8284 shows
Clear filtersMatt, a Cleveland bartender with Cavaliers tickets, meets Shawn, a writer who wants to buy them for LeBron James's first Cavaliers season. Across four encounters from 2003 to 2016, their friendship rises and falls alongside James's career and Cleveland's championship drought.
A Protestant morality play portrays King John as a virtuous defender of English church rites against Rome. Allegorical figures join historical characters as John is assassinated by Sedition and Dissimulation and defended by Verity.
In a Caroline historical tragedy, King John pursues Matilda, daughter of the rebellious baron Fitzwater, while struggling against his barons and the papal legate. Matilda is repeatedly captured and rescued before John orders her death; her martyrdom finally brings the king to remorse and reconciliation.
After dividing his kingdom between the daughters who flatter him, King Lear rejects Cordelia, the only daughter who speaks honestly. His decision sets off a chain of betrayal and conflict that leaves Lear and his family devastated.
David Williamson reworks Shakespeare’s King Lear into contemporary, accessible English while retaining the original structure and philosophy.
An anonymous Elizabethan play about the ancient British king Leir and his three daughters. Unlike Shakespeare's later version, Leir survives and is restored to his kingship at the end.
At the height of his power, Bohemian king Ottokar alienates allies through pride and betrayal, loses lands and the imperial crown, and turns to war against Rudolf of Habsburg. After his former wife’s death, Ottokar recognizes his failures but is killed in battle; Rudolf restores order and secures the Austrian and Styrian lands.
A verse drama about Iolanthe, the blind daughter of King René, kept in a secluded garden and unaware that she is a princess. When Tristan arrives to marry her, he falls in love and helps reveal her blindness; a Moorish physician cures her, and the concealed identities and engagement are resolved.
After Victor Amadeus II abdicates in favor of his son Charles Emmanuel III, Charles refuses to believe that his father intends to reclaim the crown. Victor eventually demands it back; Charles's loyalty leads to a final reconciliation before Victor's death.
A stage adaptation of Susan Cooper’s novel about Nat Field, a young actor transported from 1999 to Shakespeare’s original Globe Theatre in 1599.
A stage adaptation of H. G. Wells’s novel about a draper’s apprentice whose unexpected inheritance brings him into a different social world.
Hajj, a beggar in Baghdad, escapes a bandit, becomes Emir, and attracts the Wazir’s wife; his story concludes with his daughter’s marriage to the Caliph.
A performance of a Syrian love story is interrupted by discoveries that challenge the actors’ understanding of the text. What first appears to be melodrama becomes an inquiry into translation, war, and cultural misunderstanding.
Three Navy war heroes on a morale-building vacation in San Francisco are expected to give speeches at shipyard plants by an officer overseeing their public-relations tour. The men instead seek entertainment, moving between the St. Mark Hotel and a naval hospital.
Two teenage girls become interested in boys, and the girls' parents are making more problems rather than solving them.
Set in a Buenos Aires prison cell in 1976, the play follows revolutionary Valentin Arregui Paz and his cellmate Luis Alberto Molina as their relationship develops; Molina appears to have been planted to uncover the secrets of Valentin’s Marxist group.
Frontier hero Kit Redding’s wife and daughter are kidnapped, and years pass before he meets the renamed villain again. Kit foils the man’s attempt to cheat him at poker aboard a river steamer, learns that the villain killed his wife, then pursues and kills him and is reunited with his daughter.
A Muslim girl challenges gender rules in her family as she seeks to call the azaan like her father. Her arguments about food, education and religious authority culminate in her defying her father to perform at a school play.
After two couples meet at an unsuccessful party, they drink, swap partners and exchange keys. A rich aunt’s visit, an awkward family lunch and the arrival of a cuckolded husband compound the misunderstandings before the farce ends with order restored.
Knave or Not? is a 1798 comedy play by the British writer Thomas Holcroft. The original Drury Lane cast included John Palmer as Monsrose, Richard Wroughton as Sir Guy Taunton, Richard Suett as Sir Job Ferment, Ralph Wewitzer as Mr Taunton, William Barrymore as Oliver, John Bannister as Jonas, Thomas Hollingsworth as Mr Quake, Jane Pope as Lady Ferment and Dorothea Jordan as Susan.
