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Clear filtersHannibal takes refuge with Prusias in Nicomedia, where a promise that he will marry Laodice is challenged by Roman ambassador Flaminius, who also desires her. Marivaux uses the Roman's abuse of political power for private ends to expose imperial hypocrisy.
The Walters are celebrating their fifteenth wedding anniversary. Alice's parents are due for an evening get together, so she supervises Okkie and Debbie's choice of attire and Millie's preparation for the gathering. Harry and Sam deliver and install a TV set, a gift from Mr. Gans. Knowing Bud's violent dislike of television, everyone is a bit apprehensive. Bud arrives home with his business partner Chris Steelman, and Janice Revere, a new friend of Chris. All three are a bit merry with drink. Janice, who has married well and often, admires Alice's ability to pick a good partner on the first try. Chris and Janice leave, while Bud notices the TV and explodes. Alice calms him, asking his indulgence for that evening. He relents, just as Alice's parents arrive. Mrs. Gans is shocked when Debbie uses the word "prostitute" in response to Mr. Gans telling her what a "vamp" was. As the evening progresses, Bud, warmed with affection for Alice and primed with champagne, carelessly lets slip that he and Alice had premarital relations. The kids and Millie overhear the admission, and the resulting outrage from the grandparents. As Bud justifies it to his in-laws, they grow huffy and storm out of the apartment. Bud angrily kicks the TV, wrecking it. Alice is distraught over Bud's slip and the resulting fight with her parents. She locks herself into the bedroom. Bud then breaks the door and lock trying to enter. The next morning a handyman brings in a new door and lock for the bedroom. Bud and Alice reconcile, but Alice says Debbie asked if they were going to get divorced. Later, Janice shows up at the Walters apartment alone, to talk with Alice, who has gone out. Millie reluctantly admits her, and Janice sees the handyman repairing the door. Alice returns, and Janice is enlightened that even good marriages have their storms. Harry and Sam return to the apartment with another new TV, this one a gift from Chris. Okkie persuades Bud to watch a little television while they are relaxing. Bud likes the commercials, but then a program called Juvenile Jury comes on the set. They are all stunned to see Debbie on the program as a guest. She tells the moderator that her parents had a quarrel, they resent her trying to help heal the breach, and she's worried they may get divorced. Bud and Okkie are in an uproar. As a punctuation to the brouhaha, Bud kicks in the second TV set. As Millie sweeps up shattered remains, Debbie returns home to an ominous welcome from her father. Debbie is contrite, realizing she has gone too far. Alice whisks Debbie away while Bud fumes alone, until Chris shows up. Seeing the broken TV, he and Bud begin to quarrel. Bud finally leaves the apartment, with Chris following, trying to calm him down. Four days later, Alice and the kids breakfast alone; Bud has stayed away. Okkie assures Alice that Bud is simply cooling off. Chris arrives at the apartment to intervene for Bud, who is waiting outside the apartment. Bud apologizes for staying away, and asks forgiveness, but he had to get his head straight. Alice forgives him and further informs him she's expecting. They embrace and play ends.
Judy Miller, a Jewish college senior, submits an updated anti-nuclear play about Antigone instead of the assigned paper. Her refusal to yield brings her into conflict with Professor Henry Harper, while she stages the work on campus and challenges his decision through the university grievance process.
At an English public school in the early 1930s, Guy Bennett and Marxist Tommy Judd respond to a pupil’s suicide and the institution’s hypocrisy. As the boys maneuver within the school’s hierarchy, persecution of Bennett and Judd’s compromises expose how class, sexuality, and appearances shape their lives.
Set in the fictional town of Bowden, Alabama, in June 1880, the plot focuses on the wealthy, ruthless, and innately evil Hubbard family and their rise to prominence. Patriarch Marcus Hubbard was born into poverty and toiled at menial labor while teaching himself Greek philosophy and the basics of business acumen. He ultimately made his fortune by exploiting his fellow Southerners during the American Civil War. He treats his good-hearted but slightly eccentric Bible-quoting wife Lavinia in a way designed to undermine both her self-confidence and sense of reality; she is no help to her children and wants nothing more than to join a religious retreat so she can expiate her sins. Shrewd, amoral elder son Benjamin is plotting to usurp his father's power and steal his money, and the younger Oscar lusts for "cooch dancer" (as she's described by Regina) Laurette Sincee rather than penniless neighbor Birdie Bagtry, who desperately is looking for a loan on her family's valuable land, a situation Benjamin hopes to exploit. Regina is the sexually active daughter who wants to live in Chicago with Birdie's cousin, former Confederate officer John Bagtry, a move discouraged by her father, who has a disturbingly unnatural closeness to the girl. The only people in the household with any sense of morality are the servants, Coralee and Jacob.
Based on a traditional Ghanaian tale, Anowa rejects the suitors chosen by her parents and marries the stranger Kofi Ako, who becomes a wealthy slave trader. Their childlessness and conflict over slavery strain the marriage; an old man and woman intermittently serve as a chorus, commenting on events. The play ends with Kofi’s suicide and Anowa drowning herself.
Anselma, also known as The Princess Andrea, is a play in six acts. It is an 1885 English-language adaptation of Victorien Sardou's 1873 French-language play Andréa which was created by Leander Richardson for the Austrian actress Antonie Janisch (1848–1920), known on the stage as Madame Janisch. The play became a source of contention in the Judiciary of New York with several legal battles between the producers of Anselma and the actress Agnes Ethel arguing over the rights to Sardou's play.
A lost Athenian tragedy whose plot was entirely invented by its poet rather than drawn from myth or history, an unusual conception in fifth-century Greek tragedy. No plot details survive; stories later suggested as its subject remain conjectural.
Gambaro recasts Antigone as a dissociated figure reliving her defiance of Creon while two men mock and reenact the story around her. Their performance implicates the spectators in the punishment of dissent and evokes Argentina’s government terror and disappearances.
After Creon forbids the burial of Polynices, Antigone defies his decree to honor her brother with funeral rites. Creon condemns her, and his refusal to heed warnings from his son Haemon and the prophet Tiresias leads to the deaths of Antigone, Haemon, and Creon's wife Eurydice.
In this lost tragedy, Antigone and Haemon’s participation in the burial of Polynices appears to lead to a different ending from Sophocles’ version: the pair marry and have a son, Maeon. The surviving fragments provide little plot detail, and scholars dispute how much can be reconstructed, including whether Dionysus intervened to save them.
Antigone’s refusal to obey Creon confronts his pragmatic acceptance of political power in Anouilh’s reworking of the ancient story.
Brecht reframes Sophocles’ tragedy through a modern opening in which two sisters shelter their deserter brother before he is lynched, paralleling this death with Polynices’ fate. Creon is presented as a Nazi-style dictator.
