8284 shows
Clear filtersAt a court entertainment for Prince Charles, the ghost of Captain Cox rides a hobby horse and presents six owls who had once been men. Their identities satirize London tradesmen and a language teacher whose hopes rested on the Spanish Match.
A mistress witch and eleven disciples perform a disruptive anti-masque before the House of Fame appears with twelve virtuous queens. Their spectacle contrasts disorder and witchcraft with the idealized royal order represented by Queen Anne as Bel-Anna.
For the wedding festivities of Princess Elizabeth and Frederick V, Mercury and Iris present mythological knights and dancing anti-masques of Naiads, Hyades, Cupids, statues and rustic figures in a court spectacle grounded in Greek mythology.
Across the Battersea Arts Centre’s Old Town Hall, audiences roam through an immersive collage inspired by eight Edgar Allan Poe stories. Overlapping scenes, dance, detailed sets, and props evoke a plague-struck world without a single central narrative.
The Masquerade is a 1719 comedy play by the British writer Charles Johnson. The original Drury Lane cast included Robert Wilks as Sir George Jealous, Thomas Elrington as Ombre, Joe Miller as Smart, Colley Cibber as Masquerader, Henry Norris as Whisper, Anne Oldfield as Sophronia, Sarah Thurmond as Lady Frances Ombre and Christiana Horton as Caelia.
A British politician swaps places with his journalist cousin, who is his double, leaving the politician’s wife torn when she falls in love with the man she believes to be her husband.
During the French Wars of Religion, the Duke of Guise helps orchestrate the massacre of Huguenots in Paris. Henry of Navarre escapes, later joins forces against the Catholic League, and becomes king after Henry III is assassinated.
The Massacre of Paris is a 1689 tragedy by the English writer Nathaniel Lee. It was first staged by the United Company at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. It is based around the 1572 St. Bartholomew's Day massacre which led the killing of many Huguenots during the French Wars of Religion. The events had previously been portrayed in Christopher Marlowe's Elizabethan play The Massacre at Paris. The original Drury Lane cast included William Mountfort as Charles IX of France, Joseph Williams as Duke of Guise, Edward Kynaston as Cardinal of Lorrain, Joseph Harris as Alberto Gondi, William Bowen as Lignoroles, Thomas Betterton as Admiral of France, John Bowman as Genius, John Freeman as Cavagnes, John Verbruggen as Langoiran, Mary Betterton as Queen Mother, Elizabeth Barry as Marguerite and Frances Maria Knight as Queen of Navarre. Henry Purcell provided the incidental music. It was the most stridently anti-Catholic play of the period, and as such harked back to an earlier era. The first performance was attended by the new Queen Mary who had recently come to the throne as part of the Glorious Revolution that overthrew her Catholic father James II.
Halvard Solness, a successful but fearful builder, is unsettled by the arrival of Hilda Wangel, who urges him to fulfill a promise by climbing the tower of his new home. He climbs before a crowd and falls to his death.
Google's Sidewalk Labs and Waterfront Toronto attempt to create a technology-driven neighbourhood on the city's waterfront. A satirical account of the project's collapse traces corporate ambition, public consultation, and the competing interests behind the proposed smart city.
An East India millionaire's business associates suffer mysterious personal and financial disasters. He and his love interest investigate the apparent conspiracy before he becomes its next victim; the play satirizes popular melodramas.
In a compressed drama set in Thornfield Hall, governess Jane is drawn to her difficult employer Rochester while his confined wife and a web of Gothic secrets threaten the household; the wife ultimately sets the mansion ablaze.
The Matchmaker is a 1954 Broadway play by Thornton Wilder, a rewritten version of his 1938 play The Merchant of Yonkers.
A jester and shepherd raise a maypole and dance before presenting gifts to the household audience. A nymph prepares the room for Venus, who dances a canary; Urania then summons woodland and stream nymphs for a May song and a dance devised by Rachel Fane.
During the Garrat elections carnival, Jerry Sneak is elected mayor and briefly tries to stand up to his domineering wife, who is being courted by Major Sturgeon. Sneak's resolve collapses when his wife cries, and the election's mock civic proceedings frame the domestic farce.
A group of soldiers under Don Lope of Figueroa stops in the town of Zalamea, where the captain of the troop, Don Alvaro, is housed by the wealthy farmer Pedro Crespo. Hearing about the military's plans, Pedro Crespo decides to hide his daughter and niece in the attic, knowing that when the military comes around, honors are often ruined. However, Don Alvaro arrives with the intention of seeing Isabel, for he has heard the rumors of her beauty. Housed by Pedro Crespo, Don Alvaro devises a plan to fake a fight with Rebolledo and have him run away into the attic in order to catch a glimpse at Isabel and ascertain for himself whether the rumors about her beauty are true. The plan works, although the ruckus brings the attention of the general, Don Lope of Figueroa. Don Lope decides to stay at Pedro's house, and they develop an instant dislike for each other. Don Lope brashly declares that he would hang anyone who might bring any slight harm to his men. Pedro makes the same vow for anyone who would besmirch his honor, stating that honor is the connection to the soul and thus to God. They part ways, each thinking the other overtly stubborn. The day Alvaro marches his men out of Zalamea, he decides to leave them under the supervision of a subordinate and return for Isabel. Juan has also decided to depart and become a soldier under Don Lope's forces. Having come out of the house with her family to send her brother off, Isabel is taken by the captain; a few of his men help and prevent Pedro Crespo and Ines from helping her. Juan, having not gone far, hears the cries of anguish and returns to assist, not knowing that it is his father or sister that are being attacked. Isabel, who has been raped by Don Alvaro, wanders around until she finds her father. She tells him what happened to her, including how her brother injured Don Alvaro. Both desire death, knowing that their honor is ruined, but Pedro brings his daughter back to town. Once there, Pedro discovers that he has been elected mayor and that King Philip II is to arrive in town the next day. He also finds out that the soldiers are still there in town trying to mend Don Alvaro's wound. Pedro, as a father, goes to Don Alvaro and begs him to marry his daughter, offering any amount of his fortune he desires as dowry. Enraged, Don Alvaro refuses. Pedro arrests Don Alvaro, deciding to take matters legally. Pedro, acting as mayor, also arrests Juan upon his return for his assault on an officer. Hearing of Don Alvaro's arrest, Don Lope returns to Zalamea prepared to storm the jail. At this moment, the King arrives. After being told the facts, the King decides that the law has been followed, but that the accused must be tried elsewhere. Pedro then reveals that justice has already taken place, opening the door to show that Don Alvaro has already been executed by garrote. Pedro argues that it does not matter who executes a man that is to die anyway, a logic with which the King cannot argue. Pedro is then appointed permanent mayor of Zalamea. Juan is pardoned and returns to Don Lope's army. Isabel decides to go to a convent in order to restore her honor with God.
At a movie studio, an elderly security guard tries to stop a producer from destroying a set of model cities, persuading him to preserve it.
In a present-day bookshop, Olaudah Equiano connects a debate about a book on slavery to the Zong massacre and the insurance trial that followed. He persuades abolitionists to pursue a criminal prosecution and confronts the experiences of enslaved women aboard the ship, including one who survived being thrown overboard.
An imagined meeting in a Harlem hotel in 1965 brings Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X together during the civil rights movement.
Russian Jewish immigrant David Quixano, whose family was killed in a pogrom, hopes to compose a symphony for a society beyond ethnic divisions; he falls in love with Vera, whose father led the attack on his family.
Twelve-year-old Frankie Addams feels disconnected from her small Southern town and hopes to join her brother and his bride on their honeymoon in Alaska. With her closest companions, Berenice Sadie Brown and John Henry West, she negotiates belonging, identity, and the disappointment of a fantasy that cannot come true.
A court masque presented for Princess Elizabeth and Frederick V's wedding festivities, featuring Virginia-themed sun-worshipping princes who honor the couple and accept Christianity, alongside an anti-masque of baboons and allegorical figures.
In a black comedy about bureaucracy and conformity, an organization introduces Ptydepe, a constructed language intended to make communication more efficient. The language instead impedes work, and director Josef Gross’s efforts to understand a memorandum in Ptydepe lead him into conflict with his deputy and the organization’s shifting rules.
Three sisters, Teresa, Mary, and Catherine, gather before their mother's funeral, each haunted by her own demons. The play focusses on how each sister deals with the death and how it directly affects her. The three each have different memories of the same events, causing constant bickering about whose memories are true. As the three women meet after years of separation, all their hidden lies and self-betrayals are about to reach the surface. A theme of the play is, eponymously, memory. The sisters' memories interact with each other, and show that despite synchronicities of time and place they cannot agree upon one unifying experience. This is echoed in Vi's final speech, which portrays Alzheimer's disease as being adrift among a series of islands of your own identity. The sisters drift around their own islands of memory, unable to agree on one particular point, and yet are unified by their familial bond (Vi comments that "some things stay in your bones"). The play exhibits the unity of time, place, and character present in a tragedy, as the play seems to take place at one time, in one space, and without change in the characters' outlooks. However, because the comedy is so often interspersed with the tragic, it may be considered a tragi-comedy.
