Samson
A poor man rises to become a wealthy tycoon and marries into an impoverished aristocratic family; pressure from her relatives and the destructive marriage bring about his fall.
Plays
8284 shows
Clear filtersSamuel Weller, or, The Pickwickians
Samuel Weller, or, The Pickwickians is an 1837 comedy in three acts adapted from Dickens's novel The Pickwick Papers by William Thomas Moncrieff. It was first performed at the Royal Strand Theatre in London on 17 July 1837. W. T. Moncrieff's 'Farcical Comedy' Sam Weller; or the Pickwickians opened at the Royal Strand Theatre in 1837 in a production directed by William John Hammond (1797–1848) The production was memorable for the Alfred Jingle of John Lee and the Sam Weller of Hammond. In the same year a production opened in New York and Philadelphia where it had a good run despite poor reviews. Dickens complained against this adaptation While Moncrieff had apologised to ‘Boz’ in his notes on the playbill this failed to placate Dickens, who caricatured Moncrieff as the 'literary gentleman' and actor-manager Vincent Crummles in his novel Nicholas Nickleby "who had dramatized in his time two hundred and forty-seven novels, as fast as they had come out – some of them faster than they had come out". Moncrieff's response was to plagiarise Nickleby in another production in 1839. As the title suggests, Moncrieff decided to focus on Sam Weller, the main comic character in the novel, rather than on Samuel Pickwick himself. The play had a revival at the New Strand Theatre in May and July 1838 with largely the original cast. The play was adapted in 1850 by Thomas Hailes Lacy as The Pickwickians; or the Peregrinations of Sam Weller as a comic drama in three acts in prose.
Sanctuary
On Queensland's Gold Coast, retired foreign correspondent Bob King faces a student writing his biography. The student accuses King of selling out to governments and failing to report genocides, while King probes the student's personal history; their arguments escalate into violence and end in Bob's death.
Sandhedens hævn – En marionetkomedie
An innkeeper plans to rob and murder a young visitor, but a witch’s curse makes the innkeeper’s lies become truth the next day. The characters discover that they do not know who they really are until the curtain falls.
Sanemori
At Shinohara, the travelling monk Yugyō meets an old man whom no one else can see. The stranger reveals himself as the ghost of the warrior Sanemori. During a memorial service he recounts his last battle and the washing of his severed head, which exposed the grey hair he had dyed black, before asking the monk to pray for him.
Sanmon Gosan no Kiri
The surviving Sanmon scene from a historical kabuki drama presents notorious thief Ishikawa Goemon and his enemy, the powerful general Mashiba Hisayoshi, at the main gate of Nanzen-ji temple in Kyoto.
Sannin Kichisa Kuruwa no Hatsugai
Three thieves named Kichisa—Osho, a former Buddhist priest; Ojo, raised as a woman; and Obo, a former retainer’s son—meet by the Sumida River, become blood brothers and commit crimes. Their fate is bound up with 100 ryo and a precious sword; they are eventually pursued and arrested in a snowfall. The full play also interweaves the love story of Bunsato and the courtesan Hitoe.
Santa Claus: A Morality
In this one-act allegory, Santa Claus trades masks with Death and becomes a scientist who teaches people to believe in a fictional wheelmine. When an accident turns a mob against him, Santa gives up his body; a child and woman reunite with him through their shared search for lost loved ones and rediscover love.
Santos and Santos
In El Paso, lawyer Tomas Santos joins his brothers' family practice, then becomes a federal judge's informant against their drug-trafficking business. As he weighs family loyalty against justice, he faces the prospect of killing the judge presiding over his brother's murder trial, threatening the family's future and his own moral identity.
Sapho
In this version of Daudet's story, Fanny LeGrand's perspective is foregrounded: she seduces the naïve Jean Gaussin, but ultimately leaves him so he can reform and marry the father of her child. The play's most notorious scene sends the pair up a staircase toward an implied bedroom.
Sapho
Iris and the slave Statilius arrange an impersonation that draws Sapho into revealing her love for Segestus. Their classical comedy of romantic intrigue turns on disguises, jealousy and the exposure of Statilius’s assumed identity.
Sapho and Phao
In Syracuse, Venus gives beauty to ferryman Phao, attracting the court women and Queen Sapho. Sapho and Phao fall in love but are divided by rank; Cupid cures Sapho’s passion, then falls for her himself and remains with her as a son.
Sappho
Grillparzer’s tragedy reworks the tradition that the poet Sappho throws herself from a cliff after Phaon rejects her for her slave Melitta. In the play, Melitta loves neither Phaon nor Sappho and longs to return home, while Sappho’s poetic vocation conflicts with earthly happiness.
Saratoga
Bob Sackett falls in love with almost every woman he meets, leaving him to juggle four romantic entanglements and evade their jealous husbands and fiancés. Amid the confusion at Saratoga, he and Effie Remington discover that their feelings for one another outweigh their other attachments.