In a remote cabin, two elderly recluses whose opposing sides of one spirit have split into Abe the romantic and Cohn the realist encounter a magician and Joan of Arc; her call to join a pilgrimage to Heaven before a coming holocaust forces the men to reconsider belief and change.
Know Your Own Mind is a 1777 comedy play by the Irish writer Arthur Murphy. It premiered at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden on 22 February 1777. The original Covent Garden cast included William Thomas Lewis as Millamour, Charles Lee Lewes as Dashwould, Richard Wroughton as Malvil, Francis Aickin as Bygrove, Cockran Joseph Booth as Captain Bygrave, James Fearon as Sir John Millamour, John Whitfield as Sir Harry Lovewith, Ralph Wewitzer as Charles, Servant of Millamour, Isabella Mattocks as Lady Bell, Mary Dayes as Lady Jane and Elizabeth Hartley as Miss Neville. The Irish premiere was at the Crow Street Theatre in Dublin on 13 August 1778. It was acted nineteen times at Covent Garden and in 1789 was revived at Drury Lane, with Dorothea Jordan in the cast, and remained a standard work well into the nineteenth century.
Raymond Williams's dramatic play uses fictional characters to examine events parallel to Joseph Stalin's life, with Joseph becoming Koba and Jordan representing Lenin. Its dialogue considers whether Koba strengthened or weakened the movement.
A domestic comedy about an affair abruptly turns into a courtroom inquiry after actress Kamini kills a man in the audience. The troupe’s tangled relationships and the invented figure of Shekhar Khosla emerge as the characters’ testimony reveals how the murder was manipulated.
Dictator Kongi seeks a ceremonial yam from deposed King Danlola to symbolize abdication, while Danlola's heir Daodu grows the prized crop and tribal resistance challenges Kongi's efforts to unify the nation.
After romantic rejection and a suicide attempt, fifteen-year-old Kordian travels through Europe and searches for purpose. Inspired by the November Uprising, he resolves to assassinate Tsar Nicholas I, but his moral qualms thwart the plot; the drama ends ambiguously.
Lem’s multi-act satire attacks Stalinism and the Soviet cliché of ‘bowing before the West,’ using Soviet-sounding names and a figure of Joseph Stalin. The work was conceived at least in part as a puppet show.
In a Provincetown beach cottage in 1947, Tennessee Williams prepares A Streetcar Named Desire as actor Marlon Brando arrives to discuss playing Stanley Kowalski. Williams’s partner Pancho, director Margo Jones and Brando’s girlfriend Jo are also present as the evening’s personalities clash before Williams casts Brando.
Set in Stanković's native Vranje in southern Serbia, the play draws on Serbian folklore and examines patriarchal customs in the late nineteenth century.
An aging man listens to recordings he made on earlier birthdays, revisiting his memories and confronting the distance between his past ambitions and present isolation.
A card sharp obtains a large sum from a moneylender by pawning a false diamond, based on a rumor circulating in Moscow society.
This temple dance-drama cycle presents Krishna's story across eight plays, from his avatar and childhood deeds through battles, marriage, and ascent to heaven. Performances combine actors, singers, musicians, dance, elaborate costumes, and large puppets.
During the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Kristina Wong begins sewing masks from old bedsheets and bra straps on her Hello Kitty sewing machine. She quickly organizes the Auntie Sewing Squad, a network of hundreds of volunteers—including children and her mother—working from home to produce masks and address gaps in the U.S. public health system. As the project grows, Wong reflects on the blurred line between mutual aid and cult-like dedication. As demand for masks declines and pandemic restrictions ease, Wong navigates life after leading the group, exploring the challenges of rebuilding personal and communal connections. The performance combines humor and generosity, inviting the audience to witness Wong’s efforts to foster community during isolation while reflecting on the pandemic’s broader social impact.