Antiochus is a 1721 tragedy by the British writer John Mottley. The play is set in Ancient Greece, revolving round the relationship between Stratonice of Syria and Seleucus I Nicator and his son Antiochus I Soter, the leaders of the Seleucid Empire. The original Lincoln's Inn Fields cast included James Quin as Selecus, Lacy Ryan as Antiochus, John Egleton as Arsaces, Richard Diggs as Cleartes, Anthony Boheme as Nicanor, Elizabeth Spiller as Semandra and Anna Maria Seymour as Stratonice.
Antiochus the Great is a 1701 tragedy by the English writer Jane Wiseman. It is also known by the longer title of Antiochus the Great, or, The Fatal Relapse. It is based on the life of Antiochus the Great, the Greek ruler of Ancient Syria. The original Lincoln's Inn Fields cast included George Powell as Antiochus the Great, John Bowman as Artenor, John Corey as Seleuchus, Barton Booth as Ormandes, George Pack as Philotas, Elizabeth Barry as Leodice, Elizabeth Bowman as Berenice, and Mary Porter as Child.
Antonio, or the Soldier's Return is an 1800 historical tragedy by the British writer William Godwin. It premiered at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on 13 December 1800. The cast included John Philip Kemble as Antonio, Sarah Siddons as Helena, William Barrymore as Don Gusman, Richard Wroughton as Don Pedro, Charles Kemble as Don Henry, William Powell as Don Diego. Both the audience and critical reaction were negative. Seven years later another of Godwin's plays Faulkener was staged at the same theatre.
Antonio disguises himself as an Amazon to reach Mellida, daughter of his father's rival, Duke Piero. Their attempts to escape and marry are repeatedly disrupted by discoveries and new disguises; after Antonio stages his death, the fathers reconcile and the lovers are finally wed. A comic subplot follows Mellida's cousin and her many suitors.
After Duke Piero poisons Andrugio and accuses his daughter Mellida of infidelity, Antonio hears his father's ghost demand revenge. Antonio kills Piero's son, disguises himself as a fool, and helps stage a conspiracy that culminates in Piero's murder at a wedding feast. Antonio survives but refuses the dukedom, vowing to live in mourning for Mellida.
After a love affair draws Roman triumvir Mark Antony between Alexandria and Rome, he and Cleopatra lose a war against Octavius Caesar. Antony dies after Cleopatra's false report of her death; captured and facing a Roman triumph, Cleopatra takes her own life.
A historical tragedy based on the final days of the Luso-Brazilian Jewish playwright António José da Silva, who was executed by the Portuguese Inquisition.
In a three-act spoof of classic murder mysteries, guests gather at Raven’s Head, a mansion on a deserted island off North Carolina. An old detective investigates amid a midnight will reading, secret passages, and suspicious house staff.
A married man’s mistress approaches her thirtieth birthday and reflects unhappily on the future of their relationship; the romantic comedy turns on whether love will find a way.
A marital farce centered on divorce.
A political farce based on John Wells's Dear Bill columns, set at Chequers and parodying the relationship between Denis and Margaret Thatcher. The play uses topical jokes and the conventions of broad farce to satirize the prime minister and her husband.
In a Jacobean city comedy of marriage, money and deception, a merchant and two households are drawn into schemes involving an adulterous bargain, a false theft, a threatened land sale and staged betrayals, before the plots are exposed and the couples reconcile.
Sandro Shanshiashvili's Georgian reworking of Armoured Train 14–69 relocates the action to Dagestan and gives it Georgian and Lezghin characters. The hero is Chechen Anzor Cherbbizh, and the changed ending has Zaira dance a lezginka to select who will sacrifice himself to stop the armoured train.
Lady Aoi lies gravely ill and is represented onstage by a folded robe. A shamaness summons the living spirit of Lady Rokujo, Genji’s jealous former lover, whose resentment turns to an attack on Aoi; a mountain priest’s prayers finally drive the spirit away.
A band of five thieves uses disguises and schemes around a stolen incense burner. Benten Kozō disguises himself as a young woman to rob a cloth shop, where a family revelation changes the thieves’ fate; the five later reveal their identities in riverbank monologues, and Kozō dies seeking to atone for his crimes.
In Troezen, Queen Phaedra attempts to seduce her stepson Hippolytus, who rejects her after realizing who she is. She dies by suicide and leaves a note accusing him of rape; when Theseus returns and calls on Poseidon to kill his son, Artemis vindicates Hippolytus, while Aphrodite honors Phaedra’s embrace of desire.
An interactive theatrical recreation of the Apollo 13 mission from Mission Control’s perspective. Audience members operate working consoles and telephones, interact with performers, and hear the astronauts through headsets as scenes play across a mission-control room and a command module.
Appearance Is Against Them is a 1785 comedy play by the British writer Elizabeth Inchbald. A farce, it premiered as an afterpiece at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden in London on 22 October 1785. The original cast included John Quick as Mr Walsmley, John Palmer as Lord Lighthead, James Thompson as Thompson, William Swords as Lighthead's Servant, John Edwin as Humphry, Lydia Webb as Lady Mary Magipie, Mary Morton as Miss Angle and Sarah Maria Wilson as Fish. The Irish premiere took place at the Smock Alley Theatre in Dublin on 4 February 1786.
In ancient Rome, Appius Claudius uses his political power to pursue Virginia and conspires to have her declared a slave. When the rigged trial condemns her, her father Virginius kills her rather than surrender her to Appius; the people then turn against the corrupt rulers.
Appius and Virginia is a 1709 tragedy by the British writer John Dennis. It was a distinct reworking by Dennis of an older play of the same title by John Webster. It was not a particular success on its debut. It became best known for Dennis' use of an innovative new technique to imitate the sound of thunder. When Dennis' play was taken off and a revival of Macbeth put on, he was angered when he attended a performance and discovered they were using his thunder machine, reportedly exclaiming "they will not let my play run, and yet they steal my thunder". This gave rise to the expression "stealing thunder". The original Drury Lane cast included Barton Booth as Appius, Theophilus Keene as Claudius, Thomas Betterton as Virginius, Robert Wilks as Icilius, Benjamin Husband as Valerius, Thomas Smith as Numitorious, Jane Rogers as Virginia, Frances Maria Knight as Cornelia.
Miriam prepares an apple pie for her son’s final meal before his execution. As she bakes, she traces their life together and confronts his crime, her memories and the limits of a mother’s love.
During a tour in Palestine, a family lives under the control of the tyrannical Mrs Boynton, whose death becomes the mystery. In Christie’s stage version, Mrs Boynton dies by suicide and leaves red herrings to keep her family suspicious of one another; unlike the novel, Lady Westholme is not the killer.