Sardanapalus
In a soliloquy Salemenes deplores the life of slothful luxury led by his brother-in-law Sardanapalus, king of Assyria. The king enters, and Salemenes reproaches him with his lack of ambition for military glory and his unfaithfulness to his queen, Salemenes' sister. He warns him of possible rebellion by treacherous courtiers. Sardanapalus answers by extolling the virtues of mild and merciful rule and condemning bloodshed, but is finally persuaded to give Salemenes his signet so that he can arrest the rebel leaders. Salemenes leaves, and Sardanapalus reflects, Till now, no drop from an Assyrian vein Hath flow'd for me, nor hath the smallest coin Of Nineveh's vast treasures e'er been lavish'd On objects which could cost her sons a tear: If then they hate me, 'tis because I hate not: If they rebel, 'tis because I oppress not. The Greek slave-girl Myrrha, Sardanapalus' favourite, enters; when Sardanapalus proposes to spend the evening banqueting by the Euphrates she persuades him not to go, fearing some danger there. The Chaldean astrologer Beleses predicts the downfall of Sardanapalus, then meets the satrap Arbaces and plots the king's murder with him. Salemenes enters and tries forcibly to arrest both men, but Sardanapalus arrives unexpectedly and, not wanting to believe that Beleses and Arbaces could be traitors, breaks up the struggle. Salemenes and the king leave, and Arbaces, shamed by the king's clemency, momentarily abandons his regicidal intentions. A messenger arrives from the king, telling the two satraps to return to their respective provinces without their troops. Beleses believes this to be the prelude to a death sentence. Arbaces agrees: Why, what other Interpretation should it bear? it is The very policy of orient monarchs – Pardon and poison – favours and a sword – A distant voyage, and an eternal sleep […] How many satraps have I seen set out In his sire's day for mighty vice-royalties, Whose tombs are on their path! I know not how, But they all sicken'd by the way, it was So long and heavy. They leave, resolving to defend themselves by rebellion. Sardanapalus and Salemenes enter, and it becomes clear that Sardanapalus is now persuaded of the plotters' guilt, but still does not repent of sparing them. Myrrha joins the king and urges him to execute Beleses and Arbaces, but he, as ever, rejects the shedding of blood. The king is banqueting when news reaches him that the two satraps have refused to leave the city and have led their troops in rebellion. Sardanapalus arms himself and, after admiring his newly martial appearance in a mirror, goes to join Salemenes and his soldiers, now the only ones loyal to him. Myrrha, left behind, hears reports that a battle is in progress, and is going badly for the king. Sardanapalus and Salemenes return, closely followed by the rebels, but they beat the attack off and congratulate themselves on a victory. Sardanapalus admits to being slightly wounded. Sardanapalus awakes from a troubled sleep and tells Myrrha that he has had a nightmare of banqueting with his dead ancestors, the kings of Assyria. Salemenes now brings in his sister, Zarina, Sardanapalus' long-estranged wife, and these two are left alone together. Zarina proposes to take their children abroad for safety, and makes it clear that she still loves him. As they talk the king gradually becomes reconciled to his wife. She faints at the prospect of parting, and is carried out. Myrrha enters, and the king, initially embarrassed by her presence, falls under her spell again. I thought to have made mine inoffensive rule An era of sweet peace 'midst bloody annals, A green spot amidst desert centuries, On which the future would turn back and smile, And cultivate, or sigh when it could not Recall Sardanapalus' golden reign. I thought to have made my realm a paradise, And every moon an epoch of new pleasures. I took the rabble's shouts for love – the breath Of friends for truth – the lips of woman for My only guerdon – so they are, my Myrrha: [He kisses her] Kiss me. Now let them take my realm and life! They shall have both, but never thee! Salemenes enters, and the king orders an immediate attack on the rebels. As Myrrha waits in the palace, conversing with one of the courtiers, a wounded Salemenes is brought in, a javelin protruding from his side. He draws out the javelin and dies of the consequent blood-loss. Sardanapalus, who has also returned, desponds about his prospects in the unfolding battle. Then he is told that the Euphrates, being in violent flood, has torn down part of the city wall, leaving no defence against the enemy except the river itself, which must presently recede. A herald arrives and offers Arbaces' terms: Sardanapalus' life if he will surrender. The king refuses these terms, but asks for a truce of one hour. He uses this interval to have a pyre erected under his throne, and bids his last faithful officer save himself by fleeing. Sardanapalus and Myrrha say their last farewells to each other and to the world, then he climbs to the top of the pyre, and she throws a torch into it and joins him.
Sarita
A play with music follows Sarita from adolescence in New York through a destructive attachment to Julio. Even after marrying Mark, she struggles to escape Julio's hold, with consequences for her freedom and sanity.
Satchmo at the Waldorf
A one-person fictionalized portrait of Louis Armstrong at the Waldorf Astoria, reflecting on his career, life under Jim Crow, relationships with manager Joe Glaser and wife Lucille Wilson, and his place in the civil-rights era.
Satele lui Potemkin
An amorous triangle unfolds against the backdrop of an old Romanian fresco.
Satiromastix, or The Untrussing of the Humorous Poet
A satirical response to Ben Jonson's The Poetaster, presenting the character Horace as Jonson and mocking his claim to independent moral authority. The play combines a tragic main plot with a comic subplot.
Saturday Night at the Palace
At a closing roadhouse, two white working-class men stop to use a phone. Vince has been dropped by his soccer team and expelled from his communal home, but his fearful friend Forsie cannot bring himself to tell him. Their hostility falls on September, the Black waiter whose family is separated from him by apartheid, as tensions over prejudice and betrayal end in tragedy.
Saturday's Children
Act I (The Halevy's apartment dining room. A June evening.) Florrie and Willie Sands are visiting her parents. They discuss Bobby's marriage prospects with Mrs. Halevy, while Mr. Halevy works on a radio set he built. Florrie says Bobby is too inexperienced and needs to be taken in hand if she is ever to marry. Willie and her bicker; it is plain she has the upper hand in their marriage. A phone call from Rims O'Neil marks the start of Florrie's campaign. She tells him that Bobby is going out later, but he can see her in thirty minutes. Bobby arrives late, having dined with Mr. Mengle, who offered her a proposal. "A marriage proposal?" asks Mrs. Halevy. Bobby replies no, just a proposal. It is clear she is not naive, nor helpless with men. Florrie tells Bobby about Rims call, and urges her to put on her pink dress for him. While the others leave for a concert in the park, Florrie quickly writes in shorthand some instructions for Bobby on how to maneuver Rims. Bobby doesn't want to trick Rims, but when he mentions that Mr. Mengle wants to send him to Buenos Aires to open a branch office, she realizes she must act fast. Glancing at the shorthand notes, which Rims cannot read, she puts Florrie's plan into action, and before long Rims proposes marriage. (Curtain) Act II (The O'Neil's kitchen-dining room. November.) Married six months now, the O'Neils live in a tiny two room rental house Willie found for them. Bobby quit her job, and Rims' weekly wages are barely enough to support them. Bobby has made out a detailed budget, but Rims resents having to report every expense, particularly his occasional pinochle or poker games. Bobby feels that Rims regrets marrying her, while she hates their arguments and wishes they could go back to being a romantic couple. Florrie and Willie drop by, with the former advising Bobby to have a baby in order to bind Rims more closely. Bobby does not want to trick Rims again, so when her father visits, she asks him what to do. Mr. Halevy suggests it probably wasn't a good idea to get married, but now that you are you should please yourself. Florrie finds a poker IOU that Rims had dropped on the floor, which sets off another argument between Bobby and Rims. Finally, both walk out of the house. (Curtain) Act III (A bedroom at Mrs. Gorlik's boarding house on East 33rd Street. About 9pm, three weeks later.) Bobby returned to her parent's apartment for a week, before finding a room with Mrs. Gorlik. She only rents to women, and bedroom doors, which have no locks, must be kept open while men visit. Bobby has resumed working for Mr. Mengle, who once again has taken her to dinner. Rims, however, has taken a new job working with hydraulic machinery. Mr. Halevy visits Bobby, but finds her still out. He gets an earful of Mrs. Gorlik's opinions while waiting. Next Rims comes calling; he followed Bobby when she left work and found where she now lives. After Bobby arrives, Mr. Halevy leaves. Bobby explains to Rims that she wants their old pre-marriage relationship back, but doesn't insist on divorce. The Chauffeur for Mr. Mengle brings a package to Bobby, containing a bolt lock for her door as a joke. Rims is incensed and takes the bolt, but is kicked out by Mrs. Gorlik as it now 10pm. Bobby falls sobbing onto her bed in the darkened room, but soon sees Rims coming through the open window into her room from the fire escape, carrying the bolt and a screw driver. They embrace then Rims begins to attach the bolt lock. (Curtain)
Saturday, Sunday, Monday
A family’s gathering over a weekend meal exposes tensions between a Neapolitan husband and wife.