A traveling monk is offered shelter by a stranger who asks him to pray for an anonymous soul buried by a pine tree. After revealing his past as a robber, the stranger vanishes. Kumasaka later returns as a ghost and recounts his last fight and death at the hands of Ushiwaka, the young Yoshitsune.
Jakki, an educated Kunbi denied white-collar work, accepts a loan to marry Puddu on condition that they become Arius’s vassals if he defaults. A corrupt secretary and the devil-like lender threaten the couple, whose faith and resolve defeat them; the play also depicts caste and social reform in Goa.
Jakki leases a rice field through Roque, Arius’s agent, but pests destroy the crop before payment is due. When Roque sues, Jakki’s lawyer son Caetano argues the failed harvest voids the obligation, and Arius vanishes through a trapdoor after the case turns against him.
In three acts, Paavali watches Death claim his ill mother, then later travels, meets Elsa, and builds a school with the money he receives. When their home burns, Death returns for Paavali in his mother's form; Elsa and the villagers remember his legacy.
At a cherry-blossom viewing, a rough mountain priest drives away the monks and children except one boy, the orphaned young Minamoto no Yoshitsune. Revealed as the head Tengu, the stranger teaches Yoshitsune martial arts so he can avenge his father's death.
Writer Akshar and his wife Pooja have been married five years without having a child, while Pooja’s mother Vandana repeatedly pressures them about parenthood. Their domestic tension changes when a man known as Paddy enters the household, prompting unexpected comic complications.
Inspired by the 2000 Kursk submarine disaster, Bryony Lavery’s play places a British submarine on a covert mission in the Barents Sea. After its crew detects the Russian submarine’s explosion, the captain must decide whether to offer aid, confronting the crew with ethical and political questions about intervention.
In Kurt Cobain’s greenhouse, Sid Vicious—possibly returned from the dead—interrupts Cobain’s plan to kill himself. The two musicians discuss fame and their personal turmoil as Sid tries to persuade Kurt to live.
After Herbert Palla dies, his widow Martha and brother George dispute where his body should be buried: in the modern home or according to the clan's customs. Their conflict exposes the family's strained ties to its community and the consequences of rejecting tradition for wealth and status.
Kyoto is a play by Joe Murphy and Joe Robertson, produced and acted by Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) and Good Chance originally in Swan Theatre in 2024, then @sohoplace in 2025. The play dramatizes how Big Oil, having learned about the risk of climate change, use legal tricks and misinformation through their representative Don Pearlman in an attempt to protect their profits. Through the determination of key representatives, an agreement is reached – the Kyoto Protocol.
At a bridge party, Eva is falsely accused of cheating and expelled by the wealthy Renée, who then tries to seduce Eva’s husband. Though he loves his wife, he is tempted by the flirtation, until the couple reject the circle’s intrigues and emigrate to Java.
In this verse farce, the overworked Körner tries to prepare a manuscript and be shaved, but a stream of visitors and interruptions consumes his morning until he misses a meeting; he ends by explaining that he had himself shaved.
On the anniversary of the king's assassination, his reclusive widow shelters Stanislas, a wounded anarchist poet who resembles the dead king and had entered her room to kill her. An ambiguous love develops as they confront the court's political machinations and struggle to remain true to their ideals.
Napoleon II, held under guard at the Austrian court of his grandfather, dreams of returning to France and restoring his family's power, but Metternich thwarts his escape and failing health ends his ambitions.
Sganarelle refuses his daughter Lucinde’s wish to marry, so she and her maid Lisette pretend that Lucinde is ill. The doctors bicker over treatments and fail to help; Lucinde’s beloved Clitandre disguises himself as a doctor and prescribes marriage as the cure. The lovers marry through a trick that also secures Lucinde’s dowry, while Sganarelle discovers he has been outmaneuvered.
Three young Christians captured by pirates are ransomed by a Venetian merchant and travel to Padua to earn money as beauty consultants. In Ancona, a widow falls for Isotta, who is disguised as a man, and follows the group; in Padua, the travelers become entangled with a courtesan, an elderly married merchant, and their servants, before Isotta and the widow discover they are sisters.
