved characters from the farmhouse. Packed with effects, music, and gore, Night of the Living Dead Live skirts the line between horrific and hysterical!

“Ms. Yee brings a courageous, childlike conviction to her fey land of make-believe.” — The New York Times A young woman moves in with her boyfriend expecting domestic bliss, but instead has trouble getting comfortable. Her strange new home seems determined to help out, and soon the walls are talking. They reveal the magical tale of an old hat-maker and his long-suffering wife, who runs away with his favorite hat. This sweet and surreal story bends time and space to redefine the idea of family, home, and true love itself.

4m, 2f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Dark Comedy, Parody

Collective Rage: A Play in Five Betties by Jen Silverman

3m, 3f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Romantic Comedy

Seminar by Theresa Rebeck

“…a perfect balance between the really absurd and the absurdly real.” — Broadway World Betty is rich, Betty is lonely, Betty’s working on her truck, Betty wants to talk about love, Betty needs to hit something. And Betty keeps using a small hand mirror to stare into parts of herself she’s never examined. Five different women named Betty collide at the intersection of anger, sex, and the “thea-tah.”

“Sexy, savvy and uproarious!” — Time Out New York Four aspiring young novelists sign up for private writing classes with Leonard, 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.

5f | 105 minutes | Dark Comedy

3m, 2f | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy

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Plays

Vietgone by Qui Nguyen

Ugly Lies the Bone by Lindsey Ferrentino

“Vietgone careens wildly, threatening whiplash to heighten our amusement. By the end, however, this riotous theatrical cartoon won me over with its simple honesty.” — The Los Angeles Times

“A bracing drama that confronts an achingly topical issue with hardheaded honesty and admirable compassion. A brave playwright and a writer of dauntless conviction.” — The New York Times

An all-American love story about two very new Americans. It’s 1975. Saigon has fallen. He lost his wife. She lost her fiancé. Now in a new land, they just might find each other. Using his unique style that The New York Times calls “culturally savvy comedy,” playwright Qui Nguyen gets up close and personal to tell the story that led to the creation of…Qui Nguyen.

Newly discharged soldier Jess has finally returned to her Florida hometown. She brings with her not only vivid memories of Afghanistan, but painful burns that have left her physically and emotionally scarred. Jess soon realizes that things at home have changed even more than she has. Through the use of virtual reality video game therapy, she builds a breathtaking new world where she can escape her pain. As Jess advances further in the game, she begins to restore her relationships, her life, and slowly, herself.

3m, 2f, Flexible Casting | More than 120 minutes | Comedy

2m, 3f | 90 minutes | Drama

The Layover by Leslye Headland “Leslye Headland’s new play careens between terrific meet-cute humor and the darkest romantic obsessions.” — The Wrap Shellie and Dex meet on a plane during a layover in Chicago. After a quick seduction, each stranger playing a version of themselves, they have a playful yet passionate one-night stand. In the following months, their lives with their respective partners remain the same, but the impact of their liaison invades their psychological landscapes. Their personal dramas unfurl simultaneously, until romantic obsession and intense loneliness drive them toward an inevitable and tragic reunion. 3m, 2f, 1g | 90 minutes | Drama

The Harvest by Samuel D. Hunter “Engrossing and suspenseful… The Harvest takes place in a jammed intersection of religion, family, sexuality and poverty, which the playwright maps out in evocative detail.” — Time Out New York In the basement of a small evangelical church in Southeastern Idaho, a group of young missionaries is preparing to go to the Middle East. One of them — a young man who has recently lost his father — has bought a one-way ticket. But his plans are complicated when his estranged sister returns home and makes it her mission to keep him there. 4m, 3f | 105 minutes | Drama

Poor Behavior by Theresa Rebeck “A weekend getaway…provided your idea of a getaway is Napoleon’s retreat from Russia.” — The New York Times

Prayer For My Enemy by Craig Lucas “A newly-minted classic.” — The New York Times

A weekend in the country spins out of control when jealous wife Maureen makes a reckless accusation about her husband, Ian, and their old friend Ella. Ella’s husband, Peter, tries and fails to stop the domestic carnage in this fierce and funny story about the unexpected ease of betrayal and the fragility of marriage.

Two middle-class families in suburban New York State confront their private demons against the public backdrop of the American incursion into Iraq. As their paths cross in ways that are both comic and terrifying, lies and secrets are at last exposed, and an honest, hardearned redemption is achieved for both.

2m, 2f | 120 minutes | Comedy

3m, 3f | 105 minutes | Drama

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

NAT TURNER IN JERUSALEM by Nathan Alan Davis

“The sparse, persuasive twohander examines America’s racial history, but feels disturbingly close to the present day.”

— The Village Voice

In August 1831, Nat Turner led a slave uprising that shook the conscience of the nation. This timely new play imagines Nat Turner’s final night in a jail cell in Jerusalem, Virginia as he reckons with his past and what the dawn will bring. Woven with vivid imagery and indelible lyricism, this is a powerful examination of an individual’s resolute convictions and their seismic reverberations through time.

Phillip James Brannon in Nat Turner in Jerusalem at New York Theatre Workshop, 2016 (Joan Marcus). Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

2m | 90 minutes | Historical Drama

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

KEN LUDWIG

The recipient of this year's Samuel French Award for Sustained Excellence in the American Theatre, Ken Ludwig is a master of theatrical comedy. From Broadway and regional theaters to community playhouses and schools, Ken's theatrical farces and adventurous adaptations have delighted audiences across the country. We're proud to celebrate this prolific playwright and his contributions to the theatre.

Baskerville: A Sherlock Holmes Mystery

A Comedy of Tenors

One hotel suite, four tenors, two wives, three girlfriends, and a soccer stadium filled with screaming fans. What could possibly go wrong? It’s 1930s Paris and the stage is set for the concert of the century — as long as producer Henry Saunders can keep Italian superstar Tito Merelli and his hot-blooded wife, Maria, from causing runaway chaos. An uproarious ride, full of mistaken identities, blissful romance, and madcap delight!

The male heirs of the Baskerville line are being knocked off one by one. To find their killer, Holmes and Watson must brave the desolate moors before a family curse dooms its newest heir. Watch as our intrepid detectives battle a dizzying web of clues, silly accents, disguises, and deceit as five actors deftly portray more than 40 characters. Don your deerstalker cap! The play’s afoot!

4m, 3f | 120 minutes | Comedy, Farce

4m, 1f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Comedy, Farce

Leading Ladies

A Fox on the Fairway

Two English Shakespearean actors, Jack and Leo, find themselves so down on their luck that they’re performing “Scenes from Shakespeare” on the Moose Lodge circuit. When they hear that an old lady is about to leave her fortune to her two long lost English nephews, they resolve to pass themselves off as her beloved relatives. Trouble is, they find out that the relatives aren’t nephews, but nieces!

A tribute to the great English farces of the 1930s and 1940s. 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.

5m, 3f | 120 minutes | Comedy, Farce

3m, 3f | 120 minutes | Romantic Comedy, Farce

Moon Over Buffalo

Lend Me A Tenor

George and Charlotte Hay, fading stars of the 1950s, are working in Buffalo, New York in a rep with five actors. On the brink of a disastrous split-up, they receive word that they might just have one last shot at stardom: Frank Capra is coming to town to see their matinée, and if he likes what he sees, he might cast them in his movie remake of The Scarlet Pimpernel. Unfortunately for George and Charlotte, everything that can go wrong, does.

World famous opera singer Tito Morelli, Il Stupendo, is set to appear for one night only as Otello. The star arrives late and through a hilarious series of mishaps, is given a double dose of tranquilizers. In an attempt to salvage the evening, put-upon Max is forced into Morelli’s Otello costume. But Morelli comes to and gets into his other costume, ready to perform. Now two Otellos are running around in costume, and two women are running around in lingerie, each thinking she is with Il Stupendo.

4m, 4f | 120 minutes | Comedy, Farce

Tiny Tim’s Christmas Carol

Treasure Island

A stunning yarn of piracy on the high seas. Young Jim Hawkins is taken under the wing of the infamous pirate Long John Silver and set on a swashbuckling high seas adventure of mutiny, buried treasure, and pirates. A thrilling stage adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novel. 9m, 2f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy, TYA

Tiny Tim hatches a plan to get his father home for Christmas Day. With the help of some kindly sellers at the market and his friend Charlotte, Tim stages a spectacle filled with ghosts and Christmas cheer to convince Scrooge to give his father the day off. It all seems to be going according to plan until a little bit of real Christmas magic catches everyone by surprise. 5m, 3f, Flexible Casting | 40 minutes | Holiday, TYA

Find more Ken Ludwig titles at samuelfrench.com. Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

written with Jack Ludwig

The cast of Ken Ludwig's Robin Hood! at The Old Globe, 2017 (Jim Cox).

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Ken Ludwig’s

ROBIN HOOD!

“A comedic spin! The merriment of this show’s merry men— and women— is contagious, making Ken Ludwig’s Robin Hood!’s exclamation point well deserved.”

— Sarasota Magazine

From comic genius Ken Ludwig comes this epic adventure for the stage. Packed with thrills, romance, laughs, and great characters like Little John, Friar Tuck, and Maid Marian, Robin Hood! tells the timeless story of a hero of the people who takes on the powers that be. Get ready to duck a quarterstaff or two— you won’t want to miss a moment of the swashbuckling fun!

6m, 2f, Flexible Casting 105 minutes | Comedy, Adventure

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

MUSICALS

Joe Carroll, Corey Cott, Laura Osnes, Brandon James Ellis, and the original cast of Bandstand on Broadway, 2017 (Jeremy Daniel).

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

BANDSTAND book & lyrics by Richard Oberacker and Robert Taylor music by Richard Oberacker

“An open-hearted musical that will have you clapping your hands and clenching your fists, tapping your toes and blinking back tears.”