Saturn Returns
Gustin Novak is seen at ages 28, 58, and 88, with three actors portraying him. A single woman plays the central female figure in his life as his wife, daughter, and later carer. The play draws on the astrological idea of a Saturn return to examine his relationships across a lifetime.
Saturn’s Return
Zara, settled with her partner Matt, must decide whether to follow the expected route of marriage, mortgages and children or break from those conventions as she approaches adulthood.
Satyashodhak
A play about social reformer Jyotirao Phule, founder of Satyashodhak Samaj, presented in the traditional jalsa form of folk theatre.
Saubhagya Sundari
Prince Saubhagyasinh, presumed lost in a river, rescues Sundari from a charging elephant, and the two fall in love. Sundari’s stepmother obstructs their marriage, but Saubhagyasinh’s friend Madhavsinh helps arrange it.
Saul
A five-act tragedy compresses Saul’s final day on Mount Gilboa into a unified action: the king’s jealousy of David intensifies into delirium as the Philistines attack, and Saul regains a sense of integrity by taking his own life.
Sauny the Scot
John Lacy’s farcical reworking gives Grumio’s role to Sauny, an irreverent Scottish servant comically terrified of his master. Petruchio threatens Meg, tells others she is dead and ties her to a bier, ending with her thoroughly tamed.
Savage in Limbo
Former parochial-school classmates gather in a shabby Bronx bar, where bartender Murk compulsively waters his dead plants and the group confronts its empty lives and hopes of change. Tony and Linda, unmarried parents of two, question their relationship as the friends face their stalled lives.
Savage/Love
A non-narrative performance work composed of poems rather than a conventional plot, bringing together the writing and performance collaboration of Shepard and Chaikin.
Savages
In Brazil, British official Alan West is kidnapped by revolutionary Carlos Esquerdo, who tries to explain the movement's politics. West is preoccupied with the ongoing destruction of Indigenous peoples; the play culminates in West's death and the bombing of a Cintas tribal celebration.
Saved
Set among young people on a London council estate, the play follows Pam, her partner Fred, and lodger Len as family conflict and neglect culminate in the killing of Pam's baby by Fred and his friends. Fred is imprisoned, and Len remains with the family as they try to resume everyday life.
Say Goodnight, Gracie
A multimedia one-man biography traces George Burns from childhood on Manhattan's Lower East Side through vaudeville and his meeting and personal and professional partnership with Gracie Allen.
Say, Darling
Jack Jordan is brought to Broadway to help turn his best-selling book into a musical. As he learns about auditions, rehearsals, rewrites, cast feuds and the demands of producing, the show satirizes musical-making from inside the process.
Scanderbeg
A historical tragedy based on Skanderbeg's life and his fifteenth-century rebellion against the Ottoman Empire.
Scapin
A theatrical reworking of Molière’s comedy of intrigue, in which valet Scapin uses schemes to help young couples keep their chosen partners when their fathers arrange other marriages.
Scapin the Schemer
While their fathers arrange marriages, Octave and Léandre try to keep the women they have secretly married or love. Their valet Scapin uses a succession of lies and schemes to extract enough money from the fathers to secure the young couples’ happiness.
Scapino
In this British pantomime-style adaptation set in modern Naples, the crafty valet Scapino uses trickery to bring two masters’ children and their lovers together despite the masters’ plans.
Scarlet & Gold
Set around the 1912 Waihi goldminers’ strike, the play follows women from three groups whose interests clashed: striking miners, mine owners and shareholders, and strike-breaking workers. It reimagines historical events through characters that include unionist Bill Parry, Fred and May Evans, and fictional families.
Scarlett O'Hara at the Crimson Parrot
Scarlett, a thirty-something waitress who lives with her mother, is obsessed with classic films and has an active fantasy life. She dreams of being with her boss, Steve, while the awkward Alan pursues her.
Scene at Mount Rushmore
Brothers Bobby and Did contemplate the stone-faced presidents and their mother’s memory in a humorous family drama.
Scenes from an Execution
In the aftermath of the Battle of Lepanto, the Venetian state commissions artist Galactia to paint its victory over the Turks. Her vision conflicts with the expectations of the Doge and the Catholic Church.
Scent of Rain
A dying father in rural America wants his sons to be happily married before he dies. His two older sons are engaged to twin sisters, while he worries that his younger son Jonathan will remain alone and asks a hired hand, Bill Tom, to help find him a husband. Jonathan has long loved Bill Tom himself.
Scherenschnitt
A participatory murder drama set in a unisex hair salon, where an offstage murder of a concert pianist is investigated through audience members’ differing perceptions of events and six stereotyped characters.
Schinderhannes
The play portrays the adventures of the eighteenth-century German criminal Schinderhannes and his gang in the Hunsrück; it is based on his life but is not wholly historically accurate.
School Girls; Or, the African Mean Girls Play
At a Ghanaian girls’ boarding school in 1986, popular student Paulina Sarpong sets her sights on the Miss Universe pageant. When new American student Ericka joins the school and enters the competition, the rivalry intensifies ahead of the pageant recruiter’s visit.
School for Coquettes
A young working-class woman attends a school meant to turn her into a coquette in hopes of rising in social status.
Schweyk in the Second World War
In Nazi-occupied Prague and on the Eastern Front, Schweyk is forced into the war but repeatedly survives the Gestapo, a military prison, and labor service. Lost in a snowstorm near Stalingrad, he encounters Hitler, whose path is blocked by snow, corpses, the Soviet army, and the German people; Hitler dances grotesquely and disappears into the snow.
Scipio Africanus
Scipio Africanus is a 1718 historical tragedy by the British writer Charles Beckingham. It is inspired by the story of The Continence of Scipio, featuring the Ancient Roman general Scipio Africanus during the Second Punic War. Staged at Lincoln's Inn Fields the cast included James Quin as Scipio, John Leigh as Trebellius, Sarah Thurmond as Almeyda, Jane Rogers as Semanthe, Thomas Smith as Alucius, John Corey as Lelius, John Ogden as Lucilius, Thomas Smith as Alucius, and Mary Kent as Axarte.
Scotch Mist
Scotch Mist is a 1926 comedy play by the British writer and barrister Patrick Hastings. Star Tallulah Bankhead played the centre of a love triangle and was apparently responsible for the play's commercial success despite critical reviews. It ran for a 117 performances at the St Martin's Theatre in London's West End between 26 January and 3 May 1926. The cast included Bankhead, Godfrey Tearle, Edmund Breon, Abraham Sofaer and Beatrix Lehmann. It was produced by Basil Dean. A Broadway run directed by Edward Childs Carpenter at the Klaw Theatre the same year was less successful, lasting for 16 performances.