Characters introduced 35 years previously during The Boys in the Band are reunited. The group is brought back together at the funeral of Larry, who died of pancreatic cancer. They revisit the same apartment in Manhattan as the first play, and again begin talking and arguing. The dialog and story is relayed in "real time". New characters include Scott, a younger man dating Michael, who is poorly received by the group. Michael angrily defends Scott, and yells at the new character Jason, a "strident young activist" who had been romantically involved with Larry. Emory and Harold get involved in the arguments, while non-combative characters include Donald, Bernard, and Rick, a male nurse who had been harboring feelings for Larry.
In a budget hotel room, middle-aged manager Ted develops a utopian plan to change society, testing his friendship with Morrie.
Wesker’s two-act reworking centers on Shylock as a good man and close friend of Antonio. They share a love of knowledge and opposition to their community’s antisemitism; Shylock’s demand for a pound of flesh begins as a jest he cannot retract, and both men are relieved when the court denies it.
The Merchant of London is an 1832 historical play by the British writer Thomas James Serle. It premiered at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on 26 April 1832. The original cast included William Macready as Scroope, Henry John Wallack as Edward Beaufort, John Cooper as Richard Fitzalan, John Pritt Harley as Flaw, and Paul Bedford as Bloodmore. It takes place in Elizabethan London.
When merchant Antonio guarantees a loan for his friend Bassanio, the lender Shylock demands a pound of Antonio's flesh if it is not repaid. Bassanio wins Portia's hand, and Portia disguises herself as a lawyer to intervene at Antonio's trial.
The Merchant of Yonkers is a 1938 play by Thornton Wilder.
Set on September 12, the play follows Ben, a World Trade Center employee who was away during the attacks, as he considers exploiting his family’s belief that he died to begin a new life with his mistress, Abby, who is also his boss.
This synopsis is based on the 1946 published play. The setting throughout is said to be "any large American city, other than New York", with Boston or Philadelphia the likeliest candidates for a two-week tryout run, and what the author has in mind. Act I Scene 1 (Living room of a suite in an excellent hotel. Monday at 11:30pm.) Clem sits in his suite after the first tryout of his new play. George brings a case of whiskey instead of a bottle; he knows theatre people have many unexpected visitors. Bertha enters and calmly accepts that her second-act lines will have to be cut. Bertha and Clem discuss adultery, the subject of his new play. He is surprised to learn he was her only liaison, and she otherwise disapproves of it. Jessica calls Clem on the phone; she is in New York with their daughters. He asks if she considers him an immoral playwright and is stunned at her affirmative reply. Clem tells Bertha about meeting a Navy ensign and his girl in the tryout audience. Clem invites them up to his room when Thad calls from the lobby. Thad and Dee are introduced to Bertha. Dee talks about her father's admiration for Bertha's acting. The four get along so well that when Laura Musgrave calls Clem, he finagles an invitation for them to go to Laura's party. (Curtain) Act I Scene 2 (The same, 3:30am.) Dee and Clem bring the early newspaper editions back to his hotel room, after dropping Thad off at the train station. They read the reviews by the local drama critics: two are positive, and one decries the lack of "action". They discuss their lives and develop a rapport. Dee urges Clem to come tour a local art museum with her that afternoon, and they agree to meet for lunch at the hotel bar. As she leaves to take a taxi home, Clem impulsively kisses her. (Curtain) Act II Scene 1 (The hotel bar, Tuesday at noon.) Bertha and the Elderly Gentleman discuss her part being reduced. He is outraged about the change, his protests heard by Clem and Dee who have just come in for lunch. Bertha takes her admirer away, but Dee and Clem are soon interrupted by Betty James. She thrusts herself upon them, inveigling free tickets from Clem, while dropping Thad's name into the conversation to let Clem know Dee has a fiancé. Betty leaves, making a veiled threat to Dee about telling Mrs. Matthews where her daughter is and with whom. Mrs. Matthews comes to the bar to ask Dee to call her Red Cross supervisor, having been alerted by Betty James. While Clem takes a phone call, Dee and Mrs. Matthews discuss the impropriety of the situation and the likelihood of Betty spreading rumors. To forestall her, Mrs. Matthews invites Clem to dinner on Friday. (Curtain) Act II Scene 2 (Mrs. Matthews' house, Friday at 10:30pm.) Having finished dinner, Clem, Mrs. Matthews and Dee relax in the living room. Also present are Betty and Professor James, and the bibulous Luther. The Professor and Luther badger Clem about his new play and his opinions on other playwrights, while Betty makes suggestions the adultery in Clem's play reflects his own predilections, with side glances at Dee. The latter is convinced her mother arranged this fracas to put Clem off, rather than to stop Betty's rumor-mongering. Clem, however, handles the aggravation adroitly, and offers to guide the staggering Luther back to their hotel. Afterwards, Mrs. Matthews admits to Dee that he behaved much better than the other guests. When she goes to bed, Dee calls a taxi to take her to the hotel. (Curtain) Act II Scene 3 (The hotel bar, around midnight.) Throughout this scene, two nearby tables are occupied: a Girl and a Man at one, and a Drunk at another, while a Waiter serves the customers. None of these characters has more than a few lines, and they have no effect other than as background ambience. At the center table, Bertha and Clem talk about Dee. Bertha probes Clem's intentions towards her. He denies being a cradle-snatcher, but she is unconvinced, and warns him not to trifle with her. They are startled to see Dee come into the bar. Dee confirms Clem's recounting of the dinner. Bertha gets a telephone call from her Colonel and has to leave. Dee tells Clem she is falling in love with him. He tries to bluff her out of it but fails. She candidly confesses she is not a virgin, so he shouldn't worry about that. Luther barges into the bar, having left his hotel room where Clem deposited him. He tries to hit on Dee but is chased off. Clem then fends off Dee's advances and sends her home. (Curtain) Act III Scene 1 (Park across from hotel, early Saturday morning.) Clem encounters Dee sitting on a bench. She has been waiting, thinking he might come out to the park. He tells her about his wife and daughters. Tentatively, Dee asks if she might visit him in New York. Clem gives her a qualified yes; he isn't quite sure they understand each other. After Dee leaves, Bertha sits next to him and tells her sad story. She spent the night with the Colonel in her hotel room, only to find out in the morning he has a wife and family in Wyoming, and was now on his way there having received his discharge. (Curtain) Act III Scene 2 (Same as Act I, that afternoon.) Clem is visited by Mrs. Matthews. Dee has told her she is thinking of going to New York. Mrs. Matthews expresses her concern to Clem that he will ruin Dee's life; she knows there can be no real future there for Dee. Clem is disingenuous at first, but admits he hasn't discouraged Dee from the notion that she might fit into his world. After she leaves, Thad comes up to the hotel room. Betty has attached herself to him, bringing books for Clem to autograph. She is pushed out, and Thad delivers his plea to Clem: don't encourage Dee to stray from home. Jessica calls Clem; their daughter Joan wants to see his new play for her 15th birthday so they will come on Monday. As Clem hangs up, Dee shyly enters his room. She has brought a sketch of Clem she drew herself. Clem now discourages her from any thought of an affair or New York. She bursts into tears, but realizes he won't fall in love with her. Dee tears the sketch in half. Bertha phones to invite Clem to lunch, as Dee slips out of the room, exchanging painful glances with Clem. As he speaks with Bertha, Clem tears the sketch into tiny pieces. (Curtain)
Sir Arthur Clare delays his daughter Milliscent's marriage while she resists a nunnery and considers her love for Frank Jerningham. Raymond Mounchensey seeks to court her, enlisting magician Peter Fabell's help; their plot and a separate thieves' scheme converge before Milliscent confesses she has married Raymond.
John John suspects his domineering wife Tib of an affair with the local priest, Sir John. Tib and the priest trick him into doing household chores while they eat a pie together; John eventually throws them out, then follows them in renewed anxiety.
Falstaff tries to profit by courting the married Mistresses Ford and Page, who discover his identical letters and set out to trick and humiliate him. At the same time, their daughter Anne pursues her own choice of husband despite her parents’ competing plans.
The Metamorphosis is a 1783 comedy play by the Irish writer William Jackson. The original Drury Lane cast included James William Dodd as Toupee, Richard Suett as Sir Charles Freeman, John Hayman Packer as Mr Marlow, William Barrymore as Freeman and Mary Ann Wrighten as Mary.