— The New York Times

It’s 1945. As soldiers return home to tickertape parades and happy families, Donny dreams of rebuilding his life. When a competition to find the next swing band sensation is announced, Donny joins forces with a motley crew of fellow veterans. Complicated relationships and the lingering effects of war test each of the band’s members. But when new singer Julia joins, Donny may have found the perfect harmony that can take the band all the way. Victory will require all the talent, stamina, and raw nerve that these musicians possess. Check with your Licensing Representative for availability. 6m, 2f, Ensemble More than 120 minutes | Drama Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals Jazz, Contemporary Broadway

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Chicago

book by Bob Fosse and Fred Ebb music by John Kander lyrics by Fred Ebb script adaptation by David Thompson “One of the few musicals that provide[s] the viewer with something to think about the next day.” — The New York Times In Roaring Twenties Chicago, chorine Roxie Hart murders a faithless lover and convinces her hapless husband, Amos, to take the rap — until he finds out he’s been duped and turns on Roxie. Convicted and sent to death row, Roxie and another “Merry Murderess,” Velma Kelly, vie for the spotlight and the headlines, ultimately joining forces in search of the “American Dream”: fame, fortune, and acquittal. 9m, 10f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Comedy Large Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway, Jazz

Falsettos

music & lyrics William Finn book by William Finn and James Lapine WINNER! 1992 Tony Awards, Best Book and Best Score A seamless pairing of March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland, two acclaimed Off-Broadway musicals written nearly a decade apart. It is the tale of Marvin, who leaves his wife and young son to live with another man. His ex-wife marries his psychiatrist, and Marvin ends up alone. Two years later, Marvin is reunited with his lover on the eve of his son’s bar mitzvah, just as AIDS is beginning its insidious spread.

Really Rosie

book & lyrics by Maurice Sendak music by Carole King "There is such juicy vitality, such insouciant grace, such frolicking exploration of the waist high jungle of childhood." — New York Magazine Rosie, the sassiest kid on her block of Brooklyn’s Avenue P, entertains herself and her friends by acting out show biz fantasies, notably directing and starring in an “Oscarwinning movie.” From Sendak, the author and illustrator of Where the Wild Things Are and other popular children’s books, and acclaimed singer/songwriter Carole King, Really Rosie is a jewel for children and adults. 4m, 2f, Ensemble| Full Length Musical | Comedy Small/Combo Band | Easy Vocals | Classic Broadway

Side Show

book & lyrics by Bill Russell music by Henry Krieger additional book material by Bill Condon “…the musical burrows deep into your spirit… It’s just wonderful!” — The New York Times Based on the true story of conjoined twins Violet and Daisy Hilton, who became stars during the Depression. A moving portrait of two women joined at the hip whose extraordinary bondage brings them fame but denies them love. Told almost entirely through song, the show follows their progression from England to America, from the vaudeville circuit to Hollywood. With a new book and songs, the 2014 revival delves deeper into their backstory, fleshing out characters and situations and offering more sophistication and truth to the story. 14m, 7f, Flexible Casting | More than 120 minutes | Drama, Biography Large Orchestra | Difficult Vocals | Classic Broadway, Pop/Rock

3m, 3f, 1b | More than 120 minutes | Drama Small/Combo Band | Difficult Vocals | Classic Broadway, Pop/Rock

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

“Vernon’s score, which draws from the period’s disco, soft rock and glam sounds, is solid. Highly theatrical, unexpected, and marvelous... channels a vintage camp that is all too rare nowadays.”

— The New York Times

When Wes buys an abandoned building in the French Quarter of New Orleans, he finds himself transported to the UpStairs Lounge, a vibrant 70s gay bar. As this forgotten community comes to life, Wes embarks on an exhilarating journey of self-exploration spanning two generations of queer history. A new musical that asks what has been gained and lost in the fight for equality, and how the past can help guide all of us through an uncertain future.

THE VIEW UPSTAIRS by Max Vernon

Taylor Frey & Nathan Lee Graham in The View Upstairs at the Lynn Redgrave Theater at Culture Project, 2017 (Kurt Sneddon). Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

8m, 2f | 105 minutes | Drama Small/Combo Orchestra Moderate Vocals Pop/Rock, Contemporary Broadway

GIRLFRIEND book by Todd Almond music & lyrics by Matthew Sweet

“Those who can enter the rhythm of the musical may find themselves returning to some epic emotions from their youth.” — The Los Angeles Times Nebraska in the 90s. Will, a bit of a social outcast, and Mike, a popular football player, figure out there’s more to life than what high school has taught them. Days after graduation, they explore their relationship and begin to ask themselves where their lives begin. Based on the album by Matthew Sweet, this pop/rock musical is for anyone who’s lived in a small town and feels for their first love. 2m | 90 minutes | Dramatic Comedy | Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Pop/Rock

Ryder Bach and Curt Hansen in Girlfriend at Center Theatre Group, 2015 (Craig Schwartz).

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

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Fly By Night

Iowa

book & lyrics by Jenny Schwartz music & lyrics by Todd Almond

conceived by Kim Rosenstock written by Will Connolly, Michael Mitnick, and Kim Rosenstock

“Smart, off-angle pop art songs add to the abundance of pleasures.” — Time Out New York

“Its unabashed emotionalism could turn it into more than a hit. It could turn it into a cult phenomenon.” — New York Post A star-crossed prophecy. A lot of music. Just not a lot of light. In this darkly comic rock-fable, a melancholy sandwich maker’s humdrum life is intersected by two entrancing sisters. A sweeping ode to young love set against the backdrop of the northeast blackout of 1965. A tale about making your way and discovering hope in a world beset by darkness.

When Becca’s mom finds her soulmate on Facebook, she must leave the unusual pleasantries of her hometown and teenage life to venture to Iowa as her mother seeks a new beginning. But no amount of Facebook chatting can prepare them for their new life in the lonely Midwest. This daring piece successfully melds absurdism and musical theatre into a genre-bending romp about the relationships that connect us in a disconnected world. 1m, 6f, 1g | 90 minutes | Dark Comedy Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Pop/Rock

5m, 2f | More than 120 minutes | Dark Comedy Small Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway, Pop/Rock

Fugitive Songs

music by Chris Miller lyrics by Nathan Tysen

Jasper in Deadland

book by Hunter Foster book, music & lyrics by Ryan Scott Oliver

“A powerful yearning weaves through the tunes…a song cycle tailored to anyone who has ever thought of shucking his job, his mate or his life to start anew.” — Variety

“Foster and Oliver unleash their cleverness in this playful, energetic and wide-ranging new musical.” — The New York Times When you’re failing classes, kicked off the swim team, and your family is on the skids, life can feel like it’s going to hell. Yet, in all the disappointment, Jasper has his best friend, Agnes. In one night of teenage passion, Jasper and Agnes consummate a years-long friendship. But in the morning Agnes is gone, telling Jasper to meet her at their cliff. When he arrives there’s no sign of his best friend, only a swirling vortex to another world in the water below. Jasper dives into Deadland.

An innovative song cycle, conceived as half-musical/halfhootenanny, spotlights people on the run: a disgruntled Subway sandwich employee, a jilted ex-cheerleader, a pair of Patty Hearst fanatics, and others. Blending traditional folk music with contemporary pop and gospel, this eclectic score provides material for a wide range of experienced singers and delivers poignant and thoughtful lyrics that capture each character’s “reasons to run.” 3m, 3f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Song Cycle Small/Combo Band | Difficult Vocals | Pop/Rock, Country, Folk

5m, 4f, Flexible Casting | More than 120 minutes | Dark Comedy Medium Orchestra | Difficult Vocals | Pop/Rock

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Musicals

Chris Miller and Nathan Tysen: Fugitives

Chris Miller and Nathan Tysen

FUGITIVES

by Kent Nicholson

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

t makes sense that Chris Miller and Nate Tysen would create a song revue entitled Fugitive Songs. In a way, there is nothing more American than a fascination with fugitives, and there isn’t much theatre music which pulls together more strands of the American character than Chris and Nate’s work. Steeped in church music, traditional folk music, pop, and gospel sounds, the music they’ve given to the theatre is as eclectic as the characters they are writing for. And while the “fugitives” of their pieces are often young kids trying to understand their worlds, there is no doubt that they share the quality of all fugitives — they are all on the run. In Chris and Nate’s first full length musical, The Burnt Part Boys, the fugitive is the young Pete, who, along with his best friend Dusty, is running toward the mountaintop to blow up the old mine (known as the Burnt Part) before they can reopen it. The Burnt Part is really a grave. It’s the site of an old mining disaster that took the lives of Pete and his brother’s (Jake) father. And many of the fathers of many of the kids in town. Pete and Dusty are on the run from Jake and Chet, who have been hired to re-open the mine and continue their dead father’s work. Or maybe the fugitive in The Burnt Part Boys is Jake, the older brother, who really doesn’t want to be opening up the old mine and taking on the responsibility of taking care of his younger brother and still-grieving mother. Or it could be Frances, the young girl who agrees to join Pete in his quest to destroy the mine. After all, Frances also lost her father to the mine, and her mother to grief. As a result, she’s decided to live off the land and fend for herself halfway up the mountain in a lean-to she built herself.

In any case, all of these characters are running from some aspect of the tragedy that has destroyed their lives. Of course, in running away from something, you also must be running towards something else. In this case, a reckoning with the ghosts of their fathers, and a better understanding of life and how to keep living it. Not by running away, but by embracing each other and taking care of each other.