In 2011, the unnamed patriarch of the Lafayette family has recently died. He leaves the family home in Southeastern Arkansas, an old plantation, to his three children: the overworked elder daughter Toni, the tactless middle brother Bo, and the estranged brother Franz. Toni has been made executor of the will, and Franz has not been seen or heard from in a decade. The play opens as Franz and his eccentric fiancée River, from Portland, arrive at the house and enter through a window. Toni has been at the house preparing for an estate sale and auction of their father's old belongings with her troubled teenage son Rhys. Initially apprehensive of Franz's sudden arrival, she reluctantly allows the couple to stay at the house. The next day, Bo and his wife Rachel arrive with their children: 13 year-old daughter Cassidy and the much younger son Ainsley. As the group reconnect, unexpected items begin to be unpacked from boxes, such as jars containing body parts, but they are disregarded as being antiques from a prior owner. However, Ainsley is mistakenly given a photo album containing graphic imagery of lynchings, evoking panic from Rachel, who forbids Cassidy from viewing them. The adults deliberate why the album would be there, as the siblings did not believe their father to be racist. Rachel, however, finds this plausible: she is Jewish, and at several points in her relationship with the father, he disrespected or ignored her. Toni dismisses her accusation of the father's antisemitism. In the ensuing argument, Toni sarcastically refers to Rachel as both a "Shylock" and a "kike", leading Rachel to storm out. Toni defends her actions as maintaining the sanctity of their father's name. Meanwhile, Bo reminds the group that they also inherited $500,000 worth of debt that the auction needs to pay off. He suspects that it won't because the land and belongings have a low value. Angry that the reunion seems only to capitalize on their father's death, Toni drives away. That night, Cassidy comes downstairs to see River meditating on the photo album. She shows the younger girl the images. Cassidy is unsure how to feel about the pictures, but is quick to say that they could be sold on the internet at a decent price to collectors, due to their apparent historical value. Toni returns to the house drunk, and instructs Cassidy to place the pictures in her car. After Cassidy goes out, River attempts to connect with Toni and reveals that she is pregnant with Franz's child, to the latter's chagrin. During their discussion, Cassidy sneaks back in with the photos and hides. Rhys, on whom Cassidy has a crush, arrives to sleep on the downstairs couch. Cassidy and Rhys later view the pictures together after Toni and River leave, and Rhys keeps them as Cassidy returns to bed. Franz comes downstairs as Rhys attempts to masturbate, but the uncle only sees the lynching photos. He awkwardly begins to explain why they're important to view. The next morning, the family prepares to welcome prospective buyers, but Toni has canceled the auction out of spite. Bo reveals that his research has revealed that the album could be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, so that it doesn't matter if the auction is held after all. However, nobody is able to locate the images. Franz shows up wet and covered in mud after swimming in a local lake. He reveals that in an attempt to redeem himself to the family, he "baptized" himself in a nearby lake, bringing the photos with him and ruining them. Bo's ire enables Cassidy to reveal that she had been the one who invited Franz to the house (via Facebook) and not estate lawyers as previously thought. Rachel's concern with this illicit friendship turns to fury as Toni reveals that Franz had been estranged due to a prior drug addiction that led to Rhys entering rehab, and Franz's statutory rape of a 12 year-old girl who became pregnant. River flees in disgust and a full brawl begins among the family. Just as things quell, Ainsley, who had been playfully running around with various artifacts all weekend, arrives in the room wearing a Klan hood he found in the patriarch's bedroom, to everyone's horror. The next morning, Rachel is hurriedly leaving with Bo, and Franz claims to be working on mending his relationship with River. Toni declares that she is effectively dead to her relatives, and their selfishness in their relationships with her and the estate are not worth salvaging. After everyone leaves, the house begins to fall apart over years of disrepair.
A biographical play follows Jain philosopher and mystic Shrimad Rajchandra from his childhood in a remote Gujarati village through his renunciation of worldly pleasures, while reflecting on Jainism's influence on Indian culture and heritage.
Araminta Arrives is a 1921 play by the British writer Dorothy Brandon. It is an historical romantic comedy, set in 1887, about a young woman going to live with her aunt in London and becoming involved in a series of entanglements with men. The play was adapted from J.C. Snaith's 1908 novel, Araminta. It premiered at the Winter Gardens Theatre in New Brighton before transferring for a West End run at the Comedy Theatre that lasted for 39 performances. The cast included Eileen Beldon in the title role, along with Herbert Bunston, Louise Hampton and Lady Tree.
An elderly real-estate mogul is vexed when one daughter dates a Republican and the other falls in love with a poplar tree, which she is determined to cut down.
A pastoral masque honors Alice Spencer, Countess Dowager of Derby, as a queen of a metaphorical Arcadia. Guided by the spirit Genius, songs and personified figures praise her stature and virtue, turning the usual welcoming masque into a celebration centered on its guest.
In 1809, Thomasina Coverly, the daughter of the house, is a precocious teenager with ideas about mathematics, nature, and physics well ahead of her time. She studies with her tutor Septimus Hodge, a friend of Lord Byron (an unseen guest in the house). In the present, writer Hannah Jarvis and literature professor Bernard Nightingale converge on the house: she is investigating a hermit who once lived on the grounds; he is researching a mysterious chapter in the life of Byron. As their studies unfold – with the help of Valentine Coverly, a post-graduate student in mathematical biology – the truth about what happened in Thomasina's time is gradually revealed. The play opens on 10 April 1809, in a garden-front room of the house. Septimus Hodge is trying to distract 13-year-old Thomasina from her curiosity about "carnal embrace" by challenging her to prove Fermat's Last Theorem; he also wants to focus on reading the poem "The Couch of Eros" by Ezra Chater, who with his wife is a guest at the house. Thomasina starts asking why jam mixed in rice pudding can never be unstirred, which leads her to the topic of determinism and to a nascent theory of chaotic shapes in nature. This is interrupted by Chater himself, who is angry that his wife was caught in the aforementioned "carnal embrace" with Septimus; he has come to demand a duel. Septimus tries to defuse the situation by heaping praise on Chater's "The Couch of Eros". The tactic works, because Chater does not know it was Septimus who had savaged an earlier work of his, "The Maid of Turkey". Landscape architect Richard Noakes enters, shortly accompanied by Captain Brice and Lady Croom; the three discuss proposed modifications to the Arcadian style gardens, while Thomasina sketches an imaginary hermit on Noakes' technical drawing of the garden. The present day. Hannah Jarvis is researching the house, the garden, and specifically the hermit, for a study of hermits and the Romantic imagination. Bernard Nightingale enters with Chloe Coverly; she conceals the professor's identity from Hannah, as Nightingale had given Hannah's last book a poor review. Chloe's brother, Valentine, is gathering data on the population biology of the grouse in the surrounding grounds, using the house's "game books". When Chloe accidentally reveals Bernard's identity, Hannah reacts angrily; but she agrees to share her research material. This enables him to propose the theory that one of the 1809 inhabitants, Ezra Chater, was killed by Lord Byron in a duel. Bernard notes that records of Chater the poet disappeared after 1809, and the only other Chater of record is a botanist. The 19th century. Septimus is tutoring Thomasina, this time in translating Latin. Again their focus diverts, this time to the destruction of the Alexandrian Library, which upsets Thomasina. She mourns the loss of the knowledge