Angel, a gay gold digger sets his sights on a newly out and proud billionaire. Dragging his best friend along for the ride and leaving collateral damage in his wake, Angel's plans hit a wall when the billionaire's best friend, Chi Chi, steps in and takes over. Vengeful ex-wives, imaginary lover, closeted twin brothers: Angel will crawl over all of them for the prized wedding ring.
"BIG SCARY ANIMALS sets its sights on the idea that we don't know how to talk about our differences, tackling it with intelligence and humor. Lyle makes his point that words do matter and we should pay more attention to them; but he also effectively satirizes how overly sensitive we can be. … it provides something sorely needed: Laughter. Lots of it. As he's proven time and time again, Lyle has impeccable timing with a punchline or comic situation." Mark Lowry, TheatreJones "Lyle toys with your expectations and loyalties and forces the audience to see The Other in a sympathetic (or critical) light, and does so through one of the densest string of laugh-out-loud comedies you'll ever see. …this smart, 85-minute comedy created a sense of community that is, at its heart, the goal of all theater." Arnold Wayne Jones, Dallas Voice "The show has a handful of serious moments, but the most thoughtful among these is the concept that no matter how different people think they are, from food to decorating to political and religious opinions, there is common ground and it may be found in the place where we laugh together." Nancy Churnin, Dallas Morning News "…genuinely, undeniably, wonderfully funny…character-based, infinitely empathetic comedy." Christopher Soden, Sharp Critic
"In Feydeau's work, all misunderstandings and slamming doors, THE LOSER is a moment of pure hysteria, a kind of quintessence of the author's work. In a sort of comic pendant to Zola's Nana, Feydeau puts on stage characters guided only by the power of their desires, the will to possess someone else, the exclusive passion for pleasure. In such a society however the places are limited, the combinations difficult. On stage this provides a game of musical chairs that is perfectly hilarious. Those who are not at first motivated by the follies of love end up joining the dance. It all provides a cavalcade which explodes into craziness and hilarious situations. However, there is also in THE LOSER a panic force, an urge to go to extremes which encourages certain dark views of the tragic dimension of the human condition." Dans la bibliothèque de Clèanthe "George Feydeau created THE LOSER in 1896 with codes appropriate to a now remote era. Arranged marriages often brought men and women together while leaving each the opportunity to let his or her heart take an interest somewhere else. Being caught in the act in the presence of the police was the rule when one or another of the parties wished to put an end to a less truly satisfying union. In THE LOSER the dialogue is studded with double meanings and cleverly placed stings. This awareness of conventions works marvelously when it is recreated in the 2lst century." Stanislas Claude, Publik Art
"Exceedingly funny…poignant and closely observed… These Saint Louis-based flight attendants are very much products of the new airline realities… They are 50-ish veterans hoping to stay healthy and stave off the latest round of layoffs with their early retirement packages that get crummier with every offering. They stay in a lousy motel, the kind of place where the cable could not be more basic, you don't want to touch the remote control with your bare hands and you have to go down to the desk to get your pillows. And they don't find travel even remotely glamorous, not when there's a kid at home alone and an overly solicitous T S A officer at every airport. These are women dealing with the daily grind through the hubs of life; there are themes in this play to which every road warrior, of the nonexecutive platinum sort, will relate. Which is not to say they don't have a little fun… If you want to get all meta (and why not?), you might say that Wegrzyn is taking the idea of the stewardess on a layover, long a staple of the bedroom farce, and throwing her into a totally different kind of hotel with a totally different, and barely legal, potential lover and fellow adventurer. That theme gives this happily unpredictable 90-minute play a real patina of sadness, a sense of how a once-glamorous profession has been reduced to the quotidian by changing mores and corporate budget-cutters…there's no funnier show in Chicago." Chris Jones, The Chicago Tribune "There was a time when air travel was considered glamorous, but then, there was a time when baseball fans wore suits and hats to Wrigley Field (the past truly is a foreign country). The three veteran flight attendants at the center of Marisa Wegrzyn's MUD BLUE SKY…bear little resemblance to the Pan Am stewardesses of the old days, with their fashionable uniforms and youthful air of freedom and adventure. Wegrzyn's characters are lower-middle-class grunts at the mercy of cash-strapped airlines and rude passengers who leave unspeakable messes in the lavatory. Whereas the job may have once provided fresh opportunities for women-as long as they fit a certain mold-this play's trio seem convinced they're headed nowhere… Wegrzyn deftly blends comedy and despair as the characters attempt to cut loose-pot, porn, and cognac are involved-and forget that each of them is staring down a future that's either uncertain, uninspiring, or both… The play is a funny and forgiving argument in favor of making human connections, however brief or tenuous." Zac Thompson, Chicago Reader