Young Provençal peasant Fréderi loves a woman from Arles, but learns of her infidelity before their wedding. His family tries to save him as he approaches madness, but he ultimately dies by suicide.
Andrei, a visionary misfit, has a promising destiny cut short by a jealous husband.
A six-character combinatorial drama follows the branching bureaucratic obstacles a long-serving employee must navigate to meet the department head and unsuccessfully request a raise. The characters embody the flowchart’s propositions, alternatives, hypotheses, choices and conclusions.
Jean-Claude Brisville imagines a dialogue between René Descartes and Blaise Pascal, inspired by a real conversation the philosophers may have had in 1647, of which no details are known.
The play is about two people who wish to engage in an extramarital affair. They check into a small, discreet Parisian hotel where they wish to spend the night, but complications arise and the couple never manage to exchange as much as a kiss. The play opens in Monsieur Pinglet's office. He is visited by several people, including his neighbour Paillardin's wife Marcelle, whom he persuades to spend the night with him in a hotel in town. Pinglet arranges for his maid Victoire to follow Paillardin's nephew Maxime to philosophy school, as the boy is easily lost on his own. Pinglet's wife Angelique comes on stage to declare to Pinglet that she will not be home for dinner; she has to spend the night out of town. She then shows Pinglet some hotel brochures she has been sent in the mail. She is disgusted by the brochures, but Pinglet is excited and decides to go to the advertised hotel with Marcelle. Mathieu, an old friend of the Pinglets, comes for a visit. Mathieu, who suffers from a speech impediment when it rains, announces that he intends to stay at the Pinglets' house for a month. The Pinglets are horrified, especially at the arrival of Mathieu's four daughters, who also intend to stay there. Angelique initiates an argument with Pinglet in front of Mathieu, which prompts Mathieu to leave. Before leaving, however, he hears Pinglet and Marcelle discussing the hotel they are going to and decides to stay there for the night with his daughters. After this, Pinglet tells Angelique that he intends to eat at a restaurant. Angelique does not want him to eat out alone and so locks him in his office. Pinglet takes out a rope ladder and climbs out of the window. Act Two opens in the Hôtel du Libre Échange, introducing the audience to the hotel owner Bastien and his assistant Boulot. They throw out a guest who has not paid his bill, and he causes trouble by saying he will call the police to ransack the place. Marcelle and Pinglet arrive and order a room. Pinglet tries to persuade Marcelle to get into bed with him but has obviously had too much to drink, and the alcohol and cigar smoke go to his head. He leaves the room to get some fresh air. Paillardin arrives at the hotel, where he is led into a large room. He has been hired by the hotel owner to investigate reports of strange sounds and disturbances which the owner thinks are coming from ghosts. Paillardin leaves the room to get a drink. Mathieu arrives at the hotel with his four daughters, and Boulot, not knowing that Paillardin is already booked into the haunted room, double-books Mathieu into it. Mathieu runs into Marcelle in the corridor. He invites himself into Marcelle's room for tea, and they are doing so when Pinglet comes back. Pinglet manages to make Mathieu leave. Mathieu and his daughters go into their own room, and Mathieu then helps himself to Paillardin's cigars, nightshirt, and slippers, thinking they are gifts from the hotel. When Paillardin arrives back from the café, he is angry to see his belongings gone and concludes that the supposed ghost is just a thief pretending to haunt the place. He goes to sleep in one of the beds. Victoire arrives at the hotel with Maxime, having found one of Angelique's discarded hotel brochures and persuaded Maxime to go to the hotel with her instead of going back to philosophy school. They get a room. The daughters amuse themselves by singing and making "ghost noises", but in the middle of it all Paillardin wakes up and is frightened by them. He goes running through the hotel yelling about ghosts, and the daughters themselves are scared into hysterics by Paillardin unexpectedly appearing in their room. Maxime and Victoire are brought downstairs by the racket and are frightened when they discover Paillardin running around. After trying to hide in Mathieu's room, they exit the hotel. Paillardin tries to get into Pinglet's and Marcelle's room to