Steeped in church music, traditional folk music, pop, and gospel sounds, the music they’ve given to the theatre is as eclectic as the characters they are writing for. In Tuck Everlasting, the fugitive is much more clear. It’s the entire Tuck clan, after discovering the elixir of eternal youth in a spring which runs in the woods behind Winnie’s house. As a result of their immortality, the Tucks are forever on the run from those who would claim, and abuse, their secret. Or maybe it isn’t so clear, since “good girl” Winnie Foster might actually be the fugitive of the piece. Since she literally runs away from home because she wants to know what the world holds beyond her white picket fence. True, she does have the encouragement of her grandmother, but if her mother knew what she was up to, there would definitely be a reckoning. Of course, the Tucks' secret and Winnie’s exploration inevitably intertwine, and then they all must run from the Man in Yellow, who is really up to no good. But at least in Fugitive Songs,

Chris and Nate’s revue of songs, we know who the fugitives are. All 19 of them. Because, as the title suggests, each song tells the story of a different kind of fugitive. Whether it’s the stoner who robs a convenience store against his will, or the disgruntled subway worker. Each character represents someone on the run. What’s also clear about Nate and Chris’ work is how steeped in Americana it is. Both children of ministers, both spent significant amount of time performing and listening to music from their respective churches (Chris’ father was even a Minister of Music). Both also learned to love musicals at a relatively young age. Their melodies, their harmonies, their orchestrations are steeped in the sounds of their upbringings in Virginia and Kansas. Whether writing a piece that takes place in 1952 in the heart of coal country, or writing an adaptation of a famous children’s book that has no country, Chris and Nate make it sound like an American tale. So it makes sense that their “fugitives” would be embodied by such an American sound. And while they may be drawn to characters that are on the run, it’s pretty clear to me that neither of them is really running from themselves or their respective pasts at all. Rather, they are embracing their unique sound and heritage and bringing it into the grand tradition of storytelling that the theatre embodies. It’s fun to spend time with the fugitives in these stories. But it’s also fun to stay put and revel in the unique sounds of two writers who know where they’re meant to be.

This article originally appeared on Breaking Character Magazine in October, 2017.

TUCK EVERLASTING book by Claudia Shear and Tim Federle music by Chris Miller lyrics by Nathan Tysen based on the book by Natalie Babbitt

“A warm-spirited and piercingly touching musical!” — The New York Times 11-year-old Winnie Foster yearns for a life of adventure beyond her white picket fence. When she becomes unexpectedly entwined with the Tuck family and learns of the magic behind their unending youth, she must fight to protect them from those who would do anything for a chance at eternal life. A magical, thought-provoking musical adapted from Natalie Babbitt’s best-selling children’s classic by Claudia Shear and Tim Federle and featuring a soaring score from Chris Miller and Nathan Tysen. 6m, 3f, 1g, Ensemble | 120 minutes | Comedy | Medium Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Folk, Contemporary Broadway Andrew Keenan-Bolger and Sarah Charles Lewis in Tuck Everlasting on Broadway, 2016 (Joan Marcus). Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Anne of Green Gables

Hands on a Hardbody book by Doug Wright lyrics by Amanda Green music by Trey Anastasio and Amanda Green

“You can hear the sound of America singing in this daring new musical!” — The New York Times For 10 hard-luck Texans, a new lease on life is so close they can touch it. Under a scorching sun for days on end, armed with nothing but hope, humor, and ambition, they’ll fight to keep at least one hand on a brand-new truck in order to win it. In the hilarious, hard-fought contest, only one winner can drive away with the American Dream. Inspired by the true events of the acclaimed 1997 documentary of the same name by S.R. Bindler, produced by Kevin Morris and Bindler.

book & lyrics by Donald Harron music & lyrics by Norman Campbell additional lyrics by Mavor Moore and Elaine Campbell based on the novel by L.M. Montgomery

“A neatly packaged family show, sentimental, tuneful and blending gentle bucolic humor with old world pathos.“ — The Stage

9m, 6f | 120 minutes | Dramatic Comedy Medium Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Pop/Rock, Country

The classic tale of orphan girl Anne, who rises from destitution to happiness in the farm country entirely by virtue of her pluck and personality. Anne’s adventures at Green Gables, the farm owned by her new caretakers, are comical and heartwarming.

A Tale of Two Cities, A Musical

12m, 17f , Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Comedy Medium Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

book, music & lyrics by Jill Santoriello based on the novel by Charles Dickens

Love, Noël:

“The return to the era of big blockbusters such as Les Miserables, Phantom, and Miss Saigon.” — The Associated Press Two men in love with the same woman. Two cities swept up in revolution. One last chance for a man to redeem his wasted life and change the world. Based on Charles Dickens’ masterpiece, A Tale of Two Cities is a musical that focuses on the love triangle between young beauty Lucie Manette, French aristocrat Charles Darnay, and drunken English cynic Sydney Carton — all caught in the clutches of the bloody French Revolution.

The Letters and Songs of Noël Coward an entertainment devised by Barry Day “An endearing pastiche of Noël Coward’s intimate correspondence with a generous helping of his immortal songs.” — The Hollywood Reporter A dramatic staging of the letters and correspondence of the playwright, director, actor, composer, and singer. Coward’s letters span several decades and give insight to some of his relationships with everyone from George Bernard Shaw to Edna Ferber, from the Queen Mother to his own mother, and of course, his constant collaborator, Gertrude Lawrence. A loving portrait of one of the theatre’s most influential minds.

7m, 3f, 1g, Ensemble | 120 minutes | Drama Large Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway, Operetta

1m, 1f | 90 minutes | Musical Revue/Cabaret Piano Only | Easy Vocals | Classic Broadway Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Musicals

Kiss of the Spider Woman

book by Terrence McNally music by John Kander lyrics by Fred Ebb based on the novel by Manuel Puig originally directed by Harold Prince WINNER! 1993 Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical, and Best Original Score Cellmates in a Latin American prison, Valentin is a tough revolutionary undergoing torture, and Molina is an unabashed homosexual serving eight years for deviant behavior. Escaping from the reality of prison life, Molina shares with Valentin fantasies about an actress, Aurora. He loves her in all roles, but one scares him: the Spider Woman, who kills with a kiss. 15m, 3f | More than 120 minutes | Drama Large Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

Whenever

book by Alan Ayckbourn music by Denis King “Something to savor. A historical-futuristicfarcical-grown-up-romantic musical adventure.” — The Guardian Beginning in 1886, this historical-futuristic musical finds Emily’s good Uncle Martin inventing a time machine that wicked Uncle Lucas wants to get his hands on. So Emily must journey to the end of time to ensure evil does not prevail. Emily picks up three traveling companions from various eras (1940, 2010) along the way — a chipper Cockney, a sensitive android, and a friendly Yeti. 5m, 4f, Flexible Casting | Full Length Musical | Comedy Piano Only | Easy Vocals | Classic Broadway

Kudzu: A Southern Musical

book, music & lyrics by Jack Herrick, Doug Marlette, and Bland Simpson based on the comic strip by Doug Marlette “A joyous musical score and delicious satire.” — The Boston Globe The story of a boy who comes of age against the changing face of the American South. Like the comic strip from which it is adapted, this musical celebrates the values, humor, and original characters still found in disappearing rural America. 11m, 3f, Flexible Casting | Full Length Musical | Comedy Medium Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Pop/Rock, Country

Raisin

based on Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun book by Robert Nemiroff and Charlotte Zaltzberg music by Judd Woldin lyrics by Robert Brittan WINNER! 1974 Tony Award for Best Musical Lorraine Hansberry’s classic is transformed into a soulful, inspiring musical as a proud African American family’s quest for a better life explodes in song, dance, and incisive human drama. 9m, 6f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Drama Large Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Big Nate: The Musical

Ruthless!

book by Jason Loewith and Lincoln Peirce music by Christopher Youstra lyrics by Jason Loewith and Christopher Youstra based on the cartoons & books by Lincoln Peirce

book & lyrics by Joel Paley music by Marvin Laird “A spoof that has enough absurd plot twists and multiple identities to fill several old movies…The fun comes from the sheer brazenness!” — The New York Times Eight-year-old Tina Denmark knows she was born to play Pippi Longstocking, and she will do anything to win the part in her school musical. Anything includes murdering the leading lady! 1m, 6f | Full Length Musical | Comedy/Farce Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

“Bursting with energy and fun music! A rocking fresh bundle of raucous fun.” — D.C. Theatre Scene Nate Wright, a detention-riddled sixth grader (and drummer for the greatest garage band in the history of the galaxy, Enslave the Mollusk!), hopes to capture beautiful Jenny’s heart by winning “The Nicholodeon,” the first prize in his school’s Battle of the Bands. But when Artur and Jenny team up with Nate’s arch-rival, Gina, to form the sap-pop band Rainbows and Ponies, he’s gotta take his game to an all-star level. 4m, 3f | 75 minutes | TYA Comedy Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway, Pop/Rock

The Tap Dance Kid

book by Charles Blackwell music by Henry Krieger lyrics by Robert Lorick

The Spitfire Grill

book & music by James Valcq book & lyrics by Fred Alley based on the film by Lee David Zlotoff “Soulful…The amiable country flavored tunes and lyrics are rendered with the kind of conviction and expertise that make them transcendent.” — New York Magazine

“Stunning, warm hearted new musical comedy.” — Christian Science Monitor A wonderful cornucopia of music, drama, comedy, and above all, tap dancing. The story concerns a 10-year-old African American child named Willie who doesn’t want to be a lawyer like his stern father; he just has to dance, like his uncle, an aspiring Broadway choreographer who is very much Willie’s mentor. And dance he does!