Scuba Duba
At a château in southern France, an American family’s visit becomes a tense comedy when the husband discovers his wife has left him for a skin diver, leaving him and their daughter to deal with the situation.
Scuttlers
Set in Manchester in 1895, the play follows members of the Bengal Street Tigers as they face a violent rivalry with the Prussia Street gang and conflicts within their own group, drawing on the historical scuttler gangs.
Se Llama Cristina
A man and woman awaken locked in a California apartment with no memory, beside a crib containing a fried chicken leg. As their memories return, they revisit an abusive relationship, a rescue after a mistaken call for help, and the uncertain paternity of their child, reconstructing their identities as parents.
Sea Fever
Sea Fever is a 1931 British play by Auriol Lee and John Van Druten. It is based on the 1929 play Marius by Marcel Pagnol about Marius, a young man in Marseille whose desire to go to sea overcomes his developing romance with a local girl. It was staged at the New Theatre in the West End but was not successful, lasting for only six performances. The Sunday Times described it as being all atmosphere and no plot. The cast included Maurice Evans, Peggy Ashcroft, Norman McKinnel, and Mary Clare.
Seagulls Over Sorrento
Seagulls Over Sorrento is a play by Hugh Hastings, an Australian who had served in the Royal Navy during the Second World War. It was first staged for a single performance at the Comedy Theatre in London's West End in 1949 before embarking on a lengthy run of 1,551 performances between 14 June 1950 and 13 March 1954 mainly at the Apollo Theatre and then transferring briefly to the Duchess Theatre. The West End cast included John Gregson (replaced by Gordon Jackson), Nigel Stock, Bernard Lee, Ronald Shiner and William Hartnell. Shiner and Hartnell, in particular, were singled out for praised by critics. A Broadway version ran for only 12 performances at the John Golden Theatre.
Seared
In a struggling restaurant, chef Harry takes pride in his cooking as the business begins to succeed. His partner Mike brings in a consultant to improve the operation, setting Harry’s artistic ideals against financial pressures and forcing him to confront changes to his food and workplace.
Seascape
Seascape opens on a beach. An older couple, Nancy and Charlie, has finished a picnic lunch. As Nancy cleans up, the noise of a jet flying low engulfs the stage. Charlie predicts that a jet will someday smash into a dune. Nancy expresses her desire to be near the water forever. She loves everything about it and would like to travel from beach to beach. Charlie responds negatively to her dreams. He does not want to do anything or go anywhere. Charlie's attitude angers Nancy. She points out that life is short. She threatens to have adventures on her own. Charlie's attitude changes after Nancy's outburst, and she retreats from her plan a bit. She is content to enjoy the moment. After another jet passes by, Nancy reminds Charlie about his childhood desire to live under the water. Charlie tells her how he would sink to the bottom of a pool or lake and sit there until he had to breathe. Nancy encourages him to do this again and get in touch with his youth. Charlie refuses, embarrassed by her insistence. Nancy changes the subject to their sex life. She tells him about a time in their marriage when she thought of divorcing him. There was tension, and she suspected that he was having an affair. Charlie denies this, and Nancy accepts his word. Nancy encourages him to sink under the water again and to show her how he did it. Charlie again refuses and turns the conversation to her. He tells her that she was a good wife. Nancy says the same about him, listing the many ways in which he was a good husband. When she is done, she is bitter because the "good life" they have had seems limited to her. Charlie is hurt by her attitude. They argue. Nancy is still angry that his only interest is to rest, while she wants to experience new things. During a pause at the end of their heated argument, Leslie, a human-sized male lizard, takes a peek at them. Nancy tries to get Charlie to help write postcards, but he declines. Leslie peeks at them again, this time with his female mate, Sarah. Nancy sees the lizards and is intrigued. Charlie is afraid. Charlie demands that Nancy find him something to defend them with. When she can only find a small, thin stick, Charlie is peeved. Nancy remains interested in the lizards, but when Leslie clears his throat, she fears the lizards might hurt them. When Leslie waves his large stick, Nancy and Charlie admit their love for each other, Nancy more reluctantly than Charlie. As Leslie and Sarah move forward, another jet flies by and scares them away. Charlie tries to blame the whole episode on bad liver paste sandwiches. He believes they are dead from food poisoning. Nancy ridicules the idea. Nancy is pleased when Leslie and Sarah return. To protect themselves, Nancy believes they should show submission by lying on their backs with their legs and arms up, as a dog would. Charlie assumes the position, though with great reluctance. Act II opens where act I ended. Leslie and Sarah are unsure about Nancy and Charlie's submissive stance. When Leslie and Sarah approach, Charlie threatens to scream. Nancy is much calmer. Leslie pokes Charlie and Nancy in the side, but neither one moves. Leslie and Sarah decide that Nancy and Charlie are relatively harmless. Charlie is unsure about the creatures, while Nancy is fascinated by everything about them. Leslie and Sarah decide to approach them again. Leslie pokes Charlie hard, causing Charlie to speak. Leslie replies several times, but Charlie will not speak to the creature. Nancy finally sits up and greets Sarah. Charlie only says hello after Nancy encourages him. Sarah and Nancy believe that the tension has been defused, but Leslie and Charlie are still uncertain of each other. With Nancy's prodding, Charlie assures Leslie that they are not unfriendly. Though Leslie and Sarah speak English, they do not understand many of the words and ideas that Charlie and Nancy use. Nancy tries to shake Leslie's flipper, but Leslie cannot grasp the concept. Nancy and Charlie explain the concept of the handshake, as well as their differing anatomy. The lizards have only legs and flippers. Nancy finally shakes hands with the lizards. Charlie tries to shake hands with Leslie, but Leslie is still uncertain about him. Leslie and Charlie talk about their differences. Leslie asks about their clothing. Among other things, Nancy tells them that clothes cover their sexual organs. This leads to a discussion of the humans' sex organs, especially Nancy's breasts. The lizards do not have these organs. Nancy shows Sarah, who is fascinated. Leslie also wants to see, but Charlie is uncomfortable with the idea. To change the subject, Charlie asks about their children. Sarah and Leslie have produced seven thousand eggs. Leslie is appalled when he learns that the humans do not lay eggs. Nancy explains human gestation and that they have three children. When Nancy tells them that they keep their children for many years, she also explains the concept of love. This and all other emotions are foreign concepts to the lizards. Charlie asks how Sarah and Leslie became paired. Leslie fought off other lizards when Sarah reached her maturity and started to mate. He wanted her, but emotions did not play a role. Charlie brings up the idea of disloyalty in