hide from the "ghosts" and, when he finally succeeds in breaking down the door, Pinglet hides in the fireplace. His face is black from the soot in the fireplace, so Paillardin does not recognise him. At this point the police arrive and arrest everyone. Marcelle, pretending to be married to Pinglet, gives her name to the police as Madame Pinglet. Monsieur Pinglet, on the other hand, tries the same tactic and gives his name as Monsieur Paillardin. Act Three opens in Pinglet's office the next morning, as he climbs in through his window and removes the soot from his face. Paillardin arrives and tells Pinglet of his terrible night and how he now believes in ghosts. He has no suspicion about Pinglet and Marcelle the previous night, but he remembers Marcelle's purple dress. Pinglet quickly tells Marcelle about this, so she can dispose of it. Marcelle gives the dress to Victoire. Angelique is the next to arrive on stage, telling Pinglet in dramatic terms about how terrible a night she has had on a wild carriage journey through the countryside. She is overwhelming in her proclamations of love for Pinglet. Pinglet, however, is unfazed and, when a letter arrives to "Angelique" from the police station, he is quick to use this to his advantage. He confronts Angelique and Paillardin about the letter. Marcelle arrives. At this point Mathieu arrives and tries to talk to the Pinglets about his terrible night. Pinglet, fearing that Mathieu will tell everyone else that they met last night, pushes him into the bedroom. Police inspector Boucard arrives in Pinglet's office, and Angelique and Paillardin try to make him understand that they were not the people in l'Hôtel du Libre Échange. The police inspector does not intend to pursue the case, but is still hesitant to clear their names completely. Mathieu comes into the room and is about to tell everyone about who he met, when Maxime climbs in through the window and sees Mathieu. He does not want to be recognised and so covers his face with Pinglet's soot-stained handkerchief, inadvertently making his face black. When everyone sees his black face, they are convinced he is the man from the hotel. Maxime confesses that he was there with Victoire. Mathieu is then pushed out of the room. Boucard gives 5000 francs to Maxime, money that Pinglet had given the inspector as bail to be released from jail.
Josefa, a maid found unconscious beside her Spanish lover's body and the gun that killed him, repeatedly changes her account while an inexperienced examining magistrate investigates. He discovers that she is trying to protect her other lover, her wealthy employer, and pursues the mystery despite pressure to obtain a quick confession.
Pridamant seeks the magician Alcandre’s help to discover what became of his son Clindor. Alcandre shows him apparent scenes of Clindor’s life, including imprisonment, escape, and a tragic final act, then reveals that Clindor and the others are actors performing a play.
A metatheatrical drama about the theatre itself, set on a theatre stage.
Prince Tartaglia’s mysterious illness can be cured only by laughter. Pantalone brings the comic servant Truffaldino to court while Clarice and Leandro plot to prevent the prince’s recovery and seize the throne. Gozzi turns the fairy-tale conflict into a satire of rival theatrical styles.
In Ephesus, a young widow seals herself in her husband's tomb, intending to die there as an example of fidelity. Her nurse tries to revive her interest in life by drawing her attention to the cemetery guard, while revelations about her late husband unsettle her resolve.
Lucidor, a wealthy Parisian, tests whether Angélique loves him or his money by arranging for his valet, disguised as a rich suitor, to ask for her hand.
On D-Day at Arromanches, a knacker is focused on arranging his daughter’s marriage to a German soldier living in the family home. He invites other children serving as paratroopers in the Red Army and U.S. Army; soldiers from several factions arrive and engage in excess, and most characters end up in the knacker’s yard. The farce satirizes war, militarism, American society, and family.
Servant Mascarille repeatedly devises schemes to help his master Lelio win Celia, a young woman enslaved for her family's debt, while Lelio's impulsive interference keeps undoing the plans. Celia's identity and family ties ultimately resolve the rival courtships.
Eight shipwrecked French newcomers arrive on an island whose reasonable inhabitants grow to ordinary size as they recognize and correct their faults. The play satirizes vanity, deception, and self-interest through the visitors' changing stature.