stored there, and Septimus responds that all that was lost will eventually turn up again. They are interrupted by Chater, who succeeds in challenging Septimus to a duel, having learned (from Lord Byron off-stage) that Septimus wrote the damning review of his work. The present. Hannah rediscovers Thomasina's primer containing her ideas on iteration and chaos theory; this recalls Septimus' assertion that what was lost is eventually rediscovered. Valentine reacts with interest to the notes, as his own research centres on similar concepts. Bernard gives Hannah, Valentine, and Chloe a preview of his lecture theorising that Lord Byron shot and killed Chater in a duel. When Hannah and Valentine challenge his logic, Bernard launches into a diatribe about the irrelevance of science, then departs for his lecture (and a promotional media appearance) in London. Hannah begins to suspect that the hermit of Sidley Park – who was reportedly obsessed with algebraic computations about the heat death of the universe, the theory suggested in Thomasina's diagram – could have been Septimus. Returning to 1809, we learn that the duel never occurred. Instead, the Chater couple left for the West Indies with Captain Brice. Chater served as the expedition's botanist and his wife Charity was the captain's secret paramour. Lord Byron has also left the country. Septimus has gone rabbit hunting for Thomasina, who favours rabbit pie; he returns to find Lady Croom searching for him. She has found two letters, a love letter addressed to her, and another to Thomasina about rice pudding, both written by Septimus in case he died in a duel. She invites Septimus to an amorous rendezvous. Both 1812 and the present, the actions running concurrently. Some present-day characters are in fancy dress for a party, so that both casts appear similarly attired. After reading a newspaper report on the Byron murder theory, Chloe talks about determinism with Valentine, echoing the discussion between Septimus and Thomasina. Chloe, however, believes that sex is the force that disrupts the universe's ordered plan. Valentine, using his computer to extrapolate Thomasina's ideas, relates them to the later developed concept of entropy. He wonders whether Thomasina or Septimus was the genius behind the theories. Hannah and Valentine mention that Thomasina died in a fire on the eve of her seventeenth birthday. Meanwhile, Thomasina asks Septimus to teach her to dance, to prepare for her forthcoming 17th birthday party. Lady Croom enters, complaining to Noakes about the noise of his steam engine; Thomasina notes that the machine obeys the laws of entropy (which have not yet been formalized), which describe the universe as winding down. In the present, Bernard arrives and is met by Hannah, who has found a diary entry detailing the facts of Chater's death – this discovery totally discredits Bernard's theory and vindicates Lord Byron's reputation. While Septimus awaits appropriate music for Thomasina's dance lesson, he examines the sketch she made to illustrate the irreversibility of heat; his action mirrors that of Hannah and Valentine, who pondered the same diagram. Bernard is caught in a compromising position with Chloe, and is asked to depart. Eventually a waltz starts, and Septimus dances with Thomasina, revealing that their relationship is increasingly complicated by hints of romance. Gus (Valentine and Chloe's younger brother, who has been silent for the entire play) hands another of Thomasina's drawings to a surprised Hannah. It depicts Septimus and the tortoise, confirming her suspicion that the hermit, who had a tortoise called Plautus, was Septimus. After Thomasina's tragic death, he apparently became a hermit. Accepting her challenge to the laws of the universe as propounded by Newton, he worked for the rest of his life to apply "honest English algebra" to the question of the universe's future.
A group of young Milanese men stage a fake marriage between their friend Lofty and a woman pretending to be an Albanian princess. In his attempt to obtain identity papers, Lofty is transformed into a dog and passes through a series of comic adventures before waking from the dream. The pinball image evokes mechanization and conspicuous consumption.
A group of teenage revolutionaries, including Gavrilo Princip, are swept up in a scheme to assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
Exiled by his brothers, Archelaus reaches King Cisseus and helps defend him. When Cisseus plots against him instead of honoring his promise, Archelaus turns the plot back on the king, escapes to Macedonia and founds Aegae, guided by a goat and an oracle.
Alice Arden and her lover Mosby plot to murder her husband Thomas. After several failed attempts, hired killers carry out the murder, and the conspirators are discovered and punished.
An ageing general convenes his family to condemn his hunchbacked sister Ardèle's romance with a tutor. Behind her locked bedroom door, the unseen couple become a target of the family's hypocritical, self-interested advice and scandalized judgment.
Frank Perry pretends to have joined the Freemasons to satisfy his wife and explain his late nights. His father-in-law has used the same excuse for years, and each fears exposure when the family expects them to recognize one another as lodge brothers.
The Hon Willie Tatham is at a dance at his own house, hosted by Lady Frinton. He is surprised by the return of his wife Margot from a long trip to Egypt. She catches the lonely Willie with Kitty Lake just at the moment when the former actress gives him a consoling kiss. There is a serious row, and Margot adopts the tone of a deeply injured wife. Fortunately for Willie, his widowed father, Lord Grenham, who has a roving eye and wide worldly experience, finds a young Australian, John Willcocks, who had a flirtation with Margot in Egypt more romantic and possibly more passionate than a casual kiss at a jazz supper party. Margot has fled Egypt to avoid further temptation. Grenham arranges for Willcocks, who has come to London in search of her, to have a chance of rekindling the Egyptian romance. Willocks proves a gentleman and abandons his pursuit. Mutual forgiveness is the result. Meanwhile, Lady Frinton manoeuvres to lure Lord Grenham into a marriage. Margot, irritated by Grenham's efforts regarding Willcocks, assists in this by placing an announcement of Grenham's engagement to Frinton in The Times. This is all observed closely by the vicar, Lynton, and his wife, who is Grenham's sister. The Lyntons learn something, however, from Grenham's flexible attitude toward life. With the young couple reconciled and Lady Frinton triumphant, the vicar reproaches Grenham for calling him "a bloody old fool". Grenham responds by putting his arm round the vicar's shoulders and says, "But aren't we all, old friend?".
The play opens with a musical band of four marionettes, each playing an instrument; piano, drums, trumpet, and bass. After a brief song, the audience is introduced to Joey Arias. Arias has been kidnapped by aliens and is subjected to probing while she performs a version of Kashmir by Led Zeppelin. When the aliens are finished with the intrusion, they eject her from their spaceship and she crash lands in a jungle, presumably on earth. She follows her landing with Jungle of Eden, an original song by the Propellerheads' Alex Gifford. Alone and hungry, Arias searches for food only to find a mushroom that causes her to hallucinate. During the hallucination sequence, psychedelic imagery is projected onto a scrim at the front of the stage while Arias sings a Beatles medley comprising Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds and Within You, Without You. The scene shifts to an undisclosed location where objects float through the air accompanied by Arias's monologue on her sugar daddy. She is then sent to Hell, where she performs a musical number and some suggestive activities with two giant anatomically correct male devil puppets. Arias sings the Eric Carmen song All By Myself and is confronted by her doppelganger in puppet form who inspires her to return to New York City. This prompts another original Alex Gifford song, Lately. When Arias returns to New York, she arrives just in time to perform in a show with the aforementioned puppet band where she sings the Lambert, Hendricks & Ross song, Twisted, the Bill Carey and Carl T. Fischer song, You've Changed, and Ziegfeld Follies song, You've Gotta Pull Strings. The production ends in a Busby Berkeley-esque finalé, which includes mirrors and kaleidoscopic video images of Arias's face.