Leslie and Sarah's relationship. This upsets Nancy. The issue also confuses Sarah and Leslie. Charlie is nearly attacked by Leslie when he angrily compares the male lizard to a fish. The women calm the men down and Leslie explains his disdainful attitude toward fish. They discuss the ideas of prejudice and difference. Sarah looks up and sees birds flying by. Leslie becomes defensive. Nancy explains to Sarah that the birds are seagulls. The females compare them to underwater rays. Nancy tells Sarah that she has seen photographs of rays. Nancy and Charlie cannot explain what photography is to her, so Sarah believes they are insulting her. When Leslie returns, Sarah explains what has happened. Abruptly changing the subject, Nancy declares that Charlie believes that they are dead. She continues to dig into Charlie, sarcastically saying that no wonders are possible. Leslie and Sarah catch on to her meaning, to some degree, but Leslie is confused by the idea that reality is an illusion. When Leslie asks Charlie to explain it, Charlie becomes angry. After Nancy calms him down, another jet flies by. Leslie and Sarah are fearful. Nancy and Charlie explain the idea of the airplane. Charlie talks about other machines including those that go undersea. Nancy tells the lizards about the times in Charlie's youth when he would sink under water and stay there. Angry at Nancy, Charlie changes the subject and asks the lizards why they came out of the sea in the first place. They do not know, other than they have changed somehow and do not belong there anymore. This prompts Charlie to explain the idea of evolution, but Leslie and Sarah do not understand it fully. The lizards can only think in terms of themselves. When Sarah asks if progress is good, Charlie is uncertain. Every term and idea has to be explained to the lizards, leading to more frustration for Charlie, as well as Leslie and Sarah. Charlie asks Sarah what she would do if Leslie went away and did not come back. Nancy becomes angry at him for asking. Sarah is upset by the question and wants to go back to the sea. Leslie hits and chokes Charlie for making Sarah cry. Leslie and Sarah decide to go back. Nancy tells them to stay because eventually they will have to come back. Nancy, and to some degree Charlie, offer their help. Leslie accepts their offer.
Seascape with Sharks and Dancer
Night librarian and aspiring writer Ben rescues Tracy from the ocean and shelters her at his Cape Cod beach house. As they grow close, her fear of attachment clashes with his openness; a possible pregnancy forces her to reveal childhood fears about innocent suffering and the indifferent universe.
Season's Greetings
During four days from Christmas Eve, a dysfunctional family fills an English suburban house. Clive's attraction to Belinda disrupts her marriage, while arguments, an ill-fated puppet show, and Harvey's mistaken shooting of Clive turn the holiday into farce.
Secret Bridesmaids' Business
As Meg Bacon prepares to marry, her mother and bridesmaids gather around her; one bridesmaid knows that Meg’s fiancé has been cheating. The wedding preparations become a high-spirited satire about friendship, loyalty and truthfulness.
Secret Love in Peach Blossom Land
Two theatre troupes mistakenly rehearse at the same time on one stage: one prepares the tragic Secret Love, while the other rehearses the comedy The Peach Blossom Spring. Their collisions blend sorrow and comic banter in a staged pairing of two unrelated plays.
Secrets
Secrets is a 1922 play by Rudolf Besier and May Edginton. The play first opened in London at the Comedy Theatre on 7 September 1922, starring Fay Compton and Leon Quartermaine. Secrets opened in New York at the Fulton Theatre on 25 December 1922, and ran through May 1923, for 168 performances. The play was also adapted for films released in 1924 and 1933. It was also adapted for Australian radio in 1925.
Secrets Worth Knowing
Secrets Worth Knowing is a 1798 comedy play by the British writer Thomas Morton. The original Covent Garden cast included William Thomas Lewis as Rostrum, John Quick as Nicholas, Joseph George Holman as Egerton, Alexander Pope as Greville, Joseph Shepherd Munden as Undermine, John Fawcett as April, Thomas Knight as Plethora, Charles Farley as Valet, James Thompson as Cook and Isabella Mattocks as Sally.
Seduction
Seduction is a 1787 comedy play by the British writer Thomas Holcroft. The original Drury Lane cast included Thomas King as Mr Wilmot, John Philip Kemble as Lord Morden, James Aickin as General Burland, John Palmer as Sir Frederic Fashion, Jane Pope as Mrs Modely, Priscilla Breretton as Emily, Sarah Maria Wilson as Harriet, Charlotte Tidswell as Mrs Pinup and Elizabeth Farren as Lady Morden.
Seduction
This all-male adaptation reshapes La Ronde as ten linked encounters among a sex worker, sailor, gardener, young gentleman, professor, partner, teenager, playwright, actor, and movie producer.
See How They Run
In a 1943 English vicarage, former actress Penelope and her husband Lionel are caught in a farcical chain of impersonations after Penelope's actor friend Clive disguises himself as a visiting vicar. A German spy steals the vicar's clothes, while a drunken churchgoer, the real visiting vicar and the Bishop arrive, producing a succession of mistaken identities before Clive and the maid Ida foil the spy.
See Rock City
After the Allied victory in World War II, a young Kentucky couple confronts hidden truths and tries to find solutions to the challenges of postwar life.
Seeds
A documentary investigation follows Monsanto’s legal battle with Saskatchewan farmer Percy Schmeiser. Interviews, scientific evidence, and courtroom arguments probe the ownership of seeds and competing accounts of how patented crops reached his fields.
Seethaswayamvaram
The Aattakatha follows Rama and Lakshmana from their departure with Viswamitra through the defeat of demons, Rama’s winning of Sita in marriage, and the confrontation with Parasurama on the journey home. The currently performed selection often centers on the final encounter.
Seidman and Son
Morris Seidman, a New York garment manufacturer, navigates his relationships with his wife, son, and daughter in this family comedy adapted from Elick Moll's novel.
Sejanus His Fall
A tragedy about Lucius Aelius Sejanus, the favored official of Roman emperor Tiberius, and his fall from power.
Sekidera Komachi
At the end of her life, the impoverished poet Ono no Komachi speaks with the abbot of Sekidera about poetry. A child’s Tanabata dance inspires her to dance until dawn and reflect on life’s transience.
Selimus
Selimus plots against his father Bajazet to seize the Ottoman crown, then wages a succession struggle against his brothers. Through deception, poisoning and murder, he eradicates his family rivals and claims the throne.
Selling Kabul
Selling Kabul is a 2019 American play by Sylvia Khoury. Set in 2013, the play centers a former interpreter for the U.S. Military during the War in Afghanistan forced to choose between witnessing the birth of his child or staying in hiding as a target of the Taliban. The play was a finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Semar Gugat
After Arjuna cuts off a lock of his hair at the demand of the demon queen Durga, the wayang figure Semar seeks redress from the gods and gains a kingdom of his own. He later challenges Arjuna and the possessed Srikandi as their rule brings suffering to the people. The play’s 30 scenes use this conflict to criticize abuses of power.