Young people and workers at a Toronto youth shelter describe daily life, difficult histories, and uncertain futures. Their recorded words form a documentary portrait of the relationships and systems surrounding youth homelessness.
The Midnight Caller is a play by American playwright Horton Foote. The work was first performed in 1957 as part of a student production at the Neighborhood Playhouse with a cast including Robert Duvall. It had its professional premiere Off-Broadway at the Sheridan Square Playhouse where it opened on July 2, 1958. Directed by Leo Penn, the opening night cast included Mary James as Alma, Rebecca Dark as Cutie, Mary Perry as Rowena, Nora Dunfree as Mrs. Crawford, Justin Reed as Ralph, Patricia Frye as Helen, and Robert Morris as Harvey.
The Midnight Hour is a 1787 comedy play by the British actress and writer Elizabeth Inchbald. A farce, it premiered at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden in London on 22 May 1787. The original Covent Garden cast included William Thomas Lewis as The Marquis, John Quick as The General, Thomas Ryder as Sebastian, John Edwin as Nicolas, James Fearon as Mathias, James Thompson as Ambrose, Mary Wells as Julia, Lydia Webb as Cecily and Isabella Mattocks as Flora. The Irish premiere took place at the Smock Alley Theatre in Dublin on 17 December 1787.
The Midshipmaid is a 1931 British comedy play by Ian Hay and Stephen King-Hall, which ran for 227 performances at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London's West End. The following year Hay wrote a novel based on the play.
The story of former gang members in Newark, New Jersey.
At an Italian villa, dying widow Flora Goforth resists acknowledging her illness while engaging with the enigmatic Christopher Flanders, whom some regard as an opportunist and who says he helps people face mortality.
Epifania Ognisanti di Parerga, the richest woman in England (and possibly Europe), barges into the offices of solicitor Julius Sagamore wanting him to draw out a will leaving everything to her husband Alistair Fitzfassenden (an amateur tennis and boxing champion), and states that after the will is signed, she intends to kill herself. Sagamore manages to get her to calm down, and she explains her circumstances: before her father died and left her thirty million pounds, he had made her promise that if any man wanted to marry her, she was to give him one hundred fifty pounds and six months to turn it into fifty thousand; if the man failed, she was never to see him again. Alistair succeeded (by co-producing a hit play), but the marriage has since imploded to the point where Alistair is having a relationship with Patricia Smith (nicknamed "Polly Seedy-Stockings") and Epifania is spending time with Adrian Blenderbland (a self-styled intellectual and inveterate gourmand). Alistair and Polly arrive at Sagamore's office while Epifania is there wanting to discuss a possible separation between Alistair and Epifania, and Blenderbland also turns up also wanting to consult Sagamore. After a confusing consultation in which nothing gets resolved, Epifania leaves with Blenderbland to have lunch somewhere in the country and Alistair and Polly leave together (with Polly telling Sagamore that she fully intends to have Alistair for her own). Epifania and Blenderbland are at a rather run-down riverside establishment having just finished lunch. Epifania is cheerful, but Blenderbland is totally "out of temper" because of the horrible meal he has just had to endure. His bad mood leads to harsh words between the two, and when Blenderbland makes disparaging remarks about Epifania's late father (whom she still worships), she uses her knowledge of and skill at judo to throw him not only all over the room but down the stairs, after which she collapses in hysterics. She is found in that condition by an Egyptian doctor, who, seeing that her fit has subsided, rushes to Blenderbland's aid instead of staying with her (much to her astonishment) and later returns to inform her that the landlord is taking Blenderbland to the local hospital in her car. She becomes fascinated by the doctor and insists that he become her doctor, which he refuses. Her feminine wiles also have no effect on him, since "Women are neither interesting nor attractive to me except when they are ill. I know too much about them, inside and out," and he is completely dedicated to his work; however, as a case she does interest him. As they talk, Epifania becomes extremely interested in the doctor and tells him point-blank that she wants to marry him, She starts to tell him about her father's test, but he interrupts her to inform her that his late mother had made him promise to impose a similar test on any woman who wanted to marry him: he is supposed to give the woman two hundred piastres (approximately thirty shillings or one and a half pounds) and she is to make her living for six months with only that money and the clothes she is currently wearing. Epifania accepts the challenge (even though he has to borrow the two hundred piastres from her) and arranges for him to get the one hundred fifty pounds. She departs, leaving the doctor to wonder if she's not one of Allah's jokes on humanity (and on himself in particular). Epifania tries to get work at a sweatshop somewhere in London, but the owner and his wife are scared that she’s really a labor Inspector and try to bribe her off. In the course of their conversation, Epifania learns not only about the workings of the sweatshop but also the conditions most female workers have to exist under. She begins to suggest certain ideas to cut out the middlemen that the owner and his wife have to deal with and how the operation can be upgraded to make it more profitable for everyone. Epifania leaves (not finding much of a challenge for her here) to get a job elsewhere, but promising to return every so often to keep things running smoothly (in effect, taking control over the business from the owner and his wife); her intelligence and force of will are so powerful that the owner and his wife have no choice but to comply. Alistair and Polly are enjoying a quiet weekend at the riverside inn from Act Two which has been rebuilt and remodeled into a first-class hotel. The manager tells them the story about how a newly hired scullery-maid got control of the old inn, upgraded everything and eventually took over, forcing the old owners (his parents) out but giving him a well-paying job and making the business a major success. Alistair is horrified to discover that Epifania is the scullery-maid of the story and is about to beat a hasty retreat with Polly when Sagamore arrives with Blenderbland, who is still recovering from the injuries inflicted upon him by Epifania in Act Two. Blenderbland intends suing Epifania for damages and hospital costs, which Sagamore hopes Alistair and Polly can talk him out of. Epifania arrives and upon learning of Blenderbland's plan orders Sagamore to begin countersuit proceedings against Blenderbland, insisting that she will not submit to blackmail. Sagamore finally makes Blenderbland see that suing Epifania would be a waste of time; not only will her financial means outlast his, but a jury (presumably all-male) would have no sympathy with a man who had been thrashed by a woman. With that matter out of the way, Epifania finally decides to divorce Alistair on the grounds of spousal abuse (he had accidentally knocked her out with a solar plexus punch during a fight on their honeymoon) and announces her intention to find a man truly worthy of her. At that moment, the Egyptian doctor enters, having been summoned to attend Blenderbland, and Epifania announces her intention to marry him, having easily fulfilled the conditions of his mother’s test. However, the doctor has NOT fulfilled the terms of her father’s test; he has used the money to help the widow of his old medical teacher. It turns out that the teacher had invented a new type of filament but never filed for a patent on it, and the doctor had forced the company using the filament to compensate the inventor’s widow, thereby (in retrospect) investing in the discovery and making more than the required fifty thousand pounds. Blenderbland warns the doctor that in marrying Epifania he will be headed for trouble, but Epifania counters with, “What do the unmarried know of this infinitely dangerous heart tearing ever-changing life of adventure that we call marriage? Face it as you would face a dangerous operation: have you not performed hundreds of them?” The fact that the doctor has fallen in love with Epifania’s pulse (the strongest and steadiest he has ever encountered) settles the matter, and Epifania instructs Sagamore to arrange both her divorce and the marriage proceedings.
The Mineola Twins is a play by Paula Vogel with music by David Van Tieghem, which premiered Off-Broadway in 1999.
The Minister and the Mercer is an 1834 historical comedy play by the British writer Alfred Bunn. It premiered at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in London on 8 February 1834. The original cast included William Farren as Count Bertrand De Rauntzu, Charles James Mathews as Falkensteid, John Duruset as Count Berghen, William Dowton as Raton Burkenstaff, John Cooper as Eric Burkenstaff, Benjamin Nottingham Webster as John, Robert William Honner as Dorsten, Mrs. Sloman as Marie Julie, Ellen Kean as Christine and Julia Glover as Madame Burkenstaff. It was inspired by the 1833 French play Bertrand et Raton by Eugène Scribe. It takes place in Denmark in 1772 at time when Christian VII of Denmark was mad, and his physician takes virtual charge of the country leading to a coup to oust him.. It ran for forty one days.
A comedy satirizing the evangelical preacher George Whitefield.
Fonvizin’s comedy satirizes the brutal, selfish ignorance of the provincial gentry through Mitrofanushka, a vulgar and self-centered young man who gives no affection even to his doting mother. The play contrasts this family with idealized lovers and virtuous uncles.