A biographical drama about Aristotle Onassis’s life after he meets Jacqueline Kennedy, based on material from Peter Evans’s book Nemesis.
In Arizona Territory before the Spanish–American War, a cavalryman is accused of stealing books that conceal a key to an office. The play also follows an officer’s wife, a father who rejects responsibility for his child, and a vaquero’s love for the daughter of a German cavalry sergeant.
The play assembles unconnected scenes from discarded Bergman film ideas, story drafts, and screenplays, including an erotic comedy, a cannibal play, an opera libretto, and scenes set inside a womb.
Fleeing debtors in a flying machine, Arlequin encounters a Persian prince whose beloved is being forced to marry the Tartar Kam. Mistaken for Mohammed, he helps the princess and prince marry, then weds her servant.
A fairy tries to make Arlequin love her, but he falls for Silvia, a shepherdess. With help from the fairy’s servant Trivelin, the pair outwit the fairy and plan to marry.
After being marooned on Serendib, Pierrot and Mezzetin disguise themselves as women and become priestesses, while Arlequin is crowned king. He discovers that the islanders sacrifice their kings, and the three escape to Paris before he can be killed.
During the Russian Civil War in eastern Siberia, peasant farmer Nikolai Vershinin leads partisans seeking to capture ammunition from a counter-revolutionary armoured train. In an episodic four-act structure, the play follows Vershinin's shift from political indifference to Bolshevik commitment.
During the Serbo-Bulgarian War, idealistic Raina shelters Swiss mercenary Captain Bluntschli, whose practical view of warfare unsettles her romantic ideals. When he returns, Raina's engagement to Sergius breaks down, and she and Bluntschli choose each other.
After the 1798 Rising, Arrah protects her foster brother Beamish, a fugitive rebel, while her husband Shaun is arrested in his place; pardons and a daring prison escape resolve the danger.
The play is a farcical black comedy revolving around the Brewster family, descended from Mayflower settlers but now composed of maniacs, many of them homicidal. Act 1 Two elderly sisters, Abby and Martha Brewster, live in the old family home in Brooklyn. Their father was a doctor who made a fortune selling patent medicine, and their nephew Teddy, who lives with them, believes he is President Theodore Roosevelt, much to the consternation of the neighbours. Teddy's brother Mortimer, a theatre-hating drama critic, is seeing Elaine, daughter of the minister who lives next door. The other Brewster brother, Jonathan, left home years ago and has not been heard from since. Mortimer proposes to Elaine, much to the delight of his aunts, but is worried he'll inherit the family madness. After Elaine leaves, Mortimer is shocked to discover a dead body hidden in the window seat. He's even more horrified when his aunts glibly confess to killing the man. They've taken to murdering lonely old men by poisoning them with a glass of home-made elderberry wine laced with arsenic, strychnine, and "just a pinch" of cyanide. They've killed a dozen men. Teddy digs graves for them in the cellar, convinced he's digging locks for the Panama Canal and that the dead men all died of yellow fever. Mortimer is horrified, especially when he narrowly prevents them from poisoning another man. He breaks off his engagement without explanation. Later, Jonathan returns to the home, having escaped from prison in Indiana. He's accompanied by an alcoholic accomplice, Dr. Herman Einstein (a character based on real-life gangland surgeon Joseph Moran), who has performed plastic surgery on him to conceal his identity, and now looks like horror-film actor Boris Karloff (a self-referential joke — the part was originally played on Broadway by Karloff). They're looking for a hideout and a place to dispose of their own murder victim. Act 2 Mortimer and the aunts are not pleased to see Jonathan, but reluctantly agree to let him spend the night. Jonathan and Dr. Einstein plan to turn Grandfather Brewster's old lab into an illicit plastic surgery clinic for criminals who want to hide their identities. Mortimer and the aunts try to hide their body from the intruders, while Jonathan and Dr. Einstein try to bury their body in the cellar. They're interrupted by Elaine, who wants to know why Mortimer broke off the engagement, and local police officer O'Hara, who wants Mortimer to help him write a play. Mortimer threatens to tell O'Hara about Jonathan's murder victim, but Jonathan, who is alerted to the corpse in the cellar by Dr. Einstein, threatens Mortimer in kind. After getting rid of Elaine and O'Hara, the aunts tell Jonathan about their own murders. Jonathan is angry that the aunts have killed the same number of people as he has, and is determined to beat them. Act 3 Jonathan plans to kill Mortimer and Teddy, though Dr. Einstein is reluctant. The criminals tie up Mortimer, but are interrupted by O'Hara, who returns to work on the play and is oblivious to Mortimer's predicament. Elaine returns and rescues Mortimer. The police, led by surly Lt. Rooney, raid the house and recognize Jonathan as a fugitive. Jonathan, Teddy, and the aunts insist that there are thirteen bodies in the cellar, but the police think they are all crazy. Lt. Rooney orders Teddy to be committed to a sanitarium. The aunts refuse to abandon Teddy and insist they be committed as well. They leave the house to Mortimer, but confess that he is actually the illegitimate son of their old cook, and therefore not a Brewster by blood. This delights Mortimer, who feels he can now marry Elaine. Dr. Einstein glibly walks out the front door, unnoticed by the police. Jonathan is arrested and taken away, but taunts the aunts that he's still killed as many people as they have. The play ends with the aunts offering the superintendent of the sanitarium a nice glass of elderberry wine.
Art and Nature is a 1738 comedy play by the British writer James Miller. The play received a rough reception from what Miller described a "faction" in the Drury Lane audience, and its run was not extended beyond a single night. He described its subsequent publication as an attempt to vindicate himself. The original Drury Lane cast included Benjamin Griffin as Sir Simon Dupe, William Mills as Truemore, James Quin as Outside, Theophilus Cibber as Julio, Joe Miller as Jeffrey, Richard Winstone as Constable, Margaret Mills as Flaminia and Kitty Clive as Violetta.
In Shaw’s imagined account of the Balfour Declaration, Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour needs acetone for the war effort. Chemist Chaim Weizmann agrees to help if Balfour gives him Jerusalem, and Shaw concludes with a warning about the declaration’s consequences.
When artist Donner falls down the stairs, roommates Martello and Beauchamp suspect murder and accuse each other. Flashbacks trace the three artists’ past interactions with blind Sophie, while Beauchamp examines a recording of the fatal fall; the mystery remains unresolved.
In Larissa after Alexander the Great's death, Artémire, the virtuous wife of usurper Cassandre, loves the rightful claimant Philotas. Cassandre persecutes her, but his unexpected death saves her.
A glamorous con artist persuades young New York writer Evan Wyler to follow her and write a screenplay about her life, promising fame and fortune. After she drains his credit card and disappears, Evan joins her other victims in exposing her schemes through his own writing.
Beth Beast, a feminist leader, calls a congress at her home to teach women to claim a dominant role in society. Her neighbor Amelia joins the discussion, bringing her husband Almeida, whose entrenched machismo disrupts the gathering.