Semi-Detached
In the Midlands, Fred Midway devotes himself to climbing the social ladder. His plans to gain acceptance in the local community initially backfire before ultimately succeeding.
Semi-Monde
In the public rooms of a Paris hotel from 1925 to 1927, a changing group of socialites engage in rendezvous, affairs, quarrels and reconciliations. The play includes queer couples and exposes hypocrisy and sexual repression amid its decadent social world. In the second act, entangled affairs culminate in a shooting before the turmoil settles into a restoration of heterosexual order.
Seminar
Set in present-day New York City, Seminar follows four young writers — Kate, Martin, Douglas, and Izzy — and their professor, Leonard. Each student has paid Leonard $5,000 for a ten-week writing seminar to be held in Kate's Upper West Side apartment. As tensions arise and romance falls, they clash over their writing, their relations, and their futures.
Sensation
Sensation is a 1931 thriller play by the British writer Charles Bennett. It ran for 59 performances at the Lyceum Theatre in London's West End. The cast included Eve Gray, Sam Livesey, Roger Livesey, Henry Cass and Edgar Norfolk.
Sense and Sensibility
Elinor and Marianne Dashwood navigate family obligations, money and romance in Kate Hamill’s stage adaptation of Jane Austen’s novel.
Separate Tables
A pair of one-act plays set in the same Bournemouth hotel: Table by the Window follows a disgraced politician and his ex-wife as they cautiously reconcile; Table Number Seven follows a repressed young woman who befriends and falls in love with a man hiding sexual harassment allegations.
Septima
An adulating political intriguer lives off a politician and quickly denounces him once his influence wanes.
Serenading Louie
The story involves two couples, appearing to live well in identical houses in the suburbs. However, neither couple is happy in their marriage. An affair is being carried on secretly within this foursome, leading to a very violent conclusion.
Serious Money
The plot follows Scilla and Jake who are enjoying the pleasures and the comforts of the upper class. But the story climaxes when Jake Todd turns up murdered during the first few scenes due to his underground trading. Scilla takes it upon herself to find her brother's killer and the money he was dealing. She later finds out that he was being investigated by the Department of Trade and Industry. Though she does not find the killer, she finds the American business woman Marylou Banes with whom Jake was dealing. Marylou Banes offers her a fresh start. The story takes place around the stock market troubles in Britain. Aside from that a second story follows Billy Corman's and Zac Zackerman's attempt to take over the Albion company from Duckett. In between this takeover Corman attempts to get Jacinta Condor and Nigel Ajibala [who are the foreigners with an interest in his takeover] to buy shares in his company. They support Corman but decide to give their bid to Duckett in the end. The plot ends with Greville Todd in jail, Corman appointed as a Lord, and Scilla happily working for Marylou Banes.
Serjeant Musgrave's Dance
A deserter sergeant and three soldiers arrive in a northern English mining town in 1879, pretending to recruit workers while intending to denounce colonial violence after the death of their comrade Billy Hicks. Musgrave prepares a public demonstration that escalates toward mass retaliation, but a death among the soldiers and Annie's intervention disrupt the plan; the dragoons arrest the survivors.
Sertorius
A historical drama about the revolt of Quintus Sertorius, with Sertorius, Aristie and Viriate as its central figures.
Service
The fortunes of the Service family, owners of a department store, are affected by the Great Depression.
Sesostris
Sesostris is a 1728 tragedy by the British writer John Sturmy. It is based on the life of the Ancient Egyptian ruler Sesostris. The original Lincoln's Inn Fields cast included Anthony Boheme as Omar, Lacy Ryan as Sesostris, William Milward as Phanes and Thomas Chapman as Dion, John Ogden as Ammon, Anne Berriman as Nitocris and Elizabeth Younger as Ariaspe.
Sethona
In the temple of Osiris, Sethona, former fiancée of Menes, is distraught by Amasis usurping the Egyptian throne and potentially having killed Menes and Seraphis and trying to forcefully marry her. Orus, high priest of Osiris comforts her by telling her that a vision tells him that Egypt would be rightfully restored by Menes and his followers. Myrtaeus tries to comfort Sethona, but she persists. Orus warns Amasis for trying to make the nuptial happen when invasion from Ethiopia might be near, yet Amasis dismisses his supposed divine oracles. Amasis tries to woo Sethona, making many promises, but Sethona rejects his advances. Meanwhile, Menes is revealed to be alive and well in the temple, and he plans a scheme to take back Egypt from Amasis. At Sethona's apartment, Sethona meets Menes. Menes tells Sethona what happened, that when he was arrested during their wedding ceremony, he was against his will locked in a cell, but was rescued by Orus. Knowing it was an escape unknown to Amasis, Sethona tries to hide Menes, but he is almost caught by an officer. Otanes, having seen this, suggests to Menes to abandon Sethona to the king for a greater cause, the abolition of tyranny of Amasis and restoring Seraphis to the throne. Otanes also reveals that Seraphis, contrary to the rumours, is alive and well in Ethiopia. But Menes vehemently refuses the offer, and he is at risk of being executed. Otanes also suggests that Sethona marry Amasis, but she again refuses. She pledges to get Amasis to retract his execution order, but Amasis refuses. Soon, Amasis chooses to instead banish Menes from the palace. Back in Sethona's apartment, Menes is joined by Orus, who tries to proceed on his plan against Amasis during Amasis's nuptial ceremony. He is then joined by Seraphis. Seraphis soon meets Sethona and the two comforts each other and Seraphis tries to reveal his secrets to her. However, a sudden interruption by Amasis and Otanes breaks off the conversation. Amasis is soon informed by Myrtaeus of a revolt against him led by Menes and Amasis suspects the father of sethona was actually seraphis and is actually alive. Meanwhile, Sethona hears that Seraphis is slain during the conflict, which makes her worry that Menes is also slain, leading to her distress. Menes is rejoined with Sethona. In the catacombs, Seraphis is again revealed to be alive; however, mortally wounded. He is joined by Otanes, while Seraphis delivers his dying message. Seraphis is antagonized by Myrtaeus but he soon joins Seraphis's side. Seraphis is found by Sethona in a tomb and Seraphis reveals that when the rebellion succeeds he wish to make Menes the king of Egypt. While Sethona confesses her love of Menes, it is revealed by her father Seraphis that Menes is his son, which means he is her brother. Sethona faints from the shock that her love was incestuous this whole time. Sethona's heart grows cold after knowing the truth. However, she refuses to part ways with her father. Sethona, even after knowing the truth, lives happily ever after now that Amasis has been put away and Egypt being restored.