"There's an arresting metaphor at the heart of HICKORYDICKORY, one that Wegrzyn makes literal in her foray into magical realism: Each of us is outfitted with a 'mortal clock' that counts down the seconds until we're fated to die… In most of us they're situated in our chests, the chain wrapped tightly around our beating hearts. For an unfortunate few, however, the mortal clock is lodged in the head; these poor souls know exactly how long they have left and can hear every second tick away… Wegrzyn raises powerful themes here of mortality, responsibility and parental sacrifice. 'When you know' how long you have left, says the fiery Cari Lee, 'you don't tell the people you love' … HICKORYDICKORY's heartrending climax ought to stop your own clock for at least a few seconds." Kris Vire, Time Out Chicago "[Wegrzyn] is a quirky, gently anarchic and refreshingly populist writer unafraid of seemingly outlandish conceits, dark humor and broad theatricality… Most conceptual plays like this…tend to collapse in on themselves, eventually overrun by the logical implications of being able to know and shift time. But remarkably, Wegrzyn has created an internal logic that is difficult to defeat, however much a critic might try… Better yet, HICKORYDICKORY does not get trapped in some kind of trippy sci-fi gestalt…but remains human, sweet, compassionate and honest." Chris Jones, The Chicago Tribune
JONAH is a rumination on the story of the man and the sea. Jonah's a man on the run. He hops a Greyhound to Joppa and then grabs a cabin on the ocean-bound Carnival Princess. Drinking away his sorrows at the ship's Grass Skirt Grill, the lounge band Sheila and the Lovetones plays him into a stupor before he tumbles into the waves. Len Jenkin's JONAH is a contemporary retelling of the unfaithful servant; some love stories about the evil city of Ninevah, a Dairy Queen, and of course, the whale. "Best New Play: …incredible results…Jenkin's JONAH… The frenzied take on the Biblical beach tale featured kaleidoscopic characters and heartwarming stories interwoven in a way that was meaningful, intellectual and fun-a…hat trick." Dallas Observer
"Entertainment guaranteed!"Los Angeles Times "Matthew Lombardo's riveting new play is as funny as it gets in theatre! …A seductive, funny and frequently moving piece."The Hollywood Reporter "Howlingly funny! …Fun, touching and exceedingly funny!A must see!Pasadena Star News "Hilarious!"L A Weekly "This play is a masterpiece!"Santa Monica Press "Scores of zingers, one-liners, retorts and anecdotes leaves the audience roaring so loud the actors often struggle to be heard!"Daily Variety "A+… Matthew Lombardo's brilliant script crackles with a number of zingy one-liners! His screamingly funny play will have you rolling in the aisles"!Palm Beach Post "A raucous comedy! Lombardo has penned a hysterically funny script with serious undertones that features a cascade of PG-rated zingers, R-rated retorts and X-rated anecdotes."Sun Sentinel "Fours stars! …A terrific play! The biting wit is bawdy and hysterical! May LOOPED live on and on. I'll drink to that."The Washingtonian "Pure theatrical magic! Scathingly funny! Deliciously inappropriate. Sometimes, the saying goes, you have to laugh to keep from crying. Try to fight either as hard as you can. You will end up doing both."The Washington Times
"Matthew Lombardo's smartly tangled drama is harrowing, highly amusing and a pleasure!" The New York Times "Theatrically exciting! …Entertaining with lively dialogue, powerful exchanges and authentic performances! …Nuns have been portrayed as righteous and wrathful but few so fiercely as Lombardo's lioness of a sister!" Daily Variety "An electrifying experience! …HIGH is profoundly shattering and emotionally devastating! Lombardo's writing gets better, stronger and more human each and every time! …HIGH deserves a long and vital life!" Rex Reed, New York Observer "Matthew Lombardo's play offers an engrossing evening of theater! His writing saves the nonbeliever from discomfort by making his case in a framework of sincerity and passion, treading in the footsteps of Shaw's SAINT JOAN. And, as long as we venture into comparative literature, there is a case to be made for saying HIGH is EQUUS on crack cocaine." San Francisco Examiner "HIGH suggests no easy or comforting answers. Its characters may suffer, but the searing play suffers from nothing!" Philadelphia Inquirer
A theater professor is suspected in the murder of one of his students, with whom he was having an affair.