As Is portrays the effect that AIDS, a relatively new epidemic in the 1980s, has on a group of friends living in New York City. It was one of the early plays, and subsequent TV movies, depicting how the epidemic was affecting gay Americans. As Is opened shortly before Larry Kramer's play The Normal Heart. This play depicts a gay couple, Saul and Richard, who open the play, and their separation. Rich's firm decision to separate is reversed when he returns to Saul after contracting AIDS from his new lover. Seeking emotional support, Rich shows how people with AIDS were treated by the American family, doctors, and friends. Their impersonal and detached attitudes lead Rich to recognize the importance of the partner for the person with AIDS. The play begins, and ends, with a monologue by a middle-aged, female hospice worker, describing her new patient, Richard. In the second scene, Saul, one of the two main characters, states that he is Jewish while arguing about possessions with Richard, who makes an antisemitic remark and reveals he has AIDS during their ongoing breakup.
As It Is In Heaven is a play by playwright/actor/director Arlene Hutton. It premiered at 78th Street Theater Lab, followed by performances at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and at the Off-Broadway Arclight Theatre in New York City, where it ran from January 11 to February 5, 2002. The title comes from the Shaker song "The Saviour's Universal Prayer (Our Father Who Art in Heaven)", a Shaker rendition of the Lord's Prayer. The play is published by Dramatists Play Service, Inc.
As Long as They're Happy is a comedy play by the British writer Vernon Sylvaine which was first staged in 1953. A successful hit, it ran at the Garrick Theatre in the West End for 370 performances between July 1953 and May 1954. Veteran entertainer Jack Buchanan directed and starred as a stockbroker trying to cope with the extravagant behaviour of his daughters. Other members of the cast included Dorothy Dickson, Nigel Green, David Hutcheson and Stephen Hancock.
As You Are is a 1939 comedy play by Hugh Mills and Wells Root. It premiered at Richmond Theatre under the title Stay Just As You Are during the early months of the Second World War. It then transferred to London's West End where it ran for 74 performances from 12 January 1940 to 16 March 1940, initially at the Aldwych Theatre before moving to the Whitehall Theatre. The West End cast included Diana Churchill, Morland Graham, Edward Chapman, Hugh Dempster, Elliott Mason, Muriel George, O.B. Clarence, Vincent Holman, Charles Mortimer and Joan Hickson. A review in the New Statesman considered that despite its complicated plot, the play had many of the "right ingredients" for a successful comedy.
As You Find It is a 1703 comedy play by the English writer Charles Boyle, later Earl of Orrery. His grandfather Roger Boyle, 1st Earl of Orrery had also been a playwright. In style it is much closer to traditional Restoration comedy, than the developing trend for Sentimental comedy. Staged at the Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre in London, the cast featured John Verbruggen as Hartley, Thomas Doggett as Sir Abel Single, Thomas Betterton as Bevil, George Pack as Jack Single, George Powell as Ledger, John Bowman as Sir Pert, Anne Bracegirdle as Orinda, Elizabeth Bowman as Mrs Hartley, Elizabeth Barry as Eugenia and Elinor Leigh as Chloris.
After Rosalind is banished from court, she and Celia flee to the Forest of Arden in disguise. There Rosalind encounters Orlando, while the exiled court and several intertwined relationships move toward reconciliation and multiple marriages.
An African-American maid working in a Chinese home in Los Angeles leads a double life.
Based on a 1975 court case, the drama depicts the manslaughter trial of Dr. Winston Gerrard, a fictionalized physician accused after performing an abortion. A passive defendant faces an aggressive prosecutor, with defense counsel between them; testimony from witnesses is presented without the play taking a side.
In a Himalayan village, the poet Kalidas loves Mallika but leaves for royal service in Ujjayini. He returns famous and married to Priyangumanjari, avoids Mallika, and later comes back after abandoning court life to find her impoverished; their final meeting reveals the personal cost of his ambition and absence.
In a country house, Devlin interrogates Rebecca about an abusive lover and her disturbing recollections. Her fragmented monologues evoke violence, a factory, disappearing sirens and a woman separated from her baby on a train platform. Devlin increasingly reenacts the threatening lover’s behavior, while Rebecca’s memories blur with the experiences of women facing persecution and deportation.
Professor Vidyanand reforms rebellious student Lalya, who becomes a police officer. After criminally connected politician Dharmappa frames Vidyanand for embezzlement, prison turns the principled teacher into a revenge-seeking criminal. Lalya is tasked with arresting his former mentor; Vidyanand’s capture by his beloved student becomes his atonement.
Mohini urges King Vichitrasen to perform an Ashvamedha sacrifice, ostensibly to make him sovereign, while privately desiring the ritual's encounter with its horse. When the exhausted horse returns after a year, she rejects it and dies by suicide, leaving the king and the returning soldiers in crisis.
Demaenetus helps his son Argyrippus obtain money to be with the prostitute Philaenium, using two slaves' impersonation and trickery to obtain payment for donkeys. The money comes with the condition that Demaenetus also gets a night with Philaenium, but the plan is exposed to his wife Artemona.
Praxagora disguises herself and organizes Athenian women to take over the assembly. Once in power, they abolish private property and establish communal living, while rules requiring men to sleep first with older women lead to comic conflicts over a young couple.
In the office of mogul Daniel Weisinger, assistants Nick and Nora absorb insults and escalating demands while competing for advancement and managing the fallout from his behavior. After Heather is fired for attending her uncle’s funeral and Nora quits, the assistants’ loyalty and ambitions unravel; Nora briefly returns before Nick puts Daniel on hold and runs after her. The final scene has Jenny destroy the office in a furious tap dance.
After butcher Michele scars Assunta in a jealous attack, he is arrested and imprisoned. Assunta begins an affair with a court official, unaware he has a family; when Michele is released and learns the truth, he kills the official, and Assunta takes the blame.
A drama about euthanasia and the struggle to decide whether to end one's life, inspired by David Williamson's experiences with the health system after his heart condition.
A stage continuation of the Mrs Dale's Diary story, featuring Dr Dale and other characters from the radio serial. The touring show did not include the radio cast as an ensemble.
The two-part play places Homelife before The Zoo Story. In the first act, Peter and his wife Ann explore their marriage before Peter leaves to read in Central Park; the second act is Albee's earlier one-act play.
A once-successful actress retreats to her childhood home in Mississippi and fantasizes about reviving her career.
Ruth Maitland, a young Black woman from rural Jamaica, travels to Kingston for work as a stenographer. Her white British employer seduces her and she becomes pregnant; she later returns to rural Jamaica, where a longtime admirer proposes to her.
Two young lovers face a doomed relationship amid a bartered-bride arrangement, middle-class prejudice, family interests and political rivalry between a liberal and a conservative opponent.
At a dried-up well guarded by a hawk-like woman, the hero Cuchulain seeks waters said to grant immortality. An old man who has waited there for fifty years warns him away; when the guardian dances and the waters rise, Cuchulain misses them and pursues the warrior women she summons.