A feisty parolee follows her dreams, based on a page from an old travel book, to a small town in Wisconsin and finds a place for herself working at Hannah’s Spitfire Grill. It is for sale, but there are no takers for the only eatery in the depressed town, so newcomer Percy suggests to Hannah that she raffle it off. Entry fees are 100 dollars, and the best essay on why you want the grill wins. Soon, mail is arriving by the wheelbarrow-full and things are definitely cookin’. 3m, 4f | Full Length Musical | Drama Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Folk

5m, 6f | Full Length Musical | Dramatic Comedy Large Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway, Jazz

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Musicals

Pump Boys and Dinettes

by John Foley, Mark

Hardwick, Debra Monk, Cass Morgan, John Schimmel, and Jim Wann “Both musically and theatrically, a triumph of ensemble playing. It doesn’t merely celebrate the value of friendship and life’s simple pleasures, it embodies them.” — The New York Times The “Pump Boys” sell high octane on Highway 57 in Grand Ole Opry country, and the “Dinettes”, Prudie and Rhetta Cupp, run the Double Cupp diner next door. Together they fashion an evening of country western songs that received raves on and off Broadway. With heartbreak and hilarity, they perform on guitar, piano, bass, and yes, kitchen utensils. 4m, 2f | 105 minutes | Comedy Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Pop/Rock, Country

Judge Jackie:

Disorder in the Court book & lyrics by Christopher Dimond music by Michael Kooman based on a concept by Van Kaplan “This jury of one finds in favor of the creators and cast for inciting lighthearted laughter.” — Pittsburgh Tribune Review Judge Jackie Justice rules her reality television courtroom with an iron fist, presiding over a three-ring circus of America’s most chaotic civil cases. But, when a drop in ratings brings her face-to-face with the liability of her own love life, the judge must learn to navigate the ludicrous laws of love in this over-the-top courtroom comedy.

The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas book by Larry L. King and Peter Masterson music & lyrics by Carol Hall based on a story by Larry L. King

“A font of fun and friendliness, engagingly rich in regional nostalgia and spiced with delicate bawdry. The country and western score is a delight.” — Time This happy-go-lucky view of small-town vice and statewide political side-stepping recounts the good times and the demise of the Chicken Ranch, known since the 1850s as one of the better pleasure palaces in all of Texas. Governors, senators, mayors, and even victorious college football teams frequent Miss Mona’s cozy bordello, until that puritan nemesis Watchdog focuses his television cameras and his righteous indignation on the institution. 13m, 14f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Comedy Medium Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway, Country

Trey Parker’s Cannibal! The Musical book, music & lyrics by Trey Parker

“It’s finger-licking good! It will take a truly jaded soul to push away from the table before this often hilarious meal is over. Bon appetit!” — San Francisco Examiner The true story of the only person convicted of cannibalism in America, Alferd Packer. The sole survivor of an ill-fated trip to the Colorado Territory, he tells his side of the harrowing tale to news reporter Polly Pry as he awaits his execution. And his story goes like this: While searching for gold and love in the Colorado Territory, he and his companions lost their way and resorted to unthinkable horrors, including toe-tapping songs! 10m, 2f, Flexible Casting | 105 minutes | Comedy Piano Only | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

3m, 2f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Comedy Small/Combo Band | Classic Broadway, Pop/Rock

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

SOUTHERN COMFORT book & lyrics by Dan Collins music by Julianne Wick Davis

CRITIC’S PICK! “A sweetheart of a musical.” — The New York Times “Beautiful and heartfelt show...bring the family.” — Deadline Based on the 2001 Sundance Film Festival documentary, Southern Comfort follows the last year of Robert Eads, a transgender man in Georgia, who is diagnosed with ovarian cancer. He surrounds himself with his chosen family, who are predominantly transgender, as they share monthly potluck meals. Like any family, they have their trials and tribulations, but ultimately seek acceptance for who they are in their own skin. 3m, 3f, Ensemble | 120 minutes | Drama | Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Folk, Contemporary Broadway

Annette O’Toole in Southern Comfort at the Public Theater, 2016 (Carol Rosegg). Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Josh Groban and the cast of Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 on Broadway, 2016 (Chad Batka).

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

NATASHA, PIERRE & THE GREAT COMET OF 1812 by Dave Malloy

“A witty, inventive enchantment from rousing start to mournful finish! The most innovative and the best new musical to open on Broadway since Hamilton!”

— The New York Times

Young and impulsive, Natasha Rostova arrives in Moscow to await the return of her fiancé from the front lines. When she falls under the spell of the roguish Anatole, it is up to Pierre, a family friend in the middle of an existential crisis, to pick up the pieces of her shattered reputation. With daring score and bold storytelling, this award-winning musical brings to life a scandalous slice of a classic Russian epic. This title is unavailable for licensing at the time of publication. Contact your Licensing Representative for all licensing inquiries.

5m, 5f, Ensemble, Flexible Casting More than 120 minutes | Drama Medium Orchestra | Difficult Vocals Pop/Rock, Folk, Operetta

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN

Costume Design with Paloma Young by Rebecca Schlossberg Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

ith every new play comes a barrage of exciting creative opportunities; most notably for designers, the chance to leave a defining mark on a fresh piece of theatre. However, myriad challenges, both collaborative and otherwise, accompany this opportunity. For example, how do the 39 ensemble members of Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812 not get lost in a sea of red velvet walls and gilded frames? The answer: with a little help from costume designer Paloma Young. When you take a look back at Paloma’s distinguished career in costume design and consider all she has achieved, you might think she had an early start as a designer. But, much like the work she produces, her career path has undergone a certain amount of reinvention. “I went to Berkley for undergrad and was a history major,” Young tells me. Even then, she says, she displayed a certain amount of interest and enthusiasm for costume design, two qualities which brought about her first foray into designing a few Beckett shorts on her college campus. After graduation and stints at various odd jobs, plus what she credits as “a bad night at the bar,” she awoke with a simple revelation: she missed the design world. Jumping on this impulse, she applied rather quickly to impending deadlines for graduate school programs in design, including her alma mater, UC San Diego. Fast forward to the present. After accruing substantial regional, Off-Broadway, and Broadway credits (including a 2012 Tony Award, Best Costume Design in a Play for Peter and the Starcatcher), the designer set her sights on a new challenge: Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812. With

an immersive feel at its center, Natasha’s design team went so far as to redesign the layout of the Imperial Theatre for the show’s Broadway debut, offering audiences an intimate impression of an opulent Russian salon.

The costumes themselves, like the show’s inimitable blend of “rock, pop, soul, folk, and electronic dance music with classic Broadway,” are a bit of a mixed bag as well. Mostly inspired by this unique blend of music, “They feel a bit period, a little bit Russian, and a lot gypsy punk.” “The show got a lot sparklier,” Young replies when asked how its design has evolved to meet new challenges. The sparkle is not for show, but rather placed in its design with a very specific purpose; “I needed to use it in a way to distinguish the actors from the people behind them.” The idea of an immersive experience has always been in the show’s presentation, but the spaces in which it has been performed have gotten larger and larger, starting in a 99seat house and ending up on Broadway. Throughout this transition, tracking the actors and the story was a primary concern. “Our peripheral vision can pick up sparkle a lot faster than just something getting brighter. So, Bradley King, the lighting designer, has this fabulous light that’s coming up on them, and

there’s singing, and this great localization of the sound, but one part of that equation is that even this very small movement is going to give you a little bit of sparkle that moves your eye in that direction.” The costumes themselves, like the show’s inimitable blend of “rock, pop, soul, folk, and electronic dance music with classic Broadway,” are a bit of a mixed bag as well. Mostly inspired by this unique blend of music, “they feel a bit period, a little bit Russian, and a lot gypsy punk,” Young says. Rather than creating a sense of reality, Young intended for the costumer to capture the feeling the music presents, playing with the genres in which Natasha exists. Like the Tony Award-winning designs she made for Peter and the Starcatcher, the work she did for Natasha could be described as both collaged design work (blending together preexisting items, like actual opera garments from New York City’s Metropolitan Opera), and mixing in new materials (like flocked jeans from H&M.) While her career is sure to become even more dynamic, with designs for Andy Blankenbuehler’s Bandstand on the horizon, her advice to designers is simple: “Come into the script as if you had no limitations and land on what is the thing I need to tell this story in the best way, the way that this script is asking to be presented.”

The cast of Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 on Broadway, 2016 (Chad Batka).

This article originally appeared on Breaking Character Magazine in January, 2017.

Heathers The Musical book, music & lyrics by Kevin Murphy and Laurence O’Keefe based on the film by Daniel Waters “Ingenious, naughty and very funny. Heathers still cliques.” — New York Post Are you in, or are you out? Veronica Sawyer, a brainy, beautiful teenage misfit, hustles her way into the most powerful and ruthless clique at Westerberg High: The Heathers. Before she can get too comfortable atop the high school food chain, Veronica falls in love with the dangerously sexy new kid, J.D. When Heather Chandler, the Almighty, kicks her out of the group, Veronica decides to bite the bullet and kiss Heather’s aerobicized ass…but J.D. has another plan for that bullet. 8m, 9f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Dark Comedy Medium Orchestra | Difficult Vocals | Pop/Rock

Return to the Forbidden Planet by Bob Carlton

WINNER! 1989 Olivier Award, Best Musical

Blast off on a routine flight and crash into the planet D’Illyria where a sci-fi version of The Tempest set to rock ’n’ roll golden oldies unfolds with glee. The planet is inhabited by a sinister scientist, Dr. Prospero; his delightful daughter Miranda; Ariel, a faithful robot on roller skates; and an uncontrollable monster whose tentacles penetrate the spacecraft. This jukebox musical is packed with classics such as “Heard it Through the Grapevine,” “Young Girl,” “Good Vibrations,” and “Gloria.” 7m, 4f, Flexible Casting | Full Length Musical | Comedy/Sci-Fi Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Pop/Rock

Leader of the Pack:

The Ellie Greenwich Musical book by Anne Beatts music & lyrics by Ellie Greenwich and friends based on a play by Melanie Mintz additional material by Jack Heifner “A happy, high spirited, foot stomping romp. I never realized the songs of the sixties could sound so good.” — WNBC Radio This hit Broadway musical retrospective celebrates the life and times of Ellie Greenwich, whose doo wop sounds skyrocketed to the top of the sixties charts. The story of Ellie’s rise to fame and fortune is punctuated with the virtual Hit Parade of her music: “Chapel of Love,” “Da Do Ron Ron,” “Be My Baby,” and of course, the title song, “Leader of the Pack.” 4m, 10f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Comedy, Biography Large Orchestra | Easy Vocals | Pop/Rock

Gorilla Man

by Kyle Jarrow “Big, bloody, ridiculous theatricality… There’s a unity of vision and insanity that’s exciting.” — The New York Sun Waking one morning to find thick fur growing on the backs of his hands, young Billy discovers the awful truth his mother has been hiding from him for fourteen years: he’s destined to grow up into a murderous monster. Cast from his home, he sets out on a journey to find his father, the legendary Gorilla Man. A darkly comic coming-ofage tale filled with bombastic pop songs and peopled with lonely freaks. Puberty is hard enough without the insatiable thirst for blood! 3m, 2f, 2m or f | 90 minutes | Dark Comedy Piano Only | Moderate Vocals | Pop/Rock

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

ROCK OF AGES book by Chris D’Arienzo music by A Bunch of Really Sweet 80s Bands

“Rock of Ages is the power-ballad decade in all its glory, tricked out with big perms, bigger dreams, and the kind of operatic ecstasy you read about only in bathroom stalls.” — Entertainment Weekly Set in L.A.’s infamous Sunset Strip in 1987, Rock of Ages tells the story of Drew, a city boy from South Detroit, and Sherrie, a small-town girl, both in L.A. to chase their dreams of making it big and falling in love. Rock of Ages takes you back to the time of big bands with big egos, playing big guitar solos, and sporting even bigger hair! 7m, 10f | 120 minutes | Comedy | Small/Combo Band | Difficult Vocals | Pop/Rock Constantine Maroulis and the cast of Rock of Ages on Broadway, 2009 (Joan Marcus). Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

“A musical that deals with mutating identity and time warps becomes one of the most mutated, timewarped phenomena in show business.”

— The New York Times

Richard O’Brien’s

THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW

An over-the-top tribute to science fiction and B movies, this cult classic tells the story of a newly engaged couple getting caught in a storm and coming to the home of a mad transvestite scientist unveiling his new creation: an artificially made, fully grown, physically perfect muscle man named Rocky Horror. Complete with sass from the audience, cascading toilet paper, and an array of other audience participation props, this deliberately kitschy rock ’n’ roll gothic musical is more fun than ever.

7m, 3f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes Dark Comedy Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals Pop/Rock Morgan Mabry Mason and Alex Organ in The Rocky Horror Show, Dallas Theater Center, 2014 (Karen Almond). Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Pageant

Chess

book & lyrics by Frank Kelly and Bill Russell music by Albert Evans conceived by Robert Longbottom

music by Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus lyrics by Tim Rice based on an idea by Tim Rice book by Richard Nelson

“Screamingly funny!” — The New York Times Pageant is a pageant, with its six contestants competing for the title of Miss Glamouresse. Judges selected from the audience actually vote and determine the winner who, therefore, may be different at each performance. The show takes its shots not by mocking the pageant from the outside, but by being one. 7m | 90 minutes | Comedy Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway, Pop/Rock

35mm:

A Musical Exhibition music & lyrics by Ryan Scott Oliver based on photographs by Matthew Murphy

The pawns in this drama form a love triangle: the loutish American chess star, the earnest Russian champion and a Hungarian American female assistant who arrives at the international chess match with the American but falls for the Russian. From Bangkok to Budapest, the players, lovers, politicians, and spies manipulate and are manipulated to the pulse of a monumental rock score. The game becomes a metaphor for romantic rivalries, competitive gamesmanship, super power politics, and international intrigues. 9m, 2f, 1b or 1g | More than 120 minutes | Drama Large Orchestra | Difficult Vocals | Pop/Rock, Classic Broadway

ReWrite

by Joe Iconis

“When theater pundits talk about the future of Broadway and the new generation of composers, they’re talking about artists like Ryan Scott Oliver… a major new voice in musical theater.” — Entertainment Weekly A picture is worth 1,000 words — what about a song? Can a picture inspire a song or 15? In 35mm, each photo creates a unique song, moments frozen in time; a glimmer of a life unfolding, a glimpse of something happening. A stunning new multimedia musical that re-imagines what the modern American musical can be. 3m, 2f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Song Cycle Small/Combo Band or Medium Orchestra | Difficult Vocals Classic Broadway, Pop/Rock, Country

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

“One of the best rock scores ever produced. This is an angry, difficult, demanding and rewarding show.” — Time

“Beneath Iconis’s quirkiness lies a talented dramatist who knows how to create a nicely integrated musical.” — CurtainUp 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. Miss Marzipan is a dizzy musical about the life-changing preparation that goes into a highstakes dinner party. 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. 3m, 3f, Flexible Casting | 90 minutes | Comedy Piano Only | Moderate Vocals | Pop/Rock

Musicals

Musicals from

JERRY HERMAN La Cage Aux Folles

book by Harvey Fierstein based on the play by Jean Poiret

Georges and Albin, two men partnered for better or worse, get a bit of both when Georges’ son announces his impending marriage to the daughter of a bigoted, right-wing politician. Further complicating the situation is the family business: Albin and Georges run a drag nightclub in St. Tropez, where Albin is the star performer, Zaza. Georges reluctantly agrees to masquerade as “normal” when he meets the family of the bride-to-be. But Albin has other plans, with hilarious results. 7m, 3f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Comedy | Large Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

Mack and Mabel

book by Michael Stewart based on an idea by Leonard Spigelglass

A saga of the silent film era. Legendary director Mack Sennett is a broken man, made obsolete by talkies. He reminisces about the past, recalling his triumphs and turbulent love affair with screen legend Mabel Norman, whom he had discovered and made a star. Though he loves her, he cannot tell her, sending her into the arms of a rival. 10m, 5f, Flexible Casting | 120 minutes | Drama | Large Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

The Grand Tour

book by Michael Stewart and Mark Bramble

In 1940, an unlikely pair team up to escape Nazi France. Jacobowsky, a Polish Jewish intellectual, has a car but can’t drive. Colonel Stjerbinsky, an anti-Semitic aristocrat, can. Joining them is Marianne, the colonel’s girlfriend. So begins their adventurous journey on the road, which becomes bumpy when Jacobowsky falls in love. 29m or f, Flexible Casting | Full Length Musical | Comedy | Large Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

Jerry’s Girls

concepts by Larry Alford, Wayne Cilento, and Jerry Herman

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

Me and My Girl

The Secret Garden

book & lyrics by L. Arthur Rose and Douglas Furber book revised by Stephen Fry with contributions by Mike Ockrent music by Noel Gay

book & lyrics by Marsha Norman music by Lucy Simon adapted from the novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett “Revels in theatrical imagination [and] achieves the irresistible appeal that moves audiences to standing ovations.” — Christian Science Monitor A stunning musical that brings to life the haunting beauty of this beloved literary classic. Orphaned in India, 11-yearold Mary Lennox is sent to a Yorkshire manor to live with relatives she’s never met. Left to her own devices, Mary’s personality blossoms as she and a young gardener restore a neglected garden — bringing new life to the manor, and ultimately healing her sickly cousin and uncle.

“A winner! A gem of a musical!” — The New York Times A grand old musical from the 1930s, updated and revived for a three-year Broadway run in 1986! The late Viscount Hareford had a youthful, unfortunate marriage — and kept discreetly out of sight was a son and heir, Bill Snibson. Now, the Hareford family is despondent when their solicitor finds the legitimate heir in the less than desirable Lambeth area of London. When Bill is brought to Hareford Hall, he is forced to decide if he should fit in with high society and give up his Cockney roots.

12m, 10f, 1b, 1g | 120 minutes | Drama Large Orchestra | Difficult Vocals | Classic Broadway

The Behavior of Broadus

11m, 8f, Ensemble | Full Length Musical | Romantic Comedy Medium Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

Dames at Sea

by Carolyn Almos, Matt Almos, Jon Beauregard, Albert Dayan, and Brendan Millburn

book & lyrics by George Haimsohn and Robin Miller music by Jim Wise “A winner! A gem of a musical!” — The New York Times It’s big-time New York City, into which sweet little Ruby from faraway Hometown, USA has come to make it big on Broadway. Who should she chance to meet but another boy from Hometown, USA, Dick, a sailor who also has ambitions as a songwriter. Ruby begins in the chorus, and by the end of the day, in true Hollywood fashion, Dick saves her doomed Broadway show with a smash tune, as Ruby becomes a star on the deck of a battleship which just happens to be passing by. 4m, 3f | Full Length Musical | Comedy Medium Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

“As delightfully self-assured as it is comically selfreferential, made up of equal parts whimsy, wacky, profane and profound, this cracked experiment in satirical musical development is a wickedly entertaining watershed.” — The Los Angeles Times The incredible sort-of-true story of John Broadus Watson, father of Behaviorism and modern advertising. He has the power to control your brain. Indeed, we suspect he’s making you read this right now. This Mad Men-esque dark comedy puts the origins of our pop-culture consumerist society under a satirical magnifying glass. 7m, 3f, Flexible Casting | More than 120 minutes | Satire Medium Orchestra | Easy Vocals | Classic Broadway