Settled Out of Court
Settled Out of Court is a 1960 comedy thriller play by William Saroyan and Henry Cecil. It appeared at the Strand Theatre in London's West End with a cast including Nigel Patrick, Maxine Audley, Charles Heslop, Eric Pohlmann, John Stratton, Philip Guard and Mary Hignett. Patrick also directed the work. Adapted from Cecil's own 1959 novel Settled Out of Court, the whole play takes place in the study of a high court judge Sir George Halliday. Although it received very poor reviews from critics, it was a popular success and ran for nearly a year.
Seven
Seven dramatic monologues, developed from interviews with women activists in seven countries, present their struggles for women’s and girls’ rights and well-being. The playwrights shaped the accounts into a unified documentary script.
Seven Against Thebes
As the Argive army led by seven champions attacks Thebes, King Eteocles consults with the city's women and assigns defenders to the gates. When he learns that his brother Polynices commands the assault at the seventh gate, Eteocles resolves to fight him; the brothers kill each other, and the chorus mourns them.
Seven Chances
Jimmie Shannon stands to inherit twelve million dollars if he marries before his thirtieth birthday. When he learns of the condition one day before the deadline, his seven attempts to find a bride become the play's central comic predicament.
Seven Days
Seven Days is a three-act play written in 1909 by Avery Hopwood and Mary Roberts Rinehart. It is a farce based on Rinehart's 1908 novella of the same name, which had been expanded into a bestselling 1909 novel titled When a Man Marries. Producers Lincoln Wagenhals and Collin Kemper asked Rinehart to adapt the novella for the stage. Since she had not written a play before, she agreed to work with Avery Hopwood, a young playwright with just one produced play, to create the script. Wagenhals and Kemper staged the play at the Astor Theatre on Broadway, where it premiered on November 10, 1909. The production was a hit that played for 397 performances. The play's success led Hopwood to a highly successful career as an author of comedies and enabled Wagenhals and Kemper to retire. Rinehart and Hopwood would later collaborate on two other hit plays, Spanish Love and The Bat, both also produced by Wagenhals and Kemper, who came out of retirement. In 1925 the play was adapted into a silent film of the same name starring Lillian Rich and Creighton Hale.
Seven Deadly Sins Four Deadly Sinners
An anthology evening built around the seven deadly sins from a female perspective, mixing comedy, drama, tall tales, poetry and stories performed by four actresses drawn from a rotating company.
Seven Doors
Eleven darkly comic sketches trace personal desperation and social decline, portraying people whose lives are stripped of dignity against a shared sense of approaching destruction.
Seven Guitars
The play begins with the characters mourning the death of their friend, blues singer Floyd "Schoolboy" Barton in the backyard of Vera's split-level apartment, where she, Louise, and Hedley live. After the first scene, the play proceeds with the events of the previous week. Just released from 90 days in a workhouse (on a trumped-up charge of vagrancy), Floyd returns to his former lover Vera's apartment. Vera distrusts Floyd after his relationship with another woman during a recording session in Chicago. That recording session—with guitarist Canewell and drummer Red Carter—resulted in Floyd's first hit song, "That's All Right", which plays throughout the play. Vera rejects Floyd's invitation to come to Chicago with him as he records a follow-up song. Louise receives a letter from her niece Ruby, who writes that she's moving north from Alabama after relationship issues. Hedley, who raises and slaughters fowl in the backyard, has an advanced tuberculosis infection. He reproaches Louise for recommending he go to the local, newly integrated, sanitarium, believing that he'll be a "big man" when an angelic Buddy Bolden grants him a promised family fortune. Canewell—resenting Floyd for his budding stardom and fearing Chicago's over-zealous police—rebuffs Floyd's invitation to record more music in Chicago. The next day, Louise talks with Vera, and supports her suspicions of Floyd, recounting her own relationship with a flighty man. Red Carter arrives with cigars to celebrate the birth of his son with Canewell and Floyd. They sing and discuss women, going to Chicago, and guns, with Hedley intermittently joining the conversation, including to argue—against Red Carter and Floyd's notion of self-advancement in the absence of an active God—that the Bible foretells a black vengeance against oppressive whites a la the Lion of Judah. Later, the characters gather to listen to a Joe Louis fight on the radio. As the characters are chatting and playing whist following the fight, Ruby unexpectedly arrives, drawing both Canewell and Red Carter's flirtation. They discuss the neighbor's rooster, noting how out of place and annoying its crowing is in the city environment. Despite saying that the rooster is the king of the barnyard, like the black man, Hedley suddenly retrieves the rooster and slits its throat with his tools. The first act ends with his monologue about how the group's complaining about the rooster and its antiquated role meant that they no longer deserved it, drawing comparisons to black men in toto. Ruby and Hedley talk, with Hedley recounting how he killed a man for not calling him "King", a name—based on Buddy Bolden—that his father called him. He propositions Ruby to give him a child, but she declines due to the age gap. Floyd faces down bureaucratic intransigence from the workhouse—which owes him $0.30 pay for each day there, but which requires a specific form—and the pawnshop—where he sold his good guitar. Though his song became a hit, Floyd didn't negotiate a contract that would reward him for its success, so he lacks enough money for the guitar, the bus fare to Chicago, and a gravestone for his mother. Ruby reveals that she came north after her ex-partner Elmore—who she left for his possessive behavior—killed her new partner Leroy in cold blood. She is also pregnant, but doesn't know by which man. Floyd negotiates an advance with his white manager, T.L. Hall, who promises to meet with him the next morning to help him buy back his guitar. When he fails to appear, Floyd learns from Red Carter that Hall has abandoned the city after being found out for a long-term insurance fraud scheme. In despair, Floyd leaves the yard, declaring that he will make it to Chicago. The next day, no one knows where he went, despite Vera, Canewell, and Red Carter's attempts to find him. Hedley delivers a long monologue about his father, recounting how he once beat Hedley when he asked why his father wasn't a "big man" who fought the system like Toussaint Louverture. After Hedley apologized to his father on his deathbed, he learned that he had already passed. Later, his father came to him in a dream to apologize for dying before forgiving him and promise that Buddy Bolden would bestow Hedley a fortune. Still fearing the sanitarium and that white men would involuntarily commit him to it, Hedley goes to his boss, who gifts him a machete. Later, Hedley is riven with paroxysms of paranoia and despair over the treatment of black men until Ruby, hearing the noise, comes and soothes him, before succumbing to his sexual advances. Floyd returns after two days, showing Vera a new guitar and telling of his planned performance for Mother's Day at the local club. He also shows her how he bought them both bus tickets to Chicago, expressing his need for her and asking that she accompany him. Vera reveals that she herself had gone to the station earlier to buy her own one-way ticket from Chicago to Pittsburgh, as an expression of her conditional re-commitment to Floyd. As the women ready for the band's Mother's Day performance, Ruby confides to the others that she plans to have Hedley father her child, as the only man who wanted to provide for, rather than possess, her. She had also accompanied him to church and convinced him to go to the sanitarium the next week. Canewell enters, and reads aloud a newspaper story about the neighbor's son Poochie, who was arrested for robbing the local convenience store. When left alone, Vera tells Canewell of her reconciliation with Floyd, to which he responds with a bittersweet monologue about his own unrequited love for her. The band's performance is a major success, with the club crowded with patrons. Afterward, Canewell notices an uprooted goldenseal plant in the garden and finds $1,200 buried underneath. Floyd demands it from him and they fight over it briefly, before Floyd pulls his gun. Canewell realizes that this was his score from Poochie's convenience store robbery and relents. A drunk Hedley discovers Floyd with the money and thinks that he's Buddy Bolden. Floyd pushes Hedley to the ground after he tries to take the money. Hedley leaves and returns to slash Floyd's throat with his machete. The last scene of the play continues the first, with the characters after Floyd's burial. The police had questioned Canewell and Louise on his murder, but didn't know who committed the crime. The play ends with Hedley repeatedly singing Jelly Roll Morton's "I Heard Buddy Bolden Say".