Disguised as priests while fleeing to Mutsu, Yoshitsune and his followers are stopped by a suspicious guard. Benkei recites a forged temple-subscription list to secure their passage. The Noh play stages their escape through a tense encounter at the barrier.
When young gay impersonator Juicy spends the electricity money on his self-centered boyfriend Onyx, his older sibling Kiwi, who runs a beauty salon, tries to recover it before the power is cut. Kiwi uses salon supplies to challenge Onyx as the family conflict exposes emotional abuse, toxic masculinity, and conditional love.
Athalie, queen of Judah, has abandoned Israelite religion and believes she has destroyed the royal family, but the high priest Joad and his wife have secretly raised the surviving child Joash. As Athalie encounters the child and seeks control of him, the priests reveal his royal identity and restore him to the throne; Joad executes Athalie.
Scenes from Greek tragedies trace the violence within the House of Atreus: Agamemnon’s sacrifice of Iphigenia, Clytemnestra’s revenge, and the retaliatory killing by Orestes and Electra. The sequence follows Orestes through his pursuit by the Furies to his eventual reunion with Iphigenia.
Years after the Genpei War, monk Renshō visits the site where he killed the young warrior Atsumori to pray for his release. Atsumori first appears disguised as a grass cutter, then returns as a ghost to recount his death in dance; Renshō refuses to reenact the killing, and the spirit asks him to pray for its release.
In Attila’s camp in Noricum, the Hun king weighs a political marriage to either Ildione or Honorie while his advisers Ardaric and Valamir are in love with the princesses. He chooses Ildione, but dies of a hemorrhage before their wedding, leaving the other characters hopeful for a brighter future.
Set in Montreal, the play examines war's effects on soldiers and civilians through a traumatized young veteran, a pacifist musician, a psychologist treating veterans while coping with compassion fatigue, and a filmmaker seeking to turn the soldier's experience into a film.
In a metatheatrical comedy, the characters watch the audience and expect it to perform; the playwright is also seated among the spectators, whose habits become the joke.
The action takes place over the course of several weeks in August inside the three-story home of Beverly and Violet Weston outside Pawhuska, Oklahoma. The play opens with Beverly Weston, a once-famous poet, interviewing Johnna, a young Cheyenne woman, for a position as live-in cook and caregiver for his wife Violet, who is being treated for mouth cancer due to heavy cigarette use for most of her life. Violet is a heavy drinker addicted to several different kinds of prescription drugs and exhibits paranoia and mood swings. Beverly, who freely admits that he is an alcoholic, lightly converses about Violet's current problems, most of which Beverly concedes are the result of personal demons too powerful to be cured by drugs. Violet enters the scene clearly affected by her drugs. After an incoherent and combative argument with Beverly, Violet returns upstairs. Beverly hires Johnna, lends her a book of T.S. Eliot's poetry, and continues to drink. Several weeks later. Beverly Weston has not been seen for five days. Several family members have gathered in the house to provide support for Violet including her daughter Ivy, her sister Mattie Fae and Mattie Fae's husband Charlie. When Violet is not making calls attempting to track down her husband or popping pills, she spends the time sniping at her family, particularly Ivy, whom she criticizes for her mode of dress and lack of a romantic life. The news comes that Beverly's boat is missing, furthering the fear that he has died by suicide. Ivy's older sister Barbara arrives from Boulder, Colorado, with her husband Bill and 14-year-old daughter Jean. Barbara has not visited her mother in several years, and has mixed feelings about returning to the house because of the confrontational nature of their relationship. They fall into an argument almost immediately, during which Violet accuses her of abandoning her family and breaking her father's heart. Later in the evening, Jean bonds with Johnna after the older woman allows her to smoke some marijuana in her room. She confides to Johnna that her parents are separated and are attempting to hide the fact from the family. Bill and Barbara argue over the cause of their separation as they make a bed out of the fold-out sofa in the living room: Bill is sleeping with a much younger woman, one of his students at the university where he teaches. At five AM, the local sheriff, Deon Gilbeau (Barbara's high school boyfriend) rings the doorbell and breaks the news that Beverly has been found drowned. Barbara goes to identify the body as Violet comes downstairs in a drug-addled fog. The act ends with her spiraling into confusion. Several days later. The family has come from Beverly's funeral. Violet spends a quiet moment alone in Beverly's office, bitterly reproaching him for leaving her, and takes some more pills. Before the memorial dinner prepared for the family by Johnna, several family arguments and scenes arise. Ivy and Barbara's sister Karen has flown in from Florida with her new fiancé and can talk about nothing except her wedding plans, distressing Barbara. During an argument with her mother and Mattie Fae, Ivy unwittingly confesses that she is seeing someone romantically but refuses to say whom. Mattie Fae and Charlie's son Little Charles has overslept and missed the funeral. His father is sympathetic but Mattie Fae is, as usual, rude to and critical of her son. Karen's fiancé Steve discovers that Jean is a pot-smoker and offers to share his stash with her, lewdly flirting with the teenaged girl. In a private moment, it is revealed that Ivy's lover is actually Little Charles, her first cousin. Dinner is served, and Violet begins insulting and needling all of her family members. After inappropriately discussing Beverly's will at the table, she cruelly exposes Barbara and Bill's separation. When Barbara starts to fight back, Violet tauntingly reveals the full extent of her addiction, and the tensions develop into a violent confrontation, culminating in Barbara physically attacking her mother. After family members separate them, Barbara takes control of the situation, ordering that the family raid the house to discover all of Violet's hiding places for her pills. Several hours later things have calmed down, but the pain of the dinner confrontation has not gone away. Barbara reports that Violet's doctor thinks she has brain damage, and the three sisters share a drink in their father's study, discussing their mother. Ivy reveals that she and Little Charles are planning to run away to New York, and refuses to acknowledge the need for someone to take care of Violet. She reveals that it was Violet, not Beverly, who was heartbroken when Barbara left Oklahoma. Violet enters, now more coherent and off her drugs but no less incorrigible, is resigned to dealing with her demise on her own terms. She discusses a depressing story from her childhood with her daughters. In a private moment, Barbara and Violet apologize to each other, but it is uncertain how long the peace will last. Mattie Fae observes a tender moment between Little Charles and Ivy, and begins taunting him again when the ever-patient Charlie finally loses his temper with his wife, berating her for her cruelty to her own son and promising her that unless she can find a way to be kind to Little Charles, he is going to leave her. The lecture is accidentally overheard by Barbara, who confirms when pressed that Little Charles and Ivy are lovers. She is shocked when Mattie Fae reveals that Little Charles is not just Ivy's first cousin but also her half-brother, the result of a long-ago affair between Mattie Fae and Beverly. Mattie Fae refuses to tell Ivy or Little Charles the truth, leaving it up to Barbara, who knows that the news will destroy Ivy, to find a way to end the incestuous affair. Later that night, Steve and Jean share a joint, and before long, Steve attempts to molest Jean. Johnna walks in on the scene and attacks Steve with a skillet; the noise brings Jean's parents and Karen to the scene. An ugly argument follows when Jean defensively lashes out at her parents with hurtful comments about her father's affair, and Barbara slaps her. Karen leaves with Steve, choosing to lie to herself and mistakenly blaming Jean for what happened. Bill elects to return to Boulder with Jean and admits, when Barbara confronts him, that he is not going to come back to her. He leaves as Barbara tells him she loves him. Two weeks pass. Barbara, now drinking heavily, offers Johnna a chance to quit and leave the toxic environment of the Weston house, but she chooses to stay. Sheriff Gilbeau drops by the house with the news that Beverly had stayed at a motel shortly before he died by suicide. He and Barbara nearly share a tender moment, but she is too emotionally exhausted and drunk to consummate it. Several days later, Ivy has dinner with Barbara and Violet. Ivy attempts to tell her mother, over Barbara's objections, of her plans with Little Charles but Violet suddenly confesses that she already knows that Little Charles is Beverly's son. Ivy recoils in shock and horror, rebuffing Barbara's attempts to comfort her, and says that she will never tell him and leaves for New York anyway. Before she goes, Ivy angrily accuses Barbara of turning into Violet, stunning Barbara. Violet calmly reveals that she has deliberately destroyed Ivy and Charles' affair, which she knew of the entire time. Barbara and her mother have one last angry confrontation during which Violet blames Barbara for her father's suicide. Violet also reveals his suicide might have been preventable since she knew which motel he stayed in the night he left the house, but did nothing to help him until after she removed money from the couple's joint safe deposit box. Barbara, realizing that her mother has slipped beyond her help, leaves the house. Violet breaks down and is left only with Johnna, who ends the play with a quotation from a T.S. Eliot poem: "This is the way the world ends, this is the way the world ends."