The Minutes is a comedic play written by Tracy Letts. It had its premiere at the Steppenwolf Theater in Chicago on November 9, 2017, and began previews at the James Earl Jones Theatre in New York City on February 25, 2020. It was scheduled to open on March 15, 2020, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, production was suspended. The production ultimately opened on April 17, 2022, at Studio 54. In 2018, Letts was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, losing to Cost of Living by Martyna Majok. The play was also nominated for the 2022 Tony Award for Best Play, but lost to The Lehman Trilogy.
A wayward nun leaves her convent with a knight after being influenced by an evil minstrel. A living statue takes her place as she faces hardship and an accusation of witchcraft; the nun eventually returns with her dying infant and is forgiven.
In Tuscumbia, Alabama, an illness renders infant Helen Keller blind, deaf, and consequently mute (deaf-mute). Pitied and badly spoiled by her parents, Helen is taught no discipline and, by the age of six, grows into a wild, angry, tantrum-throwing child in control of the household. Desperate, the Kellers hire Annie Sullivan to serve as governess and teacher for their daughter. After several fierce battles with Helen, Annie convinces the Kellers that she needs two weeks alone with Helen in order to achieve any progress in the girl's education. In this time, Annie teaches Helen discipline through persistence and consistency, and language through hand signals, a double breakthrough that changes Helen's life and has a direct effect on the lives of everyone in the family.
Burns Mantle summarized the plot as follows in his 1920-21 Best Plays annual: "Irene Martin of Erie, Pa., comes to New York in search of work and a broader life. Falling in with the wrong crowd, she gives up the fight to be respectable and for seven years permits a traction magnate to maintain an apartment for her and help her care for the folks at home. By putting a Mrs. before her name she first convinces her family she is married, and later writes them she is a widow. Her Erie sweetheart, having got on in the world, comes to New York to get her. By this time she is tired of the life she is living and eager to return to Erie and respectability, but her sweetheart finds her out. She convinces him, however, that her reformation is complete and he is willing to overlook her past, but her traction magnate succeeds in planting a doubt in her mind that she will ever be able to stand Erie and its group after the magnificence and freedom she has been used to in New York. So she sends the Erie boy home to wait until she feels she is worthy to come to him." In response to those questioning the plausibility of the plot, Selwyn said it was based on "not at all uncommon" situations in New York.
The Mirror and the Light is a play by Hilary Mantel and Ben Miles based on Mantel's 2020 book of the same name. It is the third part to Wolf Hall Parts One & Two which is a double-bill play based on Mantel's novels Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies.
Alceste condemns the social hypocrisy around him yet loves Célimène, whose flirtatious conduct embodies the courtly manners he rejects. After she is revealed to have written similar love letters to several suitors, he asks her to leave society with him; she refuses, and he chooses exile.
Harpagon’s obsession with his hidden gold drives him to arrange marriages for his children while courting Mariane, who loves his son Cléante. When his cash box is stolen, the family’s competing romances and a mistaken confession lead to the discovery of long-lost relatives; Harpagon’s main concern remains recovering his money.
The Miser is a 1733 comedy play by the British writer Henry Fielding. It is an English-language adaptation of Molière's The Miser. It was a success, running for twenty five performances by May 1733. The original Drury Lane cast included Benjamin Griffin as Lovegold, Roger Bridgewater as Frederick, William Mills as Clerimont, Theophilus Cibber Ramilie, James Oates as Decoy, Edward Berry as Sparke and Christiana Horton as Mariana.
A fictionalized drama based on Walter Calverley's forced marriage traces the protagonist's descent into debauchery, ending before the murders Calverley committed in 1605.
The Misery of Civil War is a 1680 tragedy by the English writer John Crowne. It was originally staged by the Duke's Company at the Dorset Garden Theatre in London. The play was staged at the height of the Popish Plot, something Crowne addressed in his prologue. Although he states that "by his feeble skill 'tis built alone, The Divine Shakespeare did not lay one Stone" the plot in fact drew heavily on Henry VI, Part 2 and Part 3 The original cast included Joseph Williams as Henry VI of England, William Smith as Edward, John Bowman as Duke of Clarence, Thomas Gillow as Richard, Thomas Betterton as Earl of Warwick, Thomas Percival as Old Lord Clifford, John Wiltshire as Young Clifford, Mary Lee as Queen Margaret, Mary Betterton as Lady Grey and Elizabeth Currer as Lady Eleanor Butler.
Hughes's Senecan tragedy recounts Mordred's treachery and King Arthur's death through offstage action related by a chorus and messenger. Gorlois's ghost opens the play, and the dramatic method draws heavily on Seneca.
As they had done in The Ghost Breaker, the playwrights inserted a number of silent tableau after each act, where the curtain would open on a slightly changed scene, without any dialogue. The instructions for these are omitted here. Act I (The country home of John Cannell on the upper Hudson River. Just before 10pm.) Amy, Grace, Jane, and Helen insist Parker keeps his side of their wager; Helen has spent five days enticing Jack into proposing. Offstage, Mrs. Cannell is singing and playing a piano. When Stephen dances in they scold him: he was supposed to keep Mrs. Cannell occupied. Shortly before 10pm, Helen sits while the others hide. Jack appears to ask Helen for her answer. She feigns confusion; he confesses his feelings. But Babe and Spider interrupt by knocking at the French doors. The tipsy duo are lost; Jack sets them straight, but is also asked by Babe whether any islands are for sale? They depart, and impatient Jack presses Helen, saying he loves her. He proposes and the others suddenly appear, the girls exclaiming Helen won the wager. Jack learns that Helen wanted a part in Parker's new play. He will now cast her as she has proven her male-luring skill. Outwardly, Jack maintains a cool demeanor. Their host, John W. Connell arrives with Helen's fiancé, Henry Tracey, who becomes upset at hearing what happened. Stephen exacerbates the situation by claiming everyone proposes to Helen. Uninvited reporter Keen Fitzpatrick, who has been covering a strike at Tracey's coal fields, adds to the confusion. The Connells apologize to Jack as he prepares to leave in his car. Helen asks everyone to wait while she speaks to him. They quarrel, and she suggests he should put a woman under a bell-jar and study her carefully, to repair his ignorance. Jack throws his overcoat over Helen's head and drags her away. Everyone is confused, having heard Helen's screams and the sound of Jack's car driving away. Tracey runs for his own car. Keen telephones in the story then drags Stephen out to pursue the couple. (Curtain) Act II (Jack's bungalow, "Eagle Lodge", in the Adirondacks, that night.) The society scene is followed by a two-person duel, between Helen and Jack. They tussle as he tries to wash her face and hands. The lodge has a telephone, with which Helen tries to summon help. Jack justifies kidnapping her by saying she committed larceny. She obtained property under false pretenses, by taking his heart. When she smashes a window with a chair, he unchains Bobbie and fastens the collar around Helen's ankle. Their verbal sparring is interrupted by Boney peeking in from a trap door in the ceiling. He is a harmless crank, suffering from a delusion he is Napoleon. Jack locks him in the upstairs bedroom then phones Sunny Vale to come get their ward. But while on the phone Keen cuts in on the party line to warn Jack of Tracey coming with a gun. When a motor car is heard approaching, Helen urges Jack to flee before Tracey comes. Jack locks her in a cabinet, only to find the visitors are Babe and Spider, going around in circles, and still looking for an island for Babe's uncle. Sending them off, Jack releases Helen from the cabinet. He claims she loves him, because she tried to get him to leave before Tracey arrived. He kisses her, but when Jack turns his back, Helen hits his head with the telephone. (Curtain) Act III (Same as Act II, a few hours later.) Jack enters the bungalow, his head bandaged with Helen's scarf. He reads a note she left on the door. He has Bobbie sniff her slipper then he and the dog set out to find her. Boney peeks through the trap door, and uses a fishing pole to retrieve the keys from the table. He is then heard unlocking the upstairs bedroom door. He comes downstairs, and spends some time trying to tie a rope to two different door knobs. It's too short, so he cuts it in two and tries again. He hides when Keen arrives. Keen hangs up the off-hook phone, only to find Boney has joined him. Assuming he is Jack, Keen tries to question him, but gets nowhere. Keen then places a call to his newspaper. Suddenly the sound of men singing La Marseillaise is heard outside. Tim and Bill enter the bungalow, saluting Boney. Confused, Keen hangs up. Jack now reappears. Tim tells Keen and Jack about Boney's mania, and how his college-age nephew inherited a fortune on the provision he buy his uncle an island for his "St. Helena". Jack asks Keen and the two orderlies to go into the bedroom so he can question Boney about Helen. He learns nothing and goes outside. Boney then ties the bedroom door knob to the nearby gun rack, trapping the three men inside. Stephen enters to behold Boney, who turns off the only lamp. Stephen yells for help, Bony disappears. Freed from the bedroom, Tim and Bill march off singing to attract Boney, while Keen and Stephen search for Helen. Tracey surprises Jack at gunpoint. He claims Helen is his wife, and accuses Jack of being a philanderer. Jack guesses he is lying and that Tracey thinks Helen is in earshot. Jack disarms Tracey, who also leaves to look for Helen. Tim and Bill return and take Boney away. Helen stumbles in, led by Bobbie, and is comforted by Jack. Stephen rushes in, but is rebuffed by Helen saying "I don't want to be rescued". (Curtain)
In Brookhaven, Mississippi, Carnelle Scott enters the Fourth of July Miss Firecracker pageant to escape her tarnished reputation and prove she is worthy of acceptance. Her cousins Elain and Delmount, shy seamstress Popeye, and former lover Mac Sam complicate the contest and her efforts to remake herself. Carnelle loses the pageant but finds support in her family and Popeye as they watch the fireworks.