Musicals

Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill by Lanie Robertson

“Hurts and exhilarates in just the right proportions.” — New York Magazine The time is 1959. The place is a seedy bar in Philadelphia. The audience is about to witness one of Billie Holiday’s last performances, given four months before her death. More than a dozen musical numbers are interlaced with salty, often humorous reminiscences to project a riveting portrait of the lady and her music. 1m, 1f | 90 minutes | Drama Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Jazz

Adding Machine: A Musical

composed by Joshua Schmidt libretto by Jason Loewith and Joshua Schmidt based on the play by Elmer Rice “A brilliant musical! A superb libretto by Loewith and Schmidt and music that gets under your skin and stays there.” — The New York Times A darkly comic and heartbreakingly beautiful musical adaptation of Rice’s incendiary 1923 play. Mr. Zero, after 25 years of service to his company, is replaced by a mechanical adding machine. Enraged, he murders his boss. An eclectic score gives memorable voice to this stylish and stylized show, following Zero’s journey to the afterlife, where he is met with one last chance for romance and redemption. 5m, 4f, Flexible Casting | 105 minutes | Drama Small/Combo Band | Difficult Vocals | Operetta

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Adrift in Macao

book & lyrics by Christopher Durang music by Peter Melnick “A drop-dead funny book…shamefully silly lyrics…and lethally catchy music.” — Broadway World Everyone that comes to Macao is waiting for something, though none of them know exactly what that is. There’s Laureena, the curvaceous blonde; Rick Shaw, the cynical surf and turf casino owner; and don’t forget about Mitch, the American who has just been framed for murder by the mysterious villain McGuffin. With songs and quips, puns and farcical shenanigans, this musical parody of noir films will please audiences of all ages. 4m, 3f | 100 minutes | Comedy/Parody Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway

The Wiz

adapted from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum book by William F. Brown music & lyrics by Charlie Smalls “Radiates so much energy you can hardly sit in your seat…great fun.” — New York Post A beloved Broadway gem, The Wiz infuses L. Frank Baum’s The Wonderful Wizard of Oz with a dazzling mix of rock, gospel, and soul music. This timeless tale of Dorothy’s adventures through the Land of Oz is a fun, family-friendly, modern musical and one of the most popular shows in the Samuel French catalog. A magical, high-energy show, appropriate for theaters at all levels. 6m, 5f, 4m or f, Flexible Casting | Full Length Musical | Comedy Large Orchestra | Moderate Vocals | Pop/Rock, Jazz

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

FUN HOME

music by Jeanine Tesori book & lyrics by Lisa Kron based on the graphic novel by Alison Bechdel

“The Best Broadway Musical in years, with the finest score in a decade.”

— The Huffington Post

WINNER! 2015 Tony Award for Best Musical Moving between past and present, graphic novelist Alison Bechdel relives her unique childhood playing at the family’s Bechdel Funeral Home; her growing understanding of her own sexuality; and the looming, unanswerable questions about her father’s hidden desires. A refreshingly honest, wholly original musical about seeing your parents through grown-up eyes. 2m, 4f, 2b, 1g | 90 minutes | Drama | Small/Combo Band | Moderate Vocals | Classic Broadway, Pop/Rock Zell Morrow and Sydney Lucas in Fun Home on Broadway, 2015 (Joan Marcus).

Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Adam Chanler-Berat and Philippa Soo in Amelie on Broadway, 2017 (Joan Marcus). Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Restrictions may apply to certain titles.

“A sparkling musical and an enchanting act of theatrical reinvention”

— The Los Angeles Times

From the beloved film comes this inspiring tale of Amélie, an imaginative young woman who lives quietly in the world, but loudly in her mind. She covertly improvises small, but surprising acts of kindness that bring joy and mayhem. But, when a chance at love comes her way Amelie realizes that to find happiness she’ll have to risk everything to say what’s in her heart.

AMÉLIE

book by Craig Lucas music by Daniel Messé lyrics by Nathan Tysen and Daniel Messé based on the motion picture by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Guillaume Laurant Apply for a license at samuelfrench.com.

Magically adapted for the stage by Craig Lucas, Amélie is a whimsical, modernday fairytale, featuring a sweeping, romantic score by Daniel Messé, and touching lyrics by Messé and Nathan Tysen.

7m, 5f, 1g | Full Length Musical Romantic Comedy Medium Orchestra | Moderate Vocals Contemporary Broadway

PITTSBURGH PUBLIC THEATER

Making Theatre More Accessible by Margie Romero

hen Katie Conaway was promoted to Director of Education and Outreach at Pittsburgh Public Theater in the fall of 2015, one of her first directives was to enhance the playgoing experience for patrons with vision or hearing impairments. As Katie began to research what is new in the field, she had a conversation with PPT’s resident sound designer and engineer, Zach Moore. Zach suggested that she check out the services of Sound Associates Inc., a New York-based company that supplies PPT with its Assisted Listening System. “When Katie first approached me about wanting to explore captioning and description options, I called Steve Harris at Sound Associates,” Zach said. “They have been creating theatre accessibility solutions for many

years, so I knew he would be able to help.” Katie was thrilled with what Sound Associates had to offer. She learned about their technology called I-Caption and D-Scriptive, which consists of a handheld device that presents the text of a play for audience members who are hearing-impaired, and also plays audio description through a single earbud for patrons who are visually-impaired. Unlike standard audio description, which requires a person to be watching the production, then reports the action live, or American Sign Language performances that need an interpreter in attendance, the Sound Associates devices are programmed in advance and therefore are available at numerous shows.

Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

“The reason this was so appealing was it would provide maximum flexibility for our patrons. That’s what true accessibility is all about,” Katie said. Once it was decided that PPT wanted to implement I-Caption and D-Scriptive, it was Katie’s task to figure out how to make it happen. “I knew it would have to be a team effort and require commitment from multiple departments at the theater,” she said. The cost of the project was around $30,000 for labor, training, and equipment (and for overhauled Assisted Listening devices). With the help of PPT’s development and production departments, Katie began budgeting and grant writing. The lion’s share of the funding

came from the Allegheny Regional Asset District (RAD), which leverages a sales tax in the Pittsburgh area to generously support local arts and amenities. “We are a more inclusive and welcoming community when everyone can participate in the outstanding art and cultural offerings in our region,” said RAD spokesperson Julie Goetz. “It’s clear to RAD that Pittsburgh Public Theater is dedicated to substantially advancing the cause of accessible theatre for everyone. We know this new technology is being combined with their excellent leadership and programming to attract people who might otherwise not have been able to attend.” Additional gifts from the FISA Foundation and the Pennsylvania Council for the Arts allowed the project to move forward. The next step was for Katie to spend a week in New York with Sound Associates staff members, learning how to get the technology up and running. While Pittsburgh Public Theater is the first regional company to use I-Caption and D-Scriptive, it is already available on Broadway and in Las Vegas. Katie was taken to the Minskoff Theatre to see a production of The Lion King so that she could better understand using the device from a patron’s perspective. When Pittsburgh Public Theater’s season started last fall, Katie began experimenting with how many times she needed to see a show in order to write cogent audio description. While blind patrons can follow the dialogue, crucial visual elements of the play’s action are communicated through D-Scriptive. “I work very hard not to speak over the actors,” Katie said. After seeing a production about four times, from the staff run-

through to opening night, Katie is ready to record. At this point the show’s timing is set so the descriptions will be accurate and correctly placed. Also recorded in a pre-show segment is information about set and costume design, and tips for navigating the theater.

during the second half of each run (about sixteen performances), more people at Pittsburgh Public Theater will be able to give these state-of-the-art gadgets a try. “It’s very exciting that we are able to offer our patrons the exact same technology they can find on Broadway,” Katie said.

“We are a more inclusive and welcoming community when everyone can participate in the outstanding art and cultural offerings in our region.”

With Pittsburgh Public Theater’s exciting 2017-2018 season just beginning, Katie is working to alert the appropriate communities that these services are now available, free of charge. She already knows that the existing patron base has benefited from the new technology: Three different couples have told her that it saved their subscriptions. And I-Caption and D-Scriptive have started to bring new people into the theater as well. According to PPT’s Producing Artistic Director, Ted Pappas, “We’re excited to open our doors to new audience members who may not have had the opportunity to enjoy our productions before.”

Katie records in the sound booth with Zach Moore, and the D-Scriptive technology interfaces with the sound and light boards. If for some reason a show goes off the rails, D-Scriptive resets according to light cues. For I-Caption, Katie is assisted by Shaun Hall, executive assistant to The Public’s leader Ted Pappas. Shaun’s first task is to load the script into PowerPoint. He then uses a software program provided by Sound Associates to connect PowerPoint with I-Caption. Once the timing of the show is established, its dialogue progresses in real-time across the handheld device’s screen. Zach notes that I-Caption can serve a variety of purposes. “Captioning can benefit audience members who have a hard time following conversations or understanding dialects, and of course those with declining hearing. Some people might not realize that this service can help them,” he said. Since I-Caption and D-Scriptive will be available at every show

Photo: Pittsburgh Public Theater’s I-Caption and D-Scriptive Team (left to right) Shaun Hall, Katie Conaway, and Zach Moore (Photo courtesy of Pittsburgh Public Theater).

This article originally appeared on Breaking Character Magazine in October, 2017.

