A middle-school teacher is in a war zone between two students when both their reports turn out to be about the Layson Albatross. Does she side with Davy whose report says that Layson couples raising their chicks are sometimes both female? Or does she come to Beth's defense when Beth wants to silence Davy's report as "fake news."
Three 20-minute comedies in one act. Wilford, from New York, has just bought and moved to a new homestead in Vermont, but he realizes that his new neighbors may not be from this planet! Mila, her son Klig, and husband Kulerie Klee, live on a farm next to Wilford’s and their adjoining farms are separated only by a stone wall which is beginning to fall apart. What to do? Knock it down? Build it back? – and what are they walling in and walling out? Can be performed by high school, college, university students or groups.
Cell, a 10-minute comedy for 4 actors, takes us inside connecting and disconnecting calls among 4 different cell phone users. Each looking for answers to the central problems in their lives with hilarious results.
Who hasn’t struggled with expanding technology? In these three 10-minute comedies, cell phones disrupt lives to uncover a serial philander, a GPS unit miraculously provides comfort to a widower, and Everyman seeks, in vain, a Representative!
A man commits triple murder and his lawyer is stricken with guilt at the realization that “success” means his client will get three meals a day and cable TV for the rest of his life.
The set of this one-act comedy for four actors is Jane's bathtub. She finds it inhabited by a strange, Shakespearean woman whose enigmatic commentary intrudes on Jane's thoughts and her new romantic relationship. This dark comedy is about the long-term consequences of childhood abuse and a love letter to those who have suffered. There is always hope.
A 3-character poem-play that reveals the first ten years of the life of an abused child struggling on the cusp of mental illness and successfully hiding it from his dysfunctional family.
In this 10-Minute original farce, a free-thinking retired woman, Sylvia, discovers that her deceased husband has been reincarnated as her dog. A surreal and hilarious Fantasy/Comedy by Pamela Steadman. Acting script.
This 10-minute poetic play dramatizes a mother's attempt to reach inside the autistic mind of her young son. Characters include Jonah, the boy, his mother, Jonah's mind. The play is a great change of pace in an evening of short plays and as an introduction to discussion groups and classes in social work and mental health settings.
"Legacy of a Father" is a collection of seven dramatic and comedy one-act plays inspired by real one-on-one, personal interviews conducted by the playwright, Monique Franz. The series addresses a fatherless theme and deals with absentee fathers and the absence of what a father traditionally provides.
Adrienne Earle Pender gives us the influential and momentous "N" play, that dramatizes the struggle between playwright Eugene O’Neill and actor Charles Sidney Gilpin over the inclusion of the "N" word in the script for O’Neill’s first box office hit, The Emperor Jones. in 1920. The play was turned into a film "The Black Emperor of Broadway" , screened in 2020 to great acclaim.
Playroom is a series of comedies created by the author as a way to explore the short play and "one act" format, one setting (and one evening) at a time. An otherwise ordinary family, the characters of Hinton’s Playroom are thrust into extraordinary, supernatural, and preternatural circumstances.
A 45-minute introduction to various works of The Bard. Written to be performed by 2 or 4 actors within a single class period. ideal for ages 8 - 12. Includes excerpts from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hamlet, As You Like It, and one of the sonnets: number 18. Printable PDF available
“Rich’s Well-Made”, set in the bathroom, is the second installment in the Playroom series. At its heart, Playroom is a series about exploring the hidden value of everyday spaces, as well as connecting (and reconnecting) with loved ones. Playroom is a theatrical experiment that examines the relationships of the nuclear family against the backdrops of a seemingly normal home.
In Ten After Ten, Jack J. Berry uses unique settings to highlight current problems and issues. These short comedies can be performed as a single evening or used separately as part of a larger presentation to underscore a point. Excellent for classroom, church, or senior facility.
A man is about to board a mysterious train when he is stopped because of the size of his luggage. What is in his trunk that he is so reluctant to part with? And where is the train going? In this 15-minute play, L. Elizabeth Powers bears witness to the fact that it's never too late to take a different path.