At a mining homestead, overseer Barry Graham lets Alma Carleton's mother believe he saved Alma, then steals her jewels and frames the mysterious 'Unknown.' Graham later robs a coach in the Unknown's disguise; a swagman called Old Mat eventually clears up the mystery.
A three-hour pageant portrays the history of the California missions and was staged across from the San Gabriel Mission.
Müller constructs a collage-like drama of revolutionary action across historical periods, interweaving theatrical scenes with lyric and narrative passages. A dreamlike, first-person sequence follows a man awaiting a mission from a powerful “No. 1,” drawing on Müller’s memory of visiting Erich Honecker in a guarded political building.
After Manley flees England before consummating his marriage, the scheming Hazard impersonates him and wins his father-in-law’s confidence, then robs the household and plans to flee with Manley’s wife. The real Manley returns, and an unexpected family revelation resolves the marriage and inheritance conflict.
The Mistakes is a 1690 tragicomedy by the English writer Joseph Harris. It was originally staged at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane by the United Company. The original Drury Lane cast included John Hodgson as Don Juan de Mendoza, George Powell as Alberto, John Verbruggen as Antonio, William Mountfort as Ricardo, William Bowen as Lopez, Anne Bracegirdle as Miranda and Charlotte Butler as Astella. The prologue was written by John Dryden. An afterword was written by Nahum Tate, and the work is dedicated to the court painter Godfrey Kneller.
Based on a real couple’s arrangement, the woman, known as She, agrees to provide mistress services to the man, known as He, in return for income and a home.
A cardiologist's wife receives two unexpected visitors at home on the same afternoon: her husband's mistress and a social worker vetting her for adoption.
At her Florence inn, Mirandolina is courted by an impoverished marquis and a newly rich count, both of whom believe they can win her. When the misogynistic knight Ripafratta arrives, she sets out to make him fall in love, but her scheme risks turning the suitors against one another before she chooses the inn's servant Fabrizio.
Jan returns from abroad to his family’s boarding house but registers under a false name, hoping to observe his mother and sister before revealing himself. They murder wealthy lodgers, and after they drug and drown Jan for his money, his identity comes to light. His mother takes her own life, leaving his sister in despair; Jan’s wife Maria seeks help from the taciturn Old Man, who refuses.
Woodcutter Gregory is pushed by his wife into impersonating a French doctor to treat Charlotte, who feigns muteness to avoid her father's forced marriage and marry Leander. Gregory's disguise also entangles him in pursuit of his own wife.
Duffet's Mock Tempest is set not in any exotic location, but securely in the London familiar to its audience, specifically the lower reaches of contemporaneous London society. The storm that opens the play, in both the Shakespeare and Dryden–Davenant versions, is replaced in Duffet's by a riot in a brothel. Mother Stephania, a bawd, leads her cohort of pimps, prostitutes, and aristocratic customers in a valiant but vain effort to drive off an assault from the town's apprentices. The local watch carries off all the participants to Bridewell prison (the "enchanted castle"); there, the jailkeeper Prospero Whiffe reveals that the raid on the brothel was inspired by his ethereal spirit Ariel, a pickpocket. The parody goes on to mangle the romances of Prospero's two daughters (called Dorinda and Miranda, in Dryden and Davenant's adaptation). Dryden and Davenant made Miranda and Dorinda ignorant of the opposite sex; Duffet's "Dorinda and Miranda" are very familiar with men, but get confused by the concept of a "husband": Dorinda: Husband, what's that? Miranda: Why that's a thing like a man (for aught I know) with a great pair of horns upon his head, and my father said 'twas made for women, look ye. Dorinda: What, must we ride to water upon't, sister? Miranda: No, no, it must be our slave, and give us golden clothes, pray, that other men may lie with us in a civil way, and then it must father our children and keep them. Dorinda: And when we are so old and ugly that nobody else will lie with us, must it lie with us itself? Miranda: Aye, that it must, sister. Along the way, Duffet mocks Davenant's musical adaptation of Macbeth, staged in 1664 but first printed in 1674. (Duffet also ridicules Davenent's Macbeth in his Epilogue to his burlesque of Elkanah Settle's The Empress of Morocco, another work of 1674.) The Duke of Mantua has a son who is a member of the Religious Society of Friends, satirically named "Quakero." The play is wide in scope, touching on "drunkenness, violence, mutilation, cannibalism; of pimping, prostitution, adultery, incest; of hypocrisy, cowardice, torture, execution; of urine, vermin, venereal disease; of deviance, dissolution, and death". The last act of Duffet's play features a parody of Ariel's song "Where the bee sucks, there suck I" from the final scene of The Tempest. Duffet's version is "Where good ale is, there suck I". The parody version was sung by Betty Mackerel, an orange vender who was promoted to the stage. The Mock Tempest may have been revived in 1682.
A historical drama about John Christie founding Glyndebourne Opera and his romance and marriage with soprano Audrey Mildmay.
Mr. Modern sells his wife for money, then sues Lord Richly for adultery damages when the payment proves insufficient; the attempted suit is undermined by testimony that he himself arranged the transaction. The play follows the Bellamant family’s parallel affairs and marriages while criticizing the law that allowed husbands to claim damages for a wife’s adultery.
The Modish Couple is a 1732 comedy play by the British writer James Miller, under the pen name Charles Boaden. A virtuous wife reforms her rakish husband. The original Drury Lane cast included Robert Wilks as Lord Modely, John Mills as Claremont, Colley Cibber as Grinly, John Harper as Sir Lubbardly Block, Theophilus Cibber as Squire Chip, Mary Heron as Lady Modely and Jane Cibber as Clarissa. The epilogue was written by Henry Fielding.
The Modish Husband is a 1702 comedy play by the English writer William Burnaby. It is in the Restoration-style comedy of manners. Staged at the Drury Lane Theatre in London, the cast included Robert Wilks as Lionel, Colley Cibber as Lord Promise, Anne Oldfield as Camilla, Susanna Verbruggen as Lady Cringe, Jane Rogers as Lady Promise, William Bullock as Harry and William Pinkethman as Will Fanlove.
Act One The play opens with the anonymous Prime Minister, his Foreign Minister and General inside the cabinet office, their country on the verge of defeat as they wait for the Victor to arrive to accept their surrender. When the Victor arrives, instead of surrendering to him, they negotiate a deal to form a puppet government, where both the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister remain in power. To give legitimacy to this new government, the Prime Minister and his co-conspirators use a highly revered military hero, the retired Marshal, as the dictator of the country behind which they hide and use him as a puppet. Act Two Four years later, the General overthrows the Marshal and his puppet government, eventually liberating the Republic from foreign rule. Following a brief trial, the Marshal is sent to a remote prison. His daughter (The Girl), a Nurse and a Photographer stand by him.
In a fictional Hunnic empire, Archug Khan struggles to preserve the state from unworthy leadership. The verse tragedy places personal ambition against the obligations of rule and the survival of a nomadic state.
At a Beverly Hills elementary school, teacher Michael Dori embarrasses Kai, a ten-year-old student with a learning disability, over multiplication tables. When Kai brings an old, inoperable Civil War gun to school, Dori and the boy disagree over his motive; the principal and Kai’s adoptive parents must address the incident amid conflicts over race, schooling and parental involvement.
Coelio seeks to win Marianne's love through his friend Octave, who acts as a go-between in the courtship.
