Busybody
20 minutes, 2f, 1m.
Laura Jane Coles threatens Heidi Wolff.
Part of a series of short plays on the subject of torture, this play follows Missy, a busybody on a US Army base. When a recruit dies during a training drill, she pries into her neighbors’ affairs with shattering results.
Published by Original Works publishing, this play was produced in San Francisco at Bay One Acts in 2008 and by Love Creek Productions, New York City, in 2009.
“A disturbing slice of life . . . a chilling little tale designed for maximum emotional discomfort.” – Pat Craig, Contra Costa Times. Find it on Amazon.
Though They May Be Parted
20 minutes. 3f.
This dark comedy about three grown siblings who clash at a funeral home during a viewing of their deceased mother’s body was produced at Woman’s Will Playfest 2.0 in 2010 and at Broadway West Theatre, Fremont, CA, in 2009.
Stonehenge
10 minutes. 2f, 1m.
This ten-minute play is published by Smith and Kraus in their 2014 Best Ten-Minute Plays, and was presented at City Lights Theatre and the Women’s Theatre Project. Two women and a man in a bar, on a mission. Download it on the New Play Exchange.
In the Silence of Tangerine Groves
50 minutes, 2f, 2m.
Win is a perfume marketer who works hard and plays on the edge. Will an unexpected vacation chill her out, or drive her crazy? Produced by Pacifica Spindrift Players, 2008. This play was a finalist for the Estrogenius Festival, New York, 2009. It received a reading at the 2012 SF Olympians Festival, along with a rave review for its”smartly written” script by George Heymont.
Meltdown
10 minutes. 1m, 1f.
JamieLee Roberts and Cory Tallman.
Will she stay . . . or will she head out to join NASA? An amateur astronomer faces an existential crisis when she learns of a supernova that was discovered by an eleven-year old girl in upstate New York. The idea of a dying star that doesn’t quite self-destruct makes a sweet metaphor
for this couple’s relationship meltdown. Based on a true story.
The play was produced at the San Francisco Exploratorium and in the SF Theater Festival in 2010, and in Sheherezade at the Phoenix Theatre in 2009. Another version of the play, “Slightly Crack’d,” was produced by the Paw Paw Players in Michigan in 2010.
Read more about “Meltdown” here.
That’s the Way the Cookie Crumbles
10 minutes. 1f, 1m.
Amy has just been released from a psychiatric unit, and Bud wants to know what she did all day. Her answer leaves Bud with a question too frightening to contemplate. Produced at the Dragonfly Theater in Boston, 2007, and by Flush Ink Productions, Kitchener, Ontario, Canada in 2011.
Red Rover, Red Rover, Send Rocky Right Over
10 minutes. 1f, 2m.
From the Lakeshore Players 10-Min Play Festival
Rocky is a NASA scientist who built the Mars Rover. The Rover has landed on Mars and refuses to leave the mothership, because its hazard detector tells it the planet isn’t safe. Rocky is intervened on by a blonde astrophysicist from his past who convinces him to turn off the Rover’s — and his own — hazard detector, to see what happens. It premiered at Sheherezade in San Francisco in 2006, and at the Lakeshore Players in White Bear Lake, Minnesota that same year.
Her Own Devices
10 minutes. 4w, 4m.
A fun satire set at Evil Knevel High School in Bug Tussle, Texas. Darling daughters and their adoring daddies gather to take a purity oath. Then a guest speaker steps up with practical advice on how to stay pure for that one special maverick: get yourself a vibrator, a gun, and a big padlock for your bedroom door. The Woman in Black mesmerizes the crowd with her preaching style and ends up rescuing little Debbie Coombs from the clutches of her stepdaddy. A feminist Western with a lot of laughs. Produced in San Francisco, 2008.
Middle of the Road
10 minutes, 1m, 1f
A woman flees her broken-down car, strewing clothing from an unlatched suitcase all over the highway. A gallant ex-boyfriend comes to her rescue. What is he doing, there, on the side of the 880 freeway? A humorous tale that turns serious. Produced by Pianofight, San Francisco, 2010.
A Disturbance in the Farce
10 minutes. 2f, 3m.
Three men lose their pants in ten minutes in this French farce gone amok. Modern day terrorism and immigration worries invade a usually-fluffy genre. Produced by PianoFight in 2009, and by Sheherezade 2006, both in San Francisco.
Fine Line
10 minutes, 2m, 1f
Rob Dario gets Alan Quismorio in a headlock.
Two enlisted men at Abu Ghraib discover their torture has gone too far in this play — one of several written in response to US torture. A grim, black comedy that was produced at the 2006 SF Fringe Festival and in an evening of short plays called “Something about Death,” in 2007, also in San Francisco.