Seven Jewish Children
In a seven-scene litany spanning roughly seventy years, adults debate what to tell children about the Holocaust and the Israeli–Arab conflict, culminating in the 2008–09 Gaza war. Repeated commands to “tell her” and “don’t tell her” frame a struggle to protect children while confronting violence.
Seven Keys to Baldpate
Novelist Billy Magee bets he can write a 10,000-word story in 24 hours and isolates himself in a winter resort, believing he has its only key. A parade of unexpected visitors disrupts him as he uncovers a plan to steal money; at midnight he discovers his friend hired actors to stage a hoax, and realizes the entire episode has become his story.
Seven Minutes in Heaven
Six high-school freshmen gather on a Friday night for party games, awkward first kisses and tentative romance amid the exhilaration and pain of adolescence.
Seven Other Children
Nine actors discuss Palestinian children across scenes set in periods of recent history. Stirling wrote the play as a response to Caryl Churchill’s Seven Jewish Children, aiming to provide context to a debate and to show Palestinian children as victims of distorted education about Israel.
Seventeen
In a small Indiana town, seventeen-year-old Willie Baxter falls for visiting Lola Pratt and tries to impress her as an adult. His schemes, including borrowing his father's dress suit, are repeatedly thwarted by his family and friends, and he eventually recognizes that his infatuation is one-sided.
Seventh Heaven
During World War I in France, young Diane falls in love with Chico; the play's setting spans Paris and Heaven.
Sevil
In 1918–19, Sevil is abandoned by her husband Balash, who despises her after she bears a daughter and takes up with a singer. After Balash's new household rejects her, Sevil joins the revolutionary movement; years later, she returns from study in Moscow and is reunited with her daughter as Balash is left behind.
Sex
Montreal sex worker Margy tries to escape her pimp and later travels with naval officer Gregg. She becomes engaged to Jimmy, but his mother Clara is the society woman Margy once rescued; when Margy’s past is exposed, she leaves Jimmy and chooses to travel with Gregg.
Sex Tips for Straight Women from a Gay Man
At a book forum, gay author Dan uses advice from his book to try to open moderator Robyn to her sexuality and her attraction to Stefan, the seductive model assisting onstage.
Sex in the ’80s
Two architects meet again decades after a shared history in the 1980s while preparing for a professional competition in Toronto. As they revisit the past, their younger colleagues challenge their assumptions about work, relationships and the rules that govern them.
Sexo, pudor y lágrimas
A relationship comedy conceived around the sexual and emotional barriers among adults of Serrano’s generation, including machismo, miscommunication and the need for intimacy. Its minimalist staging places two apartments in one shared theatrical space.
Sexual Misconduct of the Middle Classes
After his third divorce, a novelist and star lecturer develops an attraction to a pupil, a major fan who lives nearby. The play examines their teacher-student relationship and the narrator’s self-loathing.
Sexual Perversity in Chicago
Two Chicago men and two women trade caustic views about sex and relationships; the romance between Danny and Deborah deteriorates under their inability to communicate.
Señora Carrar's Rifles
During the Spanish Civil War, Teresa Carrar tries to keep her sons from joining the fighting, but the pressure of the conflict ultimately draws her to the side of the oppressed.
Shabash Anarkali
Surinder Gulati’s Hindustani parody turns the Mughal-era romance of Prince Salim and Anarkali into comedy. The play’s irreverent treatment of Emperor Akbar drew criticism in Parliament, while the work was staged across India and broadcast on Doordarshan.
Shadow Play
Vicky Gayforth takes sleeping tablets after she and her husband Simon agree to divorce. In a drug-induced dream she revisits their courtship and marriage through shifting scenes, dances and songs; when she wakes, Simon’s concern rekindles their affection and they reconcile.
Shadow and Substance
In Ireland, a young caretaker’s sincere, unselfish Catholic faith brings the people around her back to first principles, challenging the institutional and personal distortions of religious belief.
Shadow of Heroes
Beginning in 1944, the play follows László Rajk and his wife Julia through anti-Nazi resistance, political imprisonment, a coerced false confession, Rajk’s execution and Julia’s later arrest after the Hungarian uprising.
Shadowlands
The story follows Lewis as he meets an American fan, Joy Gresham, whom he befriends and eventually marries. The story also focuses on his relationship with his brother, Warren Lewis and deals with his personal struggle: Lewis preaches that one should endure suffering with patience, but finds that the simple answers he had preached no longer apply when Joy becomes afflicted with cancer and eventually dies.
Shadows of a Great City
An orphan heiress is targeted by a cousin who plots to have her drowned and claim her fortune. After a sailor rescues and raises her, the cousin engineers the sailor’s imprisonment; a burglary and escape lead to the heiress’s rescue and the villain’s arrest.
Shadows of the Evening
In a Swiss hotel suite, Linda and Anne discuss the terminal cancer of George, Anne’s estranged husband and Linda’s lover. George reveals that he already knows he is dying and plans to spend his remaining time with both women, moving between Linda and his family with Anne.
Shahed Ma Shafsh Haga
Sarhan, a naive children's television presenter who fears women and avoids relationships, becomes the suspect in his neighbor's murder. As a witness at the trial, his fearful answers prompt him to change his life, but he rejects his new persona after the inspector reminds him of the children who enjoy his program.
Shakes versus Shav
In a ten-minute puppet comedy, Shakespeare and Shaw bicker over whose writing is superior, trade blows and compare their works; Shaw stages a mock contest between Macbeth and Rob Roy before the two writers debate the value of their art.
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