The young and imaginative Valentin is a supervisor at a private school. Although he is in love with the secretary Sylvie, he is still in the midst of a miserable, joyless human world. Egoism and malice, greed and avarice, lust for pleasure and uncontrolled instinct, mendacity and jealousy characterize the life of the directorate family related to him; Chabert and Valentin themselves are haplessly married, their marriages a pointless formality: parents and children are at war; Old Chabert suffers from the agony of work, his daughter Elisa from her ugliness, his sons-in-law are professional wretches who only know how to bring forth an excess of unwanted children, while his wife leads her unfulfilled life through the luxury of flashy hats and more amorous ones Seeks to enhance escapades. Poverty and quarrels in the school management's family are unpleasantly punctuated by the rebelliousness, stupidity and instinctiveness of the students, by the cruelty and dissolute lifestyle of their parents. In view of this overall less than human existence, Valentin decides to transform humanity all around into birds, which he typically calls a "spiritual operation", i.e. no magic, no trick game. In this way, on the spur of the moment and without much fuss, Valentin enchants everyone who "embarrasses him (!)", As he calls it. The lustful math teacher Bobignot, the lewd and untalented students Duperrier and Arbelin, the arrest-mad and "rough" inspectors Malfrin and Grindet, the sadistic Papa Périsson, the humorless bureaucratic representatives of the school authorities and finally almost everyone around him. The transformed, however, by no means turn out to be cast out and subject to an evil curse, but rather as liberated and happy. After all, the moonbirds, which become humans again at the new moon, testify to the higher moral quality of their bird existence, because they have finally gained an eye for the essentials.
After meeting architect Don Gresham atop the Empire State Building, Patty O’Neill goes to his apartment and offers to make dinner. The evening grows complicated when Don’s neighbor becomes interested in her and her suspicious father arrives, forcing everyone to confront their assumptions about her intentions.
The Moonraker is a historical play by the British writer Arthur Watkyn. It premiered at the Cambridge Arts Theatre and in June 1952 had a brief run at the Saville Theatre in London's West End. The cast included Jean Kent, Griffith Jones, Henry Oscar, Paul Whitsun-Jones, William Moore and Julian Somers. It was directed by Terence De Marney.
Landlady Aniela Dulska tolerates her son Zbyszko's affair with their maid Hanka until Hanka becomes pregnant and he proposes marriage; fearing scandal and damage to the family's standing, Dulska pays Hanka to leave, while her daughters reveal sharply different responses to the family's double standards.
The Morning Ramble also known as The Mourning Ramble; Or, The Town-humours is a 1672 comedy play by the English writer Henry Nevil Payne. It was staged by the Duke's Company at the Dorset Garden Theatre with a cast that included Thomas Betterton as Townlove, Henry Harris as Merry, William Smith as Ruffle, Matthew Medbourne as Muchland, John Crosby as Rash, Cave Underhill as Fullam, Henry Norris as Breef, Jane Long as Betty Rash, Margaret Osborne as Lady Turnup and Anne Shadwell as Rose.
The Morning Star is a 1941 play by the British actor and writer Emlyn Williams. It portrayed life in wartime London during The Blitz and featured the simulation of an air raid. It take place in a drawing room of a house in Chelsea. It premiered at the Royal Court Theatre in Liverpool before transferring to the Globe Theatre in London's West End where it ran for 475 performances between 10 December 1941 and 12 December 1942. The London cast included Williams, Frederick Lloyd, Roddy Hughes, Gladys Henson, Elliott Mason, Angela Baddeley, Ambrosine Phillpotts and Betty Ann Davies. In 1942 it appeared at the Morosco Theatre on Broadway. The Broadway version starred Gregory Peck alongside Gladys Cooper, Jill Esmond, Wendy Barrie and Rhys Williams.
The Mortimer Touch is a comedy play by the British writer Eric Linklater. It was developed out of an earlier work of his The Atom Doctor which appeared at the 1950 Edinburgh Festival and drew inspiration from Ben Jonson's The Alchemist. It premiered at the Wimbledon Theatre before transferring to the Duke of York's Theatre in the West End where it ran for 45 performances between 30 April and 7 June 1952. The original West End cast included Mervyn Johns, Roger Livesey, Richard Pearson, George Relph, William Mervyn, Harry Towb, Vincent Holman, Mona Washbourne, Pamela Brown, Esma Cannon, Glen Alyn and Molly Urquhart. It was published the same year by Samuel French.
The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told is a metaphysical/existentialist comedy written in 1998 by Paul Rudnick.
A three-act play developed from Clyde Fitch’s one-act The Harvest, whose wedding-day revelation that the bridegroom fathered a child with another woman became the new play’s second act.
Pelagea Vlassova, mother of a revolutionary, undertakes a difficult path toward political and personal liberation. She confronts illiteracy, illness, her son's death, and material hardship, and comes to understand that improving family life requires collective struggle.
In a family living room, Dolores speaks with her dead husband and sons as each explains the wartime or other cause of his death. When her last surviving son wants to leave, she resists until a radio report of an attack on a school leads her to give him a weapon.
A lonely mother’s sense of identity unravels as her children leave home and her husband grows distant, forcing her to confront maternal obsession and the loss of a role in family life.
The Mother-in-Law is a 1734 comedy play by the British writer James Miller. Also known by the longer title The Mother-in-Law, or the Doctor the Disease it debuted at the Haymarket Theatre in London. The original Haymarket cast included Benjamin Griffin as Sir Credulous Hippish, John Mills as Heartwell, William Mills as Beaumont, Benjamin Johnson as Doctor Mummy, Joe Miller as Doctor Discordiam, Theophilus Cibber as Looby Headpiece, John Harper as Galleypot, James Oates as Poet, Hannah Pritchard as Belina and Mary Heron as Primrose.
Jackie is a former drug dealer who has just been released from prison to join the American workforce. His girlfriend Veronica, however, still uses cocaine and other drugs. The play begins with an intense and comic phone conversation between Veronica and her mother, who's also an addict. Jackie arrives shortly thereafter. Just as Jackie and Veronica are jumping into bed, he sees a hat in her apartment. Realizing it is not his, he accuses her of cheating, going to his drug and parole counselor, Ralph D., for help. Meanwhile, Ralph's wife, Victoria, has "had it up to here with his helium." Jackie obtains a gun. Ralph insists that he not keep it, so he gives it to his cousin Julio for safekeeping. Jackie reveals that he had slept with his previous Alcoholics Anonymous counselor, which may be part of the reason Veronica mistrusts him. Later, Veronica is entertaining a lover, which is revealed to be Ralph. They had slept together a handful of times while Jackie was in prison. Meanwhile, Jackie gets the gun back and returns the hat to a man in their building who he thinks is its owner. He then throws it on the floor and shoots it. Jackie talks about this with Victoria, who is tired of Ralph's cheating and begs Jackie to sleep with her. She reveals to him that Veronica and Ralph have slept together—Ralph was really "the motherfucker with the hat." Jackie shows up at Veronica's apartment drunk, hurt because they have been in love since high school. When he gets loud, she hits him with a bat. Julio takes Jackie in. He reveals that he is grateful because, years ago, Jackie showed unexpected kindness to him. Jackie wants to confront Ralph, and Julio is willing to cover his back, claiming to be a "Van Damme". Jackie goes to Ralph's. The two men try to fight it out but end up futilely wrestling on the floor. Ralph admits he slept with Veronica and explains that she will never love him until she chooses to sober up. In spite of everything, he would like to be friends with Jackie. Jackie refuses to accept his friendship and returns to the apartment to pick up his things. He has broken parole by shooting the gun and is heading off to prison for a short stint. He tries to tell Veronica he loves her, but she runs out of the room, unwilling to listen. He leaves. A few moments later, Veronica comes out of hiding and calls his name.
The play revolves around the dynamic and tense relationship between a young, enthusiastic Richard Burton and an aging John Gielgud during the 1964 modern-dress Broadway production of Hamlet.
A verse drama set in 18th-century Montenegro, framed around Metropolitan Danilo's struggle amid conflict between Montenegrin tribes and Ottoman power. Through dialogues, monologues and epic scenes of communal life, it explores freedom, political identity and religious conflict. Its representation of the alleged persecution and killing of converts to Islam has remained deeply contested.