RESOURCES Licensing Head to the product page of any play or musical on samuelfrench.com and begin the licensing process by clicking the Request License button. Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll do our best to respond to requests within 24 to 48 hours. Newer and popular titles may take longer as we work directly with authors and their agents to process the request. We recommend applying for rights at least four weeks in advance of your pre-production process or any internal deadlines you have for season planning. Applications can be accepted as early as 18 months in advance of your production dates (and the sooner you submit, the better). A play or musical may be unavailable or restricted due to a current first class production or a national tour. You may also be in a region in which rights are currently withheld. If youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re looking for recommendations, want more information about a specific title, or have questions about the licensing process, contact a member of our Licensing Team at 1-866-598-8449. Literary Amy Rose Marsh, Literary Director Professional Marketing David Kimple, Licensing Manager Nikki Przasnyski, Licensing Representative Theresa Posorske, Licensing Representative College Rebecca Schlossberg, Licensing Representative International Buddy Thomas, Director of International Licensing Hilary Asare, Licensing Representative

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TITLES 10 out of 12 — 33 26 Pebbles — 8 35mm — 91 3C — 28 Adding Machine: A Musical — 94 Adrift in Macao — 94 Advance Man: Part 1 of The Honeycomb Trilogy — 57 Akhnaton — 30 Albatross, 3rd & Main, The — 59 All the Fine Boys — 6 Amelia — 19 Amélie — 96-97 Among the Dead — 36 Anarchist, The — 7 Anne of Green Gables — 79 Antipodes, The — 14-15 Antlia Pneumatica — 22 Bandstand — 70-71 Baskerville: A Sherlock Holmes Mystery, Ken Ludwig’s — 65 Be A Good Little Widow — 60 Behavior of Broadus, The — 93 Bellwether — 59 Ben Hur — 43 Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, The — 82 Beyond the Pole — 7 Big Nate: The Musical — 81 Blacktop Sky — 5 Blast Radius: Part 2 of The Honeycomb Trilogy — 57 Blood at the Root — 46 Blood Play — 33 Bull in a China Shop — 9 Bunny — 6 Butter in a Lordly Dish — 31 Cagney the Musical — 8 Cake, The — 5 Calendar Girls — 46 Captain’s Tiger, The — 49 Cardboard Piano — 36 Cleopatra, Charles Busch’s — 34 Chess — 91 Chicago — 72 China Doll — 11 City of Conversation, The — 59 clarity — 55 Cleaners, The — 55

Collective Rage: A Play in Five Betties — 61 Colossal — 16 Comedy of Tenors, Ken Ludwig’s A — 65 Dames at Sea — 93 Daughter's A Daughter, A — 30 Dear Elizabeth — 33 Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World, The — 27 Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency — 45 Disassembly — 59 Diverting Devotion — 33 Dontrell Who Kissed the Sea — 53 Doris to Darlene — 36 Dot — 21 Dusty and the Big Bad World — 53 East of Berlin — 8 El Nogalar — 26 End of the Rainbow — 22 Enfrascada — 26 Erma Bombeck: At Wit's End — 21 Escaped Alone — 10 Everything You Touch — 36 Extraordinary Chambers — 45 Fade — 26 Falsettos — 72 Familiar — 33 Father Comes Home From the Wars (Parts 1, 2 & 3) — 41 Fiddler's Three — 31 Fish Eye — 27 Five Mile Lake — 9 Flick, The — 49 Fly By Night — 75 For Peter Pan on Her 70th Birthday — 47 Four of Us, The — 34 Fox on the Fairway, Ken Ludwig’s A — 65 Friend Art — 28 Frontières Sans Frontières — 11 Fuente — 53 Fugitive Songs — 75 Fun Home — 95 Future Thinking — 27 George Romero's Night of the Living Dead™ Live — 61

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Girlfriend — 74 Gnit — 53 Going to a Place Where You Already Are — 60 Gorilla Man — 88 Grand Concourse — 22 Grand Tour, The — 92 Grandpa and the Gay Rabbi — 55 Gulf, The — 42 Hands on a Hardbody — 79 Hannah and the Dread Gazebo — 22 Happy Ones, The — 49 Harriet Jacobs — 48 Harvest, The — 62 Hatmaker's Wife, The — 61 Healing, The — 19 Heathers the Musical — 88 Here We Go — 9 Homos, or Everyone in America — 19 House Rules — 41 How I Learned What I Learned, August Wilson’s — 21 How to Get Into Buildings — 22 How to Survive the Apocalypse — 11 How to Transcend a Happy Marriage — 37 I Used to Write On Walls — 60 Important Hats of the Twentieth Century — 22 Iowa — 75 Jacuzzi — 49 Jasper in Deadland — 75 Jerry's Girls — 92 Jitney, August Wilson’s — 40 John — 33 Judas Kiss, The — 54 Judge Jackie: Disorder in the Court — 82 Kingdom Come — 27 Kiss of the Spider Woman — 80 Kudzu: A Southern Musical — 80 La Cage Aux Folles — 92 Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill — 94 Layover, The — 62 Leader of the Pack: The Ellie Greenwich Musical — 88

Leading Ladies, Ken Ludwig’s — 65 Lend Me A Tenor, Ken Ludwig’s — 65 Life, A — 16 Lifetime Burning, A — 53 Light Years, The — 11 LMNOP — 10 Loot — 41 Love from a Stranger — 31 Love, NÖel — 79 Mack and Mabel — 92 Mala Hierba — 26 Mama’s Boy — 42 Man in Snow — 5 Marian, or the True Tale of Robin Hood — 7 Marie and Rosetta — 17 Marjorie Prime — 21 Mary Page Marlowe — 29 Masked — 54 Me and My Girl — 93 Monsoon Season — 55 Moon Over Buffalo, Ken Ludwig's — 65 Moors, The — 41 Most Deserving, The — 54 Muckrakers — 21 Mystery of Love and Sex, The — 28 Nat Turner in Jerusalem — 63 Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 — 84-85, 86-87 Native Son — 42 Nice Fish — 16 No More Sad Things — 36 Occupant, Edward Albee’s — 34 Old Neighborhood, The — 54 Oldest Boy: a play in three ceremonies, The — 46 On The Exhale — 11 On The Shore of the Wide World — 59 OOHRAH! — 60 Open House, The — 28 Pageant — 91 Patient, The — 31 Peerless — 45 Penitent, The — 9 Perfect Arrangement — 45 Personal Call — 31 Peter — 8 Picasso At the Lapin Agile — 44 Pipeline — 50-51

Play About My Dad, The — 41 Pluto — 59 Pocatello — 27 Poor Behavior — 62 Prayer for My Enemy — 62 Present Laughter, Noël Coward’s — 34 Pump Boys and Dinettes — 82 Radio Golf, August Wilson’s — 46 Raisin — 80 Rancho Viejo — 5 Rats, The — 31 Realistic Joneses, The — 49 Really Rosie — 72 Return to the Forbidden Planet — 88 Revolt. She said. Revolt again. — 36 ReWrite — 91 Rights of Passage — 10 Risen From the Dough — 55 Robin Hood!, Ken Ludwig’s — 66-67 Rock of Ages — 89 Rocky Horror Show, Richard O’Brien’s The — 90 Romance Novels for Dummies — 53 Roommate, The — 16 Royale, The — 42 Ruthless! — 81 Samsara — 19 Saving Jason — 6 Se Llama Cristina — 41 Secret Adversary, The — 6 Secret Garden, The — 93 Secret of Chimneys, The — 30 Seminar — 61 Seven Spots on the Sun — 9 Shakespeare in Love — 35 Shoot/Get Treasure/Repeat — 28 Side Show — 72 Sideways — 9 Significant Other — 52 Six Rounds of Vengeance — 46 Skeleton Crew — 32 Smart People — 48 Somewhere Fun — 54 Southern Comfort —83 Sovereign: Part 3 of The Honeycomb Trilogy — 57 Spitfire Grill, The — 81 Stage Kiss — 42 Stick Fly — 48

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Stranger, The — 31 Substance of Bliss, The — 28 Summerland — 19 Swimmers — 8 Taking Care of Baby — 42 Taking Charlie — 6 Tale of Two Cities, A Musical, A — 79 Tap Dance Kid, The — 81 Tess of the D’Urbervilles — 10 That Which Isn't — 6 This Is War — 10 This Much — 19 Three Sisters — 45 Three Years from “Thirty”— 34 Tinned Goods — 8 Tiny Beautiful Things — 20 Tiny Tim’s Christmas Carol — 65 Title and Deed — 49 To Die For — 7 Tomb of King Tot, The — 16 Tomorrow in the Battle — 7 Torch Song Trilogy — 58 Towards Zero — 31 Treasure Island, Ken Ludwig’s — 65 Trey Parker's Cannibal! The Musical — 82 Tuck Everlasting — 78 Ugly Lies the Bone — 62 Underpants, The — 44 Untold Yippie Project, The — 6 Vérité — 27 Vietgone — 62 View Upstairs, The — 73 Village Bike The — 54 Wakey, Wakey — 18 WASP — 44 Wasp’s Nest, The — 31 Waverly Gallery, The — 61 Wedding Bash — 55 Whenever — 80 Wiz, The — 94 Wolves, The — 23 Wonderful Tennessee — 46 Wonderland Wives — 34 Yellow Iris — 31 Yen — 16 You Got Older — 21

AUTHORS Adjmi, David — 28 Albee, Edward — 34 Alford, Larry — 92 Alley, Fred — 81 Almond, Todd — 74, 75 Almos, Carolyn — 93 Almos, Matt — 93 Alvarez, Sofia — 28 Anastasio, Trey — 79 Anderson, Christina — 5 Andersson, Benny — 91 Ayckbourn, Alan — 80 Baker, Annie — 14-15, 33, 49 Barlow, Patrick — 43 Barnhill, Paul — 7 Barron, Clare — 21 Barry, Kieron — 7 Beatts, Anne — 88 Beauregard, Jon — 93 Bechdel, Alison — 95 Benson, France-Luce — 55 Birch, Alice — 36 Blackwell, Charles — 81 Bock, Adam — 16 Bond, Christopher — 61 Bonds, Rachel — 8, 9 Bos, Hannah — 11, 33, 49 Boyer, Dale — 61 Bramble, Mark — 92 Brant, George — 17 Brittan, Robert — 80 Brown, William F. — 94 Brunstetter, Bekah — 5, 60 Burkell, Scott — 10 Busch, Charles — 34 Butler, Oliver — 11, 33, 49 Callaghan, Sheila — 36 Campbell, Elaine — 79 Campbell, Norman — 79 Carlton, Bob — 88 Cefaly, Audrey — 42 Christie, Agatha — 6, 30-31 Churchill, Caryl — 9, 10 Cilento, Wayne —92 Clark, Eliza — 27 Colley, Peter — 8 Collins, Dan — 83