RUNDOWN is the story of Pay, a Vietnam veteran, who is involved in a civilian massacre, and his best friend, Spear, a radical antiwar activist, whose activities lead to the death of two American soldiers. "… He leaps out with a fresh vision, rich use of language and poetic imagery, a clear understanding of the vein of violence that runs beneath the top-soil of civilization. In all this, he's often compared to early Sam Shepard, and correctly so. RUNDOWN is one of the best Vietnam era plays yet written." Bernard Weiner, San Francisco Chronicle "RUNDOWN is not just another painful epic about yet another battered Vietnam vet returned from the wars. It is a probing theatrical invention that pits emotional and intellectual recall against the spectrum of forces without and within us that channel and forge our lives…. …What ranks this piece above the commonplace is its impressionistic style, arresting metaphors and vivid imagery. The vigorous writing speaks in human terms. The poetic drama remembers to create characters of flesh and blood while discussing ideas." Sylvie Drake, Los Angeles Times
This collection includes 34 one acts and monologues by notable American women playwrights. 67201 by Adele Edling Shank: Love and fantasy in the afternoon. THE BEST OF STRANGERS by Lee Hunkins: Two women sharing a hospital room cope with breast cancer, husbands, and racial barriers. BOARDERS by Constance Congdon: Three short plays about apartment dwellers, with an epilogue by their landlady. BREAKFAST SERIAL by Megan Terry: A child abuser meets his match. BRUSSELS SPROUTS by Janet Neipris: Former lovers meet under very different circumstances the second time around. THE CORD AND THE TRACK by Helen Duberstein: Two older men discuss younger women. CURTAIN CALL by Roma Greth: An actress balances on an emotional tightrope strung between approaching retirement and a fading career. THE DEATH OF HUEY NEWTON by Lynda Sturner: A couple reflect on the twists and turns their lives have taken since their 1960s glory days. DRY SMOKE by Adele Edling Shank: The story behind a fatal fire. FOOD by Neena Beber: Two women are starving for something, anything, that might provide fulfillment. THE GHOST STORY by Lenore Bensinger: The title hints at half of it; the other half involves a psychic advisor, a couple of children, a golden retriever, double fudge brownies, and the C.I.A. HAITI (A DREAM) by Karen Sunde: The plight of a Haitian family aboard a rickety boat seeking their dream of America. HALFWAY by Roma Greth: There is a question as to who is the inmate and who is the attendant in this halfway house for mental patients. HELEN MELON AT THE SIDESHOW by Katy Dierlam: The carnival "Fat Lady" delivers a monologue. IN THE BEGINNING by Rebecca Ritchie: Lilith shares with Eve a few eye-opening tidbits about Adam. JIM'S COMMUTER AIRLINES by Lavonne Mueller: Two pilots undergo trauma when one's mother decides to fly incognito on the rickety airline he owns. LIFE GAP by Y York: A story about a very poor family and the do-gooder who wants to help them. METAMORPHOSES by June Siegel: Life changes experienced by three women. THE NIP AND THE BITE by Judy GeBauer: A brief, explosive story of American violence on Mexican soil. OCEAN DREAM by Nancy Rhodes: A young woman recovers her childhood during an afternoon on the beach. ORIGAMI TEARS by D Lee Miller: The love/hate relationship of an older married couple coming to terms with the husband's death. PANICKED by Sally Ordway: A performance artist's witty examination of life turns into a howl of help to alien beings. A PERMANENT SIGNAL by Sherry Kramer: The famous Siren sisters step down from the heavens to harvest the sweetness they planted eons before. The crop is not what they expected. A PLACE WHERE LOVE IS by Sally Dixon Wiener: A terminally ill father and his daughters struggle to understand one another. POOF! By Lynn Nottage: The laws of the universe tumble when a meek woman finally speaks up. REPAIRS by Susan Miller: Finishing a basement is either a neurotic retreat from reality or a way of patching up the cracks. THE SLEEP SEEKER by Staci Swedeen: A woman struggles with unbearable memories. SPRINGTIME by María Irene Fornés: The eternal story of love and betrayal. STEPPING OFF A CLOUD by Christina Cocek: A comedy about getting it together. TRIPS by Sally Ordway: Two women pass their time on the porch of a retirement home by counting passing cars. WATCHING THE DOG by Sybille Pearson: A play within a play set in a veterinarian's office. WATER PLAY by Sally Nemeth: The rain will not stop. Rising seas reclaim the land. In a loft barely above the water line, scientist Evangeline tracks the deluge. WELL DONE POETS by Laura Quinn: A math major, a biology major, and an economics major explore feminist poetry with the help of several pitchers of beer. WORKOUT by Wendy Wasserstein: A running commentary on, to, and about a woman's life and her exercise routine.
"The murdered Algerian in Albert Camus's The Stranger isn't even worthy of a name. We know the killer is a Frenchman who goes by Meursault, but the victim is anonymous. Now THE STRANGEST, by Betty Shamieh (ROAR, FIT FOR A QUEEN), reframes the point of view once again: from a criminal Frenchman to an Algerian woman, from the colonizer to the colonized. Umm belongs to a storytelling family, and she attempts to join their traditionally male ranks by turning her drama into a suspenseful riddle. A mix of Arabic storytelling flourishes and Ionesco-like absurdum!" The New York Times "Shamieh structured THE STRANGEST as a murder mystery where one of three brothers will be shot in the end. In the play, Abu, the father of the young man who is shot, was known as a powerful storyteller. Nevertheless, the most powerful voice is Umm, Abu's wife. Reminiscent of commedia del arte…the play not only mitigates the colonial deletion of native voices in Camus's novel, but also challenges the general silencing of women." Arab Stages "THE STRANGEST, suggested by the classic novel, turns the tale inside out, exploring the mysterious murder through the device of a traditional Arab storytelling café in which the audience is immersed." New York Magazine
NO PLACE TO BE SOMEBODY received the 1970 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Charles Gordone's Pulitzer signified two "firsts": he was the first African American playwright to receive a Pulitzer, and NO PLACE TO BE SOMEBODY was the first off-Broadway play to receive the award. "Charles Gordone's NO PLACE TO BE SOMEBODY…seemed to grow in theatrically, raw energy, power and stature…. The denizens of Johnny's bar, like those of Harry Hope's saloon in THE ICEMAN COMETH, are waiting for a fulfillment of their dreams, which are illusions, and in some cases delusions…. …Its humor is full of bile. On one level this was an extraordinarily funny play and it now seems even funnier in the most malicious way…. …NO PLACE TO BE SOMEBODY is a drama of great force and commitment, one that must be seen-wherever it is playing. If nothing else-and there is much else-Gordone has a marvelous talent for dialogue, for bitter epithets and insults; for confrontations (each one a striking set piece); for small details that reveal character…and for creating whole and vivid characters."Mel Gussow, The New York Times
"In a world where immigrants are often seen as monolithic others, this play, written by an immigrant, opens a window on their challenges and struggles …El Guindi's script is spirited, profane, hilarious and pointed; line after line leaves its mark." Amy Wang, The Oregonian/ OregonLive.com "Innovative, darkly funny work… In his plays, El Guindi tends to explore the experiences of immigrants and people of color, and the complex, troubling racial dynamics that can play out in the most seemingly progressive places… The dialogue is quippy, sharp-edged, and so full of subtly disappointed pronouncements that much of it wouldn't be out of place in a Wes Anderson movie… What's