The Mountaintop begins with Martin Luther King Jr. returning to the Lorraine Motel after his sermon, I've Been To The Mountaintop. King sends his friend to fetch him cigarettes, ultimately leaving him alone in Room 306 as a storm rages outside. Ordering room service, King comes into contact with Camae (Carrie Mae), the mysterious and beautiful maid who strikes King's attention immediately. The beginning interactions between the two are filled with flirtation and humor but through the night it slowly progresses to something much deeper. King and Camae begin to discuss the hopes and fears that Martin Luther King Jr. has been feeling, forming a connection and understanding between the two. The conversation focuses on the fight for civil rights and reaches the climax when Camae reveals her true intentions for walking into King's motel room that night. Camae is an angel sent by God to collect King and bring him to heaven; Camae reveals that King will die tomorrow, April 4, by being assassinated. Forced to confront his fears, King tries to bargain and plead with Camae to give him more time, explaining that he needs to continue his work in the civil rights movement before he can go. Camae, with a great sense of sadness, reasons with King, describing how the "baton", a reference of the ever passing responsibility for the civil rights cause, will continue to be passed on even when he is gone. King still denying his future forces Camae to call God with the hopes that he can convince God to give him more time. However, the call ends with King understanding his fate is set in stone and that his death is arriving shortly. With this realization King makes one last wish, to see his legacy and how it will affect the future to come. In the last minutes, King has a vision filled with significant names that grab the "baton" to continue the fight for civil rights, events that further the cause, as well as accomplishments that have been made in the future. Martin Luther King Jr. finishes his vision with a monologue to motivate people to continue the fight for civil rights in the hope that one day we will reach the Promised Land on Earth, ending the play with him handing on the baton to whoever is willing to take it next. The Mountaintop is full of symbols that a multitude of readers skip over thinking they are "extra details" included in the play. These symbols help further develop the themes throughout the play, as well as give a hidden meaning to some of the most simplistic things. Katori Hall explains that she has created the image of Martin Luther King Jr. with "warts and all". This can be seen in her description of his "smelly feet", socks with holes in them, a sense of being vain as he debated whether he should shave his mustache or not, and his flirtatiousness and infidelities with other women despite being married. This representation of King is made to challenge readers to see Martin Luther King Jr. as more of an average human instead of placing him on top of a pedestal. Immediately, Hall received backlash from readers and the Black community, but she did not back down stating, "A warts-and-all portrayal of Dr. King is important because there's this extraordinary human being who is actually quite ordinary. I feel as though by portraying him with his flaws and foibles, we, too, can see—as human beings who have these flaws—that we, too, can be Kings; we, too, can carry on that baton that he has passed down to us."
Almeria, daughter of Granada’s King Manuel, and Alphonso, son of his enemy, are secretly married. Separated by a shipwreck, Almeria believes Alphonso dead; he returns disguised as Osmyn, while Queen Zara falls in love with him. He ultimately escapes the rulers’ dangers and reunites with Almeria, and they become the kingdom’s rulers.
The play is set in the Great Hall of Monkswell Manor, Berkshire, in what Christie described as "the present". Monkswell Manor is a recently converted guesthouse run by a young couple, Mollie and Giles Ralston. Mollie listens to a radio report about the murder of a woman named Maureen Lyon in Paddington, London; police are looking for a man in a dark overcoat. Their first four guests arrive: Christopher Wren, Mrs Boyle, Major Metcalf, and Miss Casewell. Christopher is an unkempt, flighty young man; Mrs Boyle is a constant complainer; Metcalf is an amiable ex-military man; and Miss Casewell is a mannish young woman. An unexpected fifth guest, Mr Paravicini, says his car has overturned in a snowdrift and the denizens of the house are snowed in. Uneasy, Mollie nevertheless places Paravicini in the last remaining room. The next afternoon, Sergeant Trotter of the Berkshire Police arrives at the guesthouse on skis, while Metcalf discovers that the phone has stopped working. Trotter explains he has been sent regarding the murder of Maureen Lyon. The dead woman and her husband had mistreated their three foster children, the Corrigans, which resulted in the youngest's death. Police suspect the killer is the elder Corrigan boy, who would now be twenty-two. A notebook at the murder scene contained the address of Monkswell Manor and the words "Three Blind Mice", while a note reading "This is the First" was pinned to the woman's body. Giles, Mollie, and all five guests deny a connection to the case. Afterward, Metcalf confronts Mrs Boyle, revealing that she was one of the magistrates who had assigned the children to the foster parents. Later in the evening, Mrs Boyle wanders back into the now-empty room. The opening notes of "Three Blind Mice" are heard whistled by an unknown party and the lights go out. Moments later, Mollie finds Mrs Boyle dead on the floor. Sergeant Trotter takes charge of the household, gathering the remaining residents together. Mollie cannot provide him with any useful clues. As each person recounts their whereabouts, Trotter observes various weaknesses in their stories, declaring that everyone had the opportunity to commit the murder. Giles counters that only one person fits the suspect's description: Christopher Wren, who insists that it is all a frame-up. Trotter adds that the dead boy had other relatives and loved ones who might be interested in revenge, meaning that anyone in the guesthouse could be the killer. He also notes that both Giles and Mollie had secretly been in London on the day of the first murder. Trotter forces the aghast Mollie to admit that the couple knows little about each other's pasts. Christopher Wren later confesses to Mollie that he is actually an army deserter under a false name, and Mollie acknowledges that she, too, is running away from her past. Again calling the household together, Trotter declares that he intends to check everyone's alibis. They will re-enact the murder; each person will act out another's alibi, with the hope that one alibi will be proved impossible. The household obediently disperses, leaving Trotter alone onstage. Trotter calls for Mollie and reveals he knows she was the schoolteacher of the Corrigan children. She failed to answer a letter the younger boy sent her, begging to be rescued from foster care. Due to illness, Mollie did not read the letter until after the boy's death; she is haunted by her failure to help. Trotter points a gun at Mollie, telling her that he is not a real policeman and that he cut the house's telephone wires. He is actually Georgie, the elder Corrigan brother. He begins to strangle Mollie, but is stopped by the sudden appearance of Miss Casewell. She calls him by name and reveals that she is his long-lost sister Kathy, come to take him somewhere safe. Metcalf discloses that he himself is an undercover policeman; he arranged to replace the real Metcalf at the guesthouse to investigate and hid Trotter's skis after growing suspicious, preventing Trotter from escaping. Giles and Mollie admit that they were both secretly in London buying presents, as today is their first wedding anniversary.
The Mouthpiece is a 1930 crime play by the British writer Edgar Wallace. It was one of several theatrical failures written by Wallace following the enormous success of On the Spot, with a plot described as "flimsy". It ran for twelve performances at Wyndham's Theatre in the West End. The cast included Emlyn Williams, Douglas Payne, Mabel Terry-Lewis and Margaret Bannerman. In 1935 it was posthumously novelised by Robert Curtis. A gang of criminals discover that a young woman is unaware that she is about to inherit a fortune, and scheme to marry one of their members to her to get their hands on the money.
The Moving Finger is a 1928 play by the British writer and barrister Patrick Hastings. It is a murder mystery. It ran in the West End for 30 performances at the Garrick Theatre. The cast included Sebastian Shaw, George Curzon, Ernest Milton and Lilian Braithwaite. It was produced by Basil Dean.
A split-plot Restoration tragicomedy interweaves a heroic romance, a witty couple’s pursuit of an independent marriage, and satire of Puritans, gallants and a lecherous old man. After obstacles impede the aristocratic lovers Althea and Eugenio and Diana and Philander, a deus ex machina brings their marriages about; Olivia and Wildish’s more independent union anchors the middle plot.
At Bondi Beach, bookmaker family members Joe and Ben Donnelly both desire Joe’s new wife, Kate. Joe’s business spending and sexual difficulties strain his marriage, while Ben’s attraction to Kate leads the brothers into conflict.
In an English public house, Tom vows revenge for his murdered brother while his friend Bill grows uneasy. A stranger draws a confession from Bill, confronting Tom with his companion’s guilt.
After an investment scandal leaves a politician nervously oversensitive, his doctor hires a celebrated pianist to soothe him. Her music sends him through alternating distress and exhilaration until he falls in love with her domineering style.
Once-renowned conductor Anton von Barwig is impoverished in New York and searches for his lost wife and daughter. When his daughter comes to him for music lessons without knowing who he is, he must confront the man who raised her while protecting her happiness.
The play takes place in a mansion in Chappaqua, New York in December 1940, specifically, the library. The mansion is owned by Elsa Von Grossenknueten, who is there with her maid, Helsa Wenzel. In the opening scene, we see Helsa is killed by a masked figure. We also see Elsa talking to a police officer, Michael Kelly, about some sort of undercover scheme. Both are unaware of the maid's murder. The next morning, we see Helsa again, and her personality seems to have changed. The guests Elsa has invited soon begin to arrive. They have been invited for a backer's audition to the Musical White House Merry-Go-Round. The first of the invited guests is an Irish tenor named Patrick O'Reilly. He's quickly followed by a bombastic theatre director named Ken De La Maize, and a beautiful young singer/dancer named Nikki Crandall. Nikki is followed in by a young (and bad) comedian named Eddie McCuen, who takes an instant liking to Nikki. While talking with Nikki, Eddie realizes that everyone (including Marjorie Baverstock, the producer, and Roger Hopewell and Bernice Roth, the writers) were all part of the creative team that made Manhattan Holiday, in which The Stage Door Slasher murdered three women. Eddie instantly wants to leave, and tells Nikki that she should leave as well, but he decides to stay after Marjorie and Elsa enter and woo him into staying. Roger Hopewell and Bernice Roth arrive and meet the performers, and the group gets started with their work. After things get underway, Marjorie is murdered and the body of Helsa is discovered. After a series of dizzy conversations, multiple trips through secret doorways leading to a labyrinth of hidden passageways, a power outage in the mansion, multiple crimes, and criminals are revealed. Eventually after much murderous mayhem the Stage Door Slasher is revealed and captured through deciphering Bebe's coded notebook.