Condon, Bill — 72 Connolly, Will — 75 Coward, Noel — 34, 79 Cram, Cusi — 53 Creighton, Robert — 8 D’Arienzo, Chris — 89 David, Arvind Ethan — 45 Davis, Julianne Wick — 83 Davis, Nathan Alan — 53, 63 Day, Barry — 79 Dayan, Albert — 93 Decker, Ed — 10 DeLappe, Sarah — 23 Diamond, Lydia R. — 48 Dimond, Christopher — 82 Dohrn, Zayd — 21 Domingo, Colman — 21 Doran, Bathsheba — 28 Dufault, Olivia — 16 Durang, Christopher — 94 Ebb, Fred — 72, 80 Eden, Simon David — 59 Engel, Allison — 21 Engel, Margaret — 21 Eno, Will — 18, 28, 49, 53 Evans, Albert — 91 Federle, Tim — 78 Ferrentino, Lindsey — 62 Fierstein, Harvey — 58, 92 Finn, William — 72 Firth, Tim — 46 Fitzpatrick, John — 19 Foley, John — 82 Fosse, Bob — 72 Foster, Hunter — 75 Freeman, Matthew — 6 Friel, Brian — 46 Fry, Stephen — 93 Fugard, Athol — 49 Furber, Douglas — 93 Gay, Noel — 93 Giardina, Anthony — 59 Glazer, Tony — 28 Goss, James — 45 Green, Amanda — 79 Greenwich, Ellie — 88 Gurira, Danai — 33

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Haimsohn, George — 93 Hall, Carol — 82 Hall, Jordan — 11 Hall, Lee — 35 Hansberry, Lorraine — 80 Hardwick, Mark — 82 Hare, David — 54 Hari, Johann — 6 Harmon, Joshua — 52 Harnetiaux, Trish — 22 Harrison, Christopher — 61 Harrison, Jordan — 21, 36 Harron, Donald — 79 Hatsor, Ilan — 54 Headland, Leslye — 62 Heifner, Jack — 88 Herman, Jerry — 92 Herrick, Jack — 80 Hinderaker, Andrew — 16 Hobson, Charlotte — 45 Horovitz, Israel — 5 Howze, Phillip — 11 Hunter, Samuel D. — 19, 27, 62 Iconis, Joe — 91 Jarrow, Kyle — 88 Jenkins, Louis — 16 Jones, Arlitia — 19 Jones, Nick — 22, 27 Jordan, Anna — 16 Josephson, Jonathan — 55 Joy, Lindsay — 55 Jung, Hansol — 36 Kander, John — 72, 80 Kavner, Lucas — 27 Kelley, Nambi E. — 42 Kelly, Dennis — 42 Kelly, Frank — 91 Killebrew, Boo — 41, 53 King, Carole — 72 King, Denis — 80 King, Larry L. — 82 Kooman, Michael — 82 Kraft, Lindsey — 55 Kreidler, Todd — 21 Krieger, Henry — 72, 81 Kron, Lisa — 95 Laird, Marvin — 81

Lapine, James — 72 Leeds, Andrew — 55 LeFranc, Dan — 5 Leone, Robert — 10 Letts, Tracy — 29, 45 Loesel, Paul — 10 Loewith, Jason — 81, 94 Lonergan, Kenneth — 61 Longbottom, Robert — 91 Lorick, Robert — 81 Loveless, Alex — 10 Lucas, Craig — 62, 96-97 Ludwig, Ken — 64-65, 66-67 Malloy, Dave — 84-85 Mamet, David — 7, 9, 11, 54 Marlette, Doug — 80 Martin, Steve — 44 Martin, Trevor — 61 Masterson, Peter — 82 McGovern, Christopher — 8 McNally, Terrence — 80 Melnick, Peter — 94 Messé, Daniel — 96-97 Millburn, Brendan — 93 Miller, Chris — 75,76-77, 78 Miller, Robin — 93 Mintz, Melanie — 88 Mitnick, Michael — 75 Monk, Debra — 82 Montgomery, L.M. — 79 Moore, Mavor — 79 Morgan, Cass — 82 Morisseau, Dominique — 32, 46, 50-51 Moscovitch, Hannah — 6, 8, 10 Moses, Itamar — 34 Murphy, Kevin — 88 Murphy, Matthew — 91 Myatt, Julie Marie — 49 Nelson, Richard — 91 Nemiroff, Robert — 80 Nguyen, Qui — 46, 62 Norman, Marc — 35 Norman, Marsha — 93 O’Brien, Richard — 90 Ockrent, Mike — 93 Oberacker, Richard — 70-71 O’Keefe, Laurence — 88 Oliver, Ryan Scott — 75, 91 O’Malley, Mike — 33, 34

Orton, Joe — 41 Paley, Joel — 81 Pamatmat, A. Rey — 41 Park, Jiehae — 22, 45 Parker, Trey — 82 Parks, Suzan-Lori — 27, 41 Pattison, Phil — 61 Payne, Topher — 45 Peirce, Lincoln — 81 Pickett, Rex — 9 Poirot, Jean — 92 Posner, Dassia — 45 Prince, Harold — 80 Punshon, Sarah — 6 Quilter, Peter — 6, 22 Ramirez, Marco — 42 Ravenhill, Mark — 28 Rebeck, Theresa — 61, 62 Rice, Elmer — 94 Rice, Tim — 91 Robertson, Lanie — 94 Rogers, Mac — 56-57, 57 Rose, L. Arthur — 93 Rosenstock, Kim — 75 Ruhl, Sarah — 33, 37, 38-39, 42, 46, 47 Russell, Bill — 72, 91 Rylance, Mark — 16 Santoriello, Jill — 79 Saracho, Tanya — 24-26, 26 Schimmel, John — 82 Schlossberg, Becca — 7 Schmidt, Erica — 6 Schmidt, Joshua — 94 Schreck, Heidi — 53 Schwartz, Jenny — 54, 75 Seavey, Jordan — 19 Sendak, Maurice — 72 Shear, Claudia — 78 Silverman, Jen — 16, 41, 61 Simon, Lucy — 93 Simpson, Bland — 80 Skinner, Penelope — 54 Smalls, Charlie — 94 Smith, Caroline — 7 Sobieski, Stacy — 8 Solis, Octavio — 41 Spigelglass, Leonard — 92 Stephens, Simon — 59 Sternheim, Carl — 35

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Stewart, Michael — 92, 92 Stoppard, Tom — 35 Sweet, Matthew — 74 Szymkowicz, Adam — 7 Taub, Michael — 54 Taylor, Robert — 70-71 Tesori, Jeanine — 95 Thomas, Buddy — 34 Thompson, David — 72 Thureen, Paul — 11, 33, 49 Trieschmann, Catherine — 54 Turner, Bryna — 9 Tuttle, Korde Arrington — 55 Tysen, Nathan — 75, 76-77, 78, 96-97 Ulloa, Eric — 8 Ulvaeus, Björn — 91 Urbinati, Rob — 42 Valcq, James — 81 Vardalos, Nia — 20 Verner, Gerald — 30 Vernon, Max — 73 Vieh, Lizzie — 55 Vosper, Frank — 30 Wann, Jim — 82 Warhurst, Neil — 6, 7 Washburn, Anne — 22, 33 Waters, Daniel — 88 Webb, Alex — 19 Wiener, David — 45 Weiner, Jenny Rachel — 27 Whitelaw, Fiona — 8 Wilson, August — 21, 40, 46 Wise, Jim — 93 Woldin, Judd — 80 Wright, Doug — 79 Yee, Lauren — 19, 61 Yockey, Steve — 59 Youstra, Christopher — 81 Zaltzberg, Charlotte — 80 Zimmerman, Martín — 9, 11 Zlotoff, Lee David — 81

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Journal of Plays and Musicals | Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Literary and Editorial Amy Rose Marsh Literary Director Garrett Anderson Literary Associate Marketing Ryan Pointer Marketing Director Courtney Kochuba Marketing Manager, Social Media and Community Chris Kam Marketing Manager, Media and Promotions Coryn Carson Marketing Associate, Products Lawrence Haynes Marketing Associate, Musicals Christian Amato Digital Products Manager Music and Publications David Geer Music and Publications Manager Nicole Matte Publications Associate Zachary Orts Music Supervisor John Atorino Music Associate

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Operations Casey McLain Director of Operations Tyler Mullen Systems Manager Elizabeth Minski Office Administrator Alejandra Venancio Office Administrator Samuel French Bookshop (L.A.) Joyce Mehess Bookstore Manager Cory DeLair Assistant Manager/Book Buyer Kristen Springer Floor Supervisor/Order Manager Trevor Reece Bookstore Associate Brittny Roberts Events Coordinator Adam Steinbrenner Bookstore Associate Alfred Contreras Shipping Manager

SAMUEL FRENCH Samuel French is the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s leading publisher and licensor of plays and musicals. The companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s catalog features some of the most acclaimed work ever written for the stage and titles by writers at the forefront of contemporary drama. Samuel French is proud to serve as a leader in theatrical publishing and licensing, and is committed to the future by championing playwrights, innovating the industry, and celebrating all those who make theatre happen around the world.

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PLAN YOUR SEASON Discover new titles, popular plays and musicals, and some hidden gems in this collection of Samuel French titles.