After a shipwreck, two masters and their enslaved attendants arrive on an island where their social roles are reversed. The servants expose their masters’ conduct; the pairs ultimately reconcile and return to their original roles.
Ten years after leaving school, Laura brings her former English teacher a book she has written about their relationship. The reunion forces both to confront the unequal power behind their shared history.
La Bête is a 1991 comedy play by American playwright David Hirson. Written in rhymed couplets of iambic pentameter, the Molière-inspired story, set in 17th-century France, pits dignified, stuffy Elomire, the head of the royal court-sponsored theatre troupe, against the foppish, frivolous street entertainer Valere, whom the troupe's patron, Prince Conti, wishes them to bring aboard. Despite Elomire's violent objections, the company is forced to perform one of Valere's own plays, which results in dramatic changes to the future of Elomire, Valere, and the company itself.
Georges owns a Saint-Tropez drag nightclub where his partner Albin performs as Zaza. When Georges’s son brings his fiancée’s conservative parents to dinner, Georges and Albin try to conceal their relationship; Georges’s attempts to make Albin appear masculine fail, and Albin must ultimately pass as a woman to protect the couple’s son.
Separated as children, twin siblings Lidio and Santilla each disguise themselves as the other. Their overlapping disguises, Lidio’s affair with the married Fulvia, and a proposed marriage for Santilla drive a comedy of mistaken identities until the twins recognize one another.
A Puerto Rican rural family leaves its farm for San Juan and then the Bronx in search of a better life. Across three acts, the family faces urban poverty and dislocation; Luis embraces industrial work, while his grandfather remains attached to the land. Luis is killed by a factory machine, and the family returns to Puerto Rico for his burial.
Calisto enlists the procuress Celestina to help him pursue Melibea. Celestina and Calisto's servants scheme for money; after the servants kill Celestina, Melibea and Calisto's affair ends in their deaths.
After a conquered group takes refuge on an island, men establish a government that excludes women. The women form their own council and challenge their dependence, though the comedy ends with a promise that their rights and interests will be respected.
Urged on by the Hoopoe, a troubled nation of birds crosses seven valleys to seek its king. As companions abandon the journey or die, the survivors discover that the divine presence they sought is embodied in themselves.
A young wife satisfies both a canon and a young man, aided by the canon's generosity. When her husband's two nephews fear losing their inheritance and denounce her, the valet Finet warns her, and she drives her enemies away.
After drinking too much at Maxim’s, Dr. Petypon wakes with la Môme Crevette, a Moulin Rouge dancer, in his bed. His uncle mistakes the dancer for Petypon’s wife and invites her to a country house party, where the deception spirals through mistaken identities, old romances, and frantic cover stories before the characters find their proper partners.
Orphan Claire arrives in Brussels and finds work at a furniture shop, where the owner initially doubts her abilities. She proves herself as a salesperson and falls in love with Amelin, the owner's son.
An aristocratic prince stages an experiment to determine whether men or women were the first to be unfaithful. Four orphans, two boys and two girls, are raised in isolation and then released together to discover love, sex, and jealousy.
The prince kidnaps Silvia from her beloved Arlequin, intending to marry her. His servant Flaminia uses flattery and disguise to turn each lover toward someone else, and the prince’s revelation lets Silvia and Arlequin end their engagement and marry their new partners.
Lawyer Pierre Pathelin tricks clothier Guillaume Joceaulme into giving him cloth on credit by feigning illness. When Joceaulme later prosecutes shepherd Thibault l’Aignelet for stealing sheep, Pathelin coaches him to answer only like a sheep; the judge confuses the cases, and the shepherd then uses Pathelin's trick to evade paying his fee.
A young Parisian woman, promised in marriage to Lelio without having met him, disguises herself as a knight and befriends him. Lelio seeks her help to escape a marriage contract with a countess, but the disguised woman exposes his mercenary plans and asserts her independence.
Madame Duru arranges marriages for her daughter Erise and son Damis against her husband's plan to match them with the wealthy Gripon family's children. When her husband returns disguised, the resulting confusion ends with Madame Duru explaining her reasons and the servant Marthe reconciling the couple.