A political fable imagines the social and economic consequences of Muslims vanishing from India.
A promenade cycle of three medieval mystery plays—Nativity, The Passion and Doomsday—retells the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. Tony Harrison adapts medieval cycle material as plays within plays, with craftsmen and guild members acting sacred stories in a contemporary setting.
The Mysterious Husband is a play by the British writer Richard Cumberland. It is a Domestic drama with a tragic ending, first performed in 1783. Along with several other Cumberland plays it was influenced by the 1768 gothic play The Mysterious Mother by Horace Walpole. The original Covent Garden cast included John Henderson as Lord Davenant (a part written for him), William Thomas Lewis as Charles Davenant, Richard Wroughton as Captain Dorner, Richard Yates as Sir Edmund Travers, Elizabeth Satchell as Marianne and Elizabeth Younge as Lady Davenant.
At Mandacrest Estate, Lord Edgar and Lady Enid confront vampires, a resurrected Egyptian mummy, a werewolf and the mystery of Edgar's first wife, Irma Vep. After discovering that the supposed prisoner is actually the vampire Jane, Enid reveals that the Egyptian adventure was an elaborate sham, and she and Edgar reconcile.
Barry Pree reshaped Fergus Hume's mystery novel as a farcical spoof of old-time melodramas. The stage production's audience cheered the hero and booed the villain, with mockingly theatrical histrionics and music-hall performance.
At a celebration in the Maharaja’s palace, Tintin discovers that a celebrated blue diamond has been stolen and concludes that the thief is among the guests. He and detectives Durant and Durand question them aboard a ship to Syldavia, where Tintin uses a telegram to catch the culprit in the castle’s medieval hall.
A revised and enlarged Passion play retelling the Passion of Christ.
Wealthy Sir Matthew Mite returns from India and uses his fortune to pursue entry into British political society, seeking an aristocratic marriage and a parliamentary seat through bribery.
The Naked Genius is a 1943 American play written by Gypsy Rose Lee. The work premiered on Broadway on October 21, 1943, at the Plymouth Theatre where it ran until November 20, 1943, for a total of 36 performances. The work was produced by Mike Todd, used sets designed by Frederick Fox, and costumes designed by Billy Livingston. The play was staged by George S. Kaufman, and starred Joan Blondell as Honey Bee Carroll, Pauline Myers as Angela, Millard Mitchell as Stuart Tracy, Rex O'Malley as Fred-Eric, Byron Russell as Williams, Bertha Belmore as Lollie Adams, Doro Merande as Myrtle McGuire, Donald Randolph as Charles Goodwin, Lewis Charles as Sam Hinkle, Rosemary Rice as Emily, Georgia Sothern as Alibassi, Phyllis Povah as Pansy, John Souther as Judge Taylor, Bernice Maison as Sally Martin, and Gil Maison as Teddy Martin. Fox bought the film rights for $150,000. The play was later adapted into the 1946 film Doll Face directed by Lewis Seiler and starring Carmen Miranda and Vivian Blaine.
A young couple expecting a child move in with the woman’s parents, and their stay is marked by failures of communication.
The play alternates between the scenes of the characters' real lives, and sketches played at the Irving Place Theater, which serve as comment on the play itself. The play opens at an automat in Greenwich Village in 1937 where gay men congregate and arrange meetings. Chauncey Miles is a star at the Irving Place Theater, a burlesque house in New York City. He specializes in playing the "nance", a "stock character who was a flamingly effeminate homosexual". In fact, Chauncey is gay and looks for men at the automat, but he must be careful or risk being arrested. There he meets Ned, newly arrived in New York and homeless. Chauncey invites him to his apartment for a sexual encounter, assuming him to be a curious heterosexual. In the morning, however, Ned confesses that he is also gay and has recently left his wife hoping to find out more about himself. Though Chauncey is hesitant to begin a serious relationship, they become lovers. At this time, Mayor Fiorello La Guardia is attempting to end burlesque in New York (during this period the gay population was often persecuted). Ephraim, the manager and top comic of the Irving Place Theater, warns Chauncey that the knowledge of his sexuality is attracting gay men to the theater, a fact of which the police may become aware. However, Chauncey, a passionate Republican supporter of La Guardia, believes that the attacks on burlesque and gays will stop after the election. When another of the performers suddenly quits the Irving Place to work elsewhere, Chauncey brings Ned on as a last-minute replacement. In spite of an awkward beginning, Chauncey guides him through the sketch, and Ned is given a job at the theater as a stooge in Chauncey's sketches. Ned and Chauncey's relationship becomes known and accepted by Ephraim and the theater's strippers, who become part of their regular circle of friends. Before one performance, word reaches the troupe that the commissioner of licenses, Paul Moss, is in the audience with a number of policemen. Ephraim tells Chauncey not to play the nance character for fear of a police raid. However, unable to think of other dialogue, Chauncey plays his trademark character, kisses Ephraim onstage, and the theater is raided. Act two begins with Chauncey in court. He defends burlesque and free expression, but serves two nights in jail. On being released, he is embarrassed to find the other members of his company are treating him as a hero. Under the new restrictions on burlesque, Chauncey is limited to performing one "nance" sketch played in drag, which he finds demeaning. The jokes in his routines turn increasingly derogatory. The other members of the company urge Chauncey to participate in a planned walkout by all the entertainment unions in the city. The conservative Chauncey is reluctant to join in. Eventually, the walkout is canceled when the unions agree to LaGuardia's restrictions. Chauncey's relationship with Ned begins to suffer as he starts resorting to anonymous sexual encounters in parks. He starts turning away from Ned, who is now more open about his own sexuality. Ned asks Chauncey to be monogamous for him, and Chauncey initially agrees. Several weeks later, however, Ned finds Chauncey again at the automat, looking for one-night stands. Chauncey rejects Ned, telling him he has lost interest in him, and that he prefers "to be used and discarded." Ned, sensing the imminent shutdown of burlesque, tells Chauncey he has taken a job as an ensemble member in a tour of Red, Hot and Blue and asks Chauncey to join him as a last try at a monogamous relationship. Chauncey insists the crackdown on burlesque is temporary, and that he will stay where he is. Confessing his self-hatred, he rejects the offer of a monogamous relationship, telling Ned, "This is not what I should be having." He kisses Ned goodbye, but is (ironically) seen by a policeman who arrests him for deviant behavior in public after Ned has left. Finally, Chauncey appears on stage in complete drag, playing an old prostitute. In the middle of the sketch, his loss hits him and he breaks down, alternating between grief and professional composure. Shortly after, the Irving Place Theater is closed down. Ephraim and the girls leave to perform out of state. It is revealed that Chauncey, as a repeat offender and banned from leaving New York, was offered leniency if he named the other party, (i.e., Ned), but refused to do so. The other company members sadly tell him goodbye. Chauncey stands alone on the stage of the Irving Place. As he softly sings a verse of his trademark song, a piece of the ceiling falls, narrowly missing him, and Chauncey remains center stage under a broken spotlight as the curtain falls.
The National Health is a 1969 British play by Peter Nichols. Reminiscent of the Carry On film series, this black comedy with tragic overtones focuses on the appalling conditions in an under-funded National Health Service hospital, which are contrasted comically with a Dr. Kildare-style soap opera airing on the ward television.
The National Lampoon Show, a spinoff of the humor magazine National Lampoon, was a 1974–1976 stage show that helped launch the performing careers of John Belushi, Brian Doyle-Murray, Bill Murray, Gilda Radner, and Harold Ramis. The show was produced by Ivan Reitman. ("overlooked" by National Lampoon writer/editor Sean Kelly). After closing in New York, it went on a second, nine-month-long, national tour. Ramis, meanwhile, used some of the sketches from the show in the script of National Lampoon's first film production, Animal House, released in 1978.
Near Mount Kosciuszko in early colonial New South Wales, land speculator Neal Blackmore tries to seize a gold deposit on John Hillgrove’s property. Blackmore’s henchman murders fossicker Kosciusko Joe and frames Hillgrove’s son Jack, who must clear his name and rescue Lily from Blackmore’s men during a snowstorm.
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