especially powerful about THE TALENTED ONES is that it deviates from many "good immigrant" narratives that reduce immigrant characters-whether real or imagined-to blandly virtuous caricatures… El Guindi's risky, weird comedy is enough to keep you in your seat." Megan Burbank, The Portland Mercury "The new play is just offbeat enough to be unexpectedly funny and bizarre…THE TALENTED ONES' worldview still manages to be kind of beautiful-knife wounds and all." Shannon Gormley, Willamette Week "There is comedy-side-splitting and dark. It's a haunting play because the truths are so real and the action so raw… A play that should have no problems finding its way into theaters across the country." Judy Nerdy, Judy Nerdy Play Reviews
from Interview, August 1987 by Kevin Sessums: "There's a creature known in the South as a feist dog. Little. Scraggly. High-strung. You know where one lives by a backyard full of barks. The thing'll take on a German shepard-shit, the whole German army-if it thinks its territory is being threatened. But it likes kids too. And it likes the feel of a hand on its underbelly. Playwright and screenwriter Alan Bowne, whose work concerns the scraggly underbelly of life itself, has the friendly tenacity of one of those tight-tailed mutts… Bowne didn't start writing until he was 35. Before that? 'I bummed around. Drug dealer. Movie extra. Junkie…' …he begins to growl away at a number of subjects. …Love: 'Living without love is death itself. If you have love in your life-the true thing-then you've got everything.'"And that is what Alan Bowne's great plays-BEIRUT, SHARON AND BILLY-are about. COCAINE & UNDERPANTS tells the story of a small-time drug dealer and his girlfriend, who turns tricks to get by. A man visits them to extract retribution for a little mistake they made…
Subtitled "A Documentary Fantasy Musical About Life in Prison", BABES IN THE BIG HOUSE explores feminism, sexuality, and the degradation of women. "BABES IN THE BIGHOUSE is a wildly varying production, with situations so funny they're sad, so tragic they're hilarious. The characters are acid-strong."Steve Jordan, Omaha World-Herald "BABES is a funny, shocking, affecting piece of theater. Ms Terry's jazz-like verbal constructions were absolutely great."Maggie Hawthorn, Seattle Post-Intelligencer "Megan Terry, like Kafka did in The Trial, uses razor-honed, sardonic gallows humor to coax empathy and understanding-so her theme-the dehumanization of incarcerated people aided and abetted by sexist stereotyping and sadism-comes across with even greater power and urgency."Victor Livingston, Philadelphia Evening Bulletin
"If an existentialist philosopher attempted a light romantic comedy, it would sound a little like LAUGH IT UP, STARE IT DOWN..."The New York Times "Engaging, entertaining, and existentially satisfying and well worth the visit to the iconic Cherry Lane Theatre."CEO Express "...Those aware of theatre's ability to act as a mirror will not only be entertained, but will also be left empowered."Stage Buddy "Part absurdist comedy, part a musing on fate."Huffington Post, Stage Door "LAUGH IT UP, STARE IT DOWN rests squarely in the modern absurdist tradition..." TheaterMania
A story that focuses on life, death, and choice, draws together the lives of five seemingly disparate characters: A hard-driving businessman struggling to raise his grandson. A paroled convict hoping to find redemption. A shy college professor trying to win the approval of his students. A middle-aged office manager pressured to hide her secrets. And a haunted young man hungry for revenge. As their stories unfold in plots both tragic and comic, these desperate souls find themselves intertwined in each other's battles and dreams."It's a small world, and for the disparate and troubled characters in INTERCHANGE, Ken Jaworowski's engrossing new play ... their universe will be reduced to one degree of separation before the evening is done. In a series of 19 taut and well-constructed