The comedy follows the love relationships of two couples, Lysandre and Celidee, and Dorimant and Hippolyte, ending with both couples marrying.
Sculptor Lucio Settala is torn between his wife Silvia and his model Gioconda, whose presence fuels his pursuit of absolute art. After Lucio’s suicide attempt, Gioconda tries to destroy his statue; Silvia saves it at the cost of her hands, and Lucio leaves his wife for Gioconda.
Set in Siena during factional conflict, the drama follows Guelph leader Orso and Ghibelline noblewoman Cordelia. After Orso assaults her during the city's capture, Cordelia and her nurse Uberta seek vengeance; Cordelia later shelters the wounded Orso, but her brother poisons her, and the lovers die together as they are married in the plague-stricken cathedral.
In a provincial town, a writer of anonymous letters stirs fear and conflict within an unconventional family: a disengaged father, his daughter, and twin sons, one good-natured and the other recently out of prison. The father's former lover falls for the latter twin, while a police friend operates undercover.
A dead Colombian schoolteacher speaks to figures from her past in a dreamlike sequence. As they recall her childhood and teaching, the play exposes the military violence that led to her death.
Three years after separating, a man and woman reunite to finalize their divorce. As they talk, shared nostalgia and their history draw them together while misunderstandings and betrayals come to light.
Two sisters dress alike and hide their faces behind masks during a walk in a park. Their lover Ergaste mistakes one sister for the other, producing a series of misunderstandings before the sisters disappear together.
Afraid of marriage, Alidor stages a false love affair to make Angélique leave him and conspires with her admirer Cléandre to redirect her. Their plots misfire; Phylis and Cléandre fall in love, while Angélique enters a convent and Alidor gains the freedom he sought.
Princess Élide loves hunting and appears immune to love, but a young man wins her over by feigning indifference. The five-act comedy includes six intermèdes with verse and music.
Adine returns from abroad disguised as a young man and falls in love with Blanford, to whom she was promised in childhood. Blanford appears to favor Dorfise, a self-proclaimed prude entrusted with his money, while Adine’s disguise and the competing advances produce comic misunderstandings.
Ten linked scenes pass from one pair of lovers to the next, forming a circle of secret sexual encounters across social classes. The work examines sexual morality and class ideology in 1890s Vienna.
A collection of monologues told by La Sagouine, an Acadian cleaning woman from rural New Brunswick.
In the surviving fragment, Alexandrian noblewoman Myrrhina travels to the desert to tempt the hermit Honorius away from religious devotion. After their conversation, Honorius chooses to return to sin in Alexandria, while Myrrhina embraces religion and remains in the desert.
Silvanire’s wealthy father orders her to marry the rich but foolish Théante, though she loves the poorer Aglante. A jealous shepherd gives Silvanire a magic mirror and she is believed dead; after she revives, he tries to abduct her. Aglante and the other shepherds rescue her, and her parents finally consent to her marriage to Aglante.
A burlesque parody of Victor Hugo's romantic drama, the surviving scenes portray Queen Victoria's sexual and political intrigues, including her relationships with ministers and a concealed younger sister. The known manuscript preserves Acts 2 and 4, the latter possibly incomplete.
A Florentine comedy about the miser Ghirigoro and his obsession with money, alongside Alamanno’s pursuit of Fiammetta. Romantic intrigue and the trouble caused by greed eventually lead Ghirigoro to declare that he will change his way of life.
Gelsomina is sold by her mother to the travelling strongman Zampano. Their journey brings her into contact with a circus performer whose kindness challenges the life imposed on her, in an adaptation told chiefly from her perspective.
After being betrayed, Lélio renounces love and withdraws to the countryside, while the widowed countess also refuses to love. Their servants Arlequin and Columbine scheme to bring them together; they fall in love themselves, and the play ends with three couples united.
Eteocles and Polynices fight for control of Thebes despite the pleas of their mother Jocasta, sister Antigone, and their relatives. The conflict ends in the deaths of the principal characters.