During the First World War, Lord Augustus Highcastle boasts about the seriousness of the war while leaving a list of British gun emplacements unattended. A female spy flatters him, switches the document for a fake and reports her success to the War Office, leaving Augustus to realize he has been duped.
Miserly Euclio guards a pot of gold while trying to arrange his pregnant daughter Phaedria's marriage. His wealthy neighbor Megadorus proposes to her; Lyconides confesses to having made her pregnant, and a slave steals the gold. The surviving manuscript breaks off before the conclusion.
Joannes Burmeister's Neo-Latin reworking of Plautus's comedy, recast as a biblical drama featuring Achan and Rahab from the Book of Joshua.
During court-ordered visitation, Stewart tries to reconnect with his children while his nervous new wife Mona is present. Their mother Gloria arrives drunk, and Aunt Bam steps in to manage the volatile family reunion.
The ill, reclusive Lemon recounts a childhood shaped by her charismatic Aunt Dan’s stories and ruthless realpolitik. Dan’s later experience of illness briefly changes her outlook, while Lemon concludes that compassion is a comforting fiction and violence is necessary.
Aunt Edwina is a 1959 comedy play by the British writer William Douglas Home. It premiered at Devonshire Park Theatre in Eastbourne, before beginning a run of 101 performances in London between 3 November 1959 and 6 February 1960.The production was staged initially at the Fortune Theatre in the West End before transferring to the Lyric Theatre in Hammersmith. The London cast included Henry Kendall, Margaretta Scott, Cyril Raymond (later replaced by Geoffrey Lumsden), Nicholas Selby, Peter Cellier and Hilary Tindall.
Auntie Mame is a comedic stage play written by American playwrights Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee. The play was adapted from the novel of the same name first published in 1955 by Patrick Dennis. The play was a critical and commercial success, and was nominated for five Tony Awards, running for 639 performances.
Aurelio and Miranda is a 1798 play by the British writer James Boaden, inspired by Matthew Gregory Lewis 1796 novel The Monk. It premiered at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on 29 December 1798. The original cast included John Philip Kemble as Aurelio, Sarah Siddons as Miranda, William Barrymore as Raymond, Charles Kemble as Lorenzo, John Bannister as Christoval, Walter Maddocks as Hilario, Ralph Wewitzer as Pedro, Jane Powell as Agnes, Charlotte Tidswell as St. Agatha, Maria Bland as Zingarella, Sarah Sparks as Leonella and Elizabeth Heard as Antonia.
A rhymed-verse Restoration drama loosely based on the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb, his brother Murad Baksh and their father Shah Jahan.
A count, duke, king, emperor, bishop, archbishop, and pope face judgment and are condemned to the Ship of Hell for sinful lives and oppression of the poor.
In an allegorical port, the Angel and Devil judge deceased passengers who argue over which boat they deserve. Most are sent to Hell for their worldly sins; four crusading knights reach Heaven, while a humble fool remains in the port.
Deceased souls seek passage onto the Angel's ship. Only a young boy boards the Ship of Heaven, the gambler goes to Hell, and the remaining characters must stay in Purgatory to atone.
A northeastern Brazilian comedy shaped by cordel literature and Catholic tradition. Framed as a pantomime by a clown-host, its characters include the scheming friends João Grilo and Chicó and a final judgment in which Jesus and Our Lady of Aparecida hear the characters’ cases.
Postal worker Eloi’s sexuality is repressed by his rigidly moralistic mother. He intercepts a lewd photograph sent between a university student and an antique dealer, then visits the student to warn him about sending such material.
Seven short vignettes, each for two people and set entirely in a car's front seat, explore the relationships of people sharing a journey. The original five segments—Bench Seat, Long Division, Road Trip, Autobahn, and Merge—were later joined by All Apologies and Funny.
A man entering the autumn of his life is unaware that his wife is unfaithful and is also gradually losing his sight. The domestic drama follows how his physical blindness and ignorance of the affair intersect.
A schoolteacher on holiday in the Tyrol falls in love with the married owner of the hotel where she is staying.
Late in her life, Ava Gardner invites journalist Peter Evans to help write her memoir. Their conversations revisit her Hollywood career, marriages, and private disappointments, becoming a contest over intimacy, trust, and who controls the story of a famous life.
In Rome, an American man arrives to retrieve his father’s body after a road accident and meets an English woman there to retrieve her mother’s body from the same accident. He learns that the two dead parents had been lovers.
Recent graduate Princeton moves to a rundown New York neighborhood and searches for a purpose while forming relationships with his neighbors, including puppet characters and human residents. The musical parodies children's educational television while its young adult characters confront work, money, racism, sexuality, pornography, and uncertain futures.
Awake and Sing! is a drama play written by American playwright Clifford Odets. The play was initially produced by The Group Theatre in 1935.
Three families holiday on the coast over Christmas 1968. Their experiences of grief, class, racism, family conflict, and illness converge; a young boy with leukaemia and a grieving mother perform a symbolic piece about freedom and letting go.
A five-act tragedy set in Trondheim Cathedral under Haakon Herdebred: cousins Axel and Valborg love one another, but a scheming monk prevents their marriage despite a papal dispensation.
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