scenes, Mr Jaworowski plots the course of five seemingly unrelated lives that are gradually revealed to be closely interconnected and that will be irrevocably altered through circumstance and coincidence. In the poignant opening, a son tells his irascible father while on a fishing trip that his cancer is no longer in remission. The son, a single father of a seven-year-old, pleads with his dad to raise his grandson in kindness rather than anger. Other vignettes introduce a milquetoast economics professor who secretly pines for an English professor colleague; a former Wall Street trader just out of prison and desperate for a job; a middle-management executive under the thumb of her harridan of a boss; and a disturbed young man in a court-ordered counseling program bent on a private vendetta. As their stories unfold, each will face disillusion and disappointment as the thread that will ultimately bind them together becomes discernible. By the end, there will be heartache for some and hope for others. Along the way, each will learn that a little compassion can have resounding repercussions ..." -Willborn Hampton, The New York Times
Christopher Marlowe, sixteenth-century author, was murdered at the age of 29. This tragicomedy speculates that his death was tied to his scandalous play about the relationship between Jesus and the disciple John."Playwright Tom Jacobson is a linguistic gadfly. Often, you are tickled by him. Occasionally you are bedeviled by him. Once or twice, you just want to swat him. Linguistic pyrotechnics explode in Jacobson's period verse drama THE BELOVED DISCIPLE. Little is known of Marlowe's life. It is certain that he was an atheistic iconoclast whose heretical views placed him in constant danger of arrest. The motive for his murder in 1593 remains murky. In this clever attempt to solve the mystery, Jacobson's precocious use of language is rivaled only by the sheer effrontery of his subject matter." -F Kathleen Foley, Los Angeles Times
A woman is run over and critically injured. The driver appears at her bedside. There are encounters in life that take you somewhere you've never been and never meant to go."Lydia Stryk's compelling AN ACCIDENT ... is a fictionalized account of the recovery process the playwright herself went through after [an] accident seven years ago, but it's equally the drama of something Stryk was denied - coming to terms with the man who hit her. In an acting pas de deux ... Libby's recovery is mirrored by that man's wrestle with his guilt and responsibility. The sharply defined stages of her progress occur within the context of their wary, forthright, prickly, warm, confrontational and erotically charged interactions ... the spare, concentrated poetry of Stryk's language. [And] the degree to which [the character] makes us feel her physical struggle in our own bodies makes her sinuous progress ... our triumph, too." -Robert Hurwitt, San Francisco Chronicle"... a visceral and emotional story about recovery, memories, and even the discovery of self. Introspective at times, and often seething with cynical humor, AN ACCIDENT is uncompromisingly human ... [The play] takes us on a roller-coaster of emotion. It's all here: guilt, sorrow, remorse, fear, shame, longing, desire ... Its truth cannot be denied. It's powerful and riveting theater." -Clinton Stark, StarkSilverCreek"Lydia Stryk's play is a pounding two-person drama with utterly compelling pile drivers of empathy for the characters and surprisingly good humor ..." -Albert Goodwyn, San Francisco Examiner"AN ACCIDENT has a harrowing sense of truth that is hard to shake. With her stark, poetic language, Stryk captures the frailty of life and the omnipresence of mortality in everyday activities ..." -Karen D'Souza, San Jose Mercury News
Jetzt zum Newsletter anmelden und tolle Angebote und Anregungen für Ihre nächste Lektüre erhalten.
Mit Ihrer Newsletter-Anmeldung erklären Sie sich mit unseren Datenschutzbestimmungen einverstanden.