Two hungry thieves trick Mendrugo, a simpleton carrying food to his imprisoned wife, by describing the fantastical Land of Jauja. While one spins tales of a place where food abounds and work is punished, the other steals from Mendrugo’s pot.
In 1800 Rome, opera singer Floria Tosca tries to save her lover, the artist Mario Cavaradossi, from police chief Scarpia. She kills Scarpia after agreeing to his terms, but discovers the promised execution was real and throws herself from the castle.
Margaret of Burgundy kills her lovers after their nocturnal encounters to prevent them from bearing witness. The five-act, nine-tableau drama is based on the circumstances of the Tour de Nesle Affair.
A two-act dramatic play centered on Salem and Kent, with one act set in Mexico and the other in the United States. Its title refers to the illness commonly associated with tourists; some interpretations connect the work to the Vietnam War.
Julio, a young man newly arrived in Venice, falls in love with a young married woman. The five-act comedy plays with the distinct Venetian, Tuscan, and Bergamasque dialects spoken by its characters.
In Paris, the widow Clarice is the mistress of Philiste. His friend Alcidon is in love with Philiste’s sister Doris, who is beloved by Célidan, while an official named Géron is also enamored of Doris.
At a Paris Catholic boys’ school, philosophy student André Sevrais forms a close friendship with younger, rebellious Serge Souplier. A teacher-priest, the Abbé de Pradts, pursues his own concealed obsession with Serge and uses his authority to obstruct the boys’ relationship.
In the surviving opening scene, a wealthy young man tells his father that he sought admission to a prestigious Granada casino. Members voted with white and black balls, and he received the black ball because he is gay.
While Pancracio is away, his wife Leonarda welcomes a penniless student and two lovers for a party; when her husband returns unexpectedly, the quick-witted student uses stories and wordplay to help conceal the gathering.
Finea’s large dowry draws suitors who underestimate her. Her lessons and love for Laurencio expose competing expectations of intelligence, education and marriage.
The personification of Death visits the Narces family four years after daughter Angelica’s disappearance. She fails to claim Martin, who brings home Adela, a would-be suicide who becomes part of the family. When Angelica returns, her past is revealed and Death comes for her, allowing the family to mourn and bury her.
Fairy princess Cherestani marries the mortal Farruscad despite her father Demogorgon's opposition. Farruscad must never curse her; if he does, she will be transformed into a snake for 200 years.
Juan, whose chronic epilepsy has led doctors to predict an early death, chooses to live fully; he meets Celina, a record seller, and their friendship develops into love.
In an Abruzzese castle in the 1820s, Gigliola seeks vengeance for her mother Monica, whom her stepmother Angizia murdered before marrying Gigliola’s father, Tibaldo. As Gigliola prepares to kill Angizia and then herself, Tibaldo kills Angizia first; Gigliola nevertheless dies from a serpent’s bite, and the family’s decay culminates in her father’s death as well.
A solo autobiographical theatrical narrative in fragments follows Josée Thibeault from her childhood as a mail carrier's daughter in Trois-Rivières to life in the Canadian West, reflecting on family ties to wood, paper and place.
After discovering his wife Savina’s infidelity, Paolo sends her abroad and pretends he has killed her. His acquittal brings public admiration, trapping him behind the heroic image he has manufactured.
On a night in August 1937 during the Spanish Civil War, a Republican lieutenant and an inexperienced Nationalist soldier confront one another.
Don Pedro, king of Castile, has taken Constance, princess of Navarre, captive. She escapes in disguise and finds refuge with Don Morillo, where she meets Alamir, who falls in love with her. After Alamir’s army defeats the Castilians, he reveals he is the Duke of Foix, clearing the way for his marriage to Constance.
A comedy rooted in Commedia dell'Arte, with a large cast that includes the perpetually quarreling gondoliers Nane and Menego.
Factory owner Gilbert Lemoine learns his father had an illegitimate daughter, Micheline, who works in his factory; they share his inheritance and pledge his wealth to workers. After a capitalist rival engineers Lemoine’s arrest, Micheline gives her inheritance to the workers, who reopen the factory and restore his honor.
A mermaid falls in love with a man named Ricardo.
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