Vincent in Brixton
A largely fictional drama about Vincent van Gogh's time in Brixton in 1873, where the young artist falls in love with an English widow.
Plays
8284 shows
Clear filtersVinegar Tom
Alice and her mother Joan are accused of witchcraft by neighbors who interpret their economic, marital, and agricultural misfortunes as evidence of the supernatural. The play uses the 17th-century trials to examine gender, power, and the scapegoating of poor, nonconforming women; contemporary songs interrupt the historical scenes.
Vint
Civil servants pass time by playing vint with personal files; when an official hears his wife's name, he takes an unexpected action.
Virginia
Virginia is a 1754 tragedy by the British writer Samuel Crisp. The play is set in Ancient Rome, and portrays the story of Appius and Virginia. It premiered at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane with a cast that included David Garrick as Virginius, David Ross as Iclius, Henry Mossop as Appius, Thomas Davies as Claudius, Thomas Mozeen as Rufus, Susannah Maria Cibber as Virginia, Elizabeth Bennett as Plautia and Mary Ann Yates as Marcia.
Virginius
Virginius is an 1820 tragedy in five acts by the Irish writer James Sheridan Knowles. It was part of a crop of plays set during the Roman Republic, part of a revival of interest in the period. The play is based on the story of Verginia. The original cast featured William Macready as Virginius, Maria Foote as Virginia, Harriet Faucit as Servia, William Abbot as Appius Claudius, Charles Connor as Caius Claudius, John Faucit as Titus, Daniel Egerton as Numitorius, Thomas Comer as Lucius, Charles Kemble as Icilius and Daniel Terry as Dentatus.
Virtual Intimacy
An interactive performance examines queer hookup culture, gay men's identities, and how technology shapes relationships. Community participants share experiences with professional performers, while audience members use their phones to respond anonymously and contribute to the event.
Visitatio Sepulchri (Barking Abbey version)
Three nuns dressed as the Marys visit Christ’s tomb and discover it empty. Christ appears to Mary Magdalene, who sings the news to her companions; they announce the resurrection to the apostles.
Visiting Mr. Green
After young executive Ross Gardiner is convicted of reckless driving for nearly hitting 86-year-old widower Mr. Green, he must make weekly visits for six months. Their mutual resentment gives way to family secrets and old wounds.
Visitors
An elderly couple live on a farm on Salisbury Plain, where their relationships with each other, their son and a young carer are examined.
Vivat! Vivat Regina!
Vivat! Vivat Regina! is a play written by Robert Bolt. It debuted at Chichester in 1970 and later at the Piccadilly Theatre London. Principal actors were Sarah Miles and Eileen Atkins. The play was directed by Peter Dews and designed by Carl Toms. Richard Pearson also played a role. Later, the play had a successful run on Broadway in 1972. The play tells the story of two rival monarchs who never met: Scotland's Mary, Queen of Scots and her cousin, Queen Elizabeth I of England. The play's title is Latin for "Long live! Long live the Queen!", and is taken from the acclamation at the Coronation Service. The first act contrasts the personalities of the two monarchs, as they engage in a battle of wiles. Elizabeth is portrayed as a woman who has given up on love and family in order to maintain a firm grasp on power, while Mary is portrayed as a reckless, impulsive woman ready to risk power for love. The second act concentrates on Mary's term as a prisoner of Elizabeth, during which time she reflected on her own pending execution. Eileen Atkins played Elizabeth in the play's British and American debuts. Bolt's wife Sarah Miles played Mary in the original British production, while Claire Bloom played Mary in the play's Broadway debut. The 1972 Broadway production received four Tony Award nominations: Best Play, Best Actress in a Play (Eileen Atkins), Best Featured Actor in a Play (Douglas Rain), and Best Featured Actor in a Play (Lee Richardson). A 1985 off-Broadway revival featured Geraldine Page as Elizabeth and Sabra Jones as Mary. Janet McTeer as Elizabeth and Barbara Flynn as Mary headlined director Roy Marsden's 1995 revival of Vivat! Vivat Regina! which played the Mermaid Theatre from October 23 to November 25. The play was, next to A Man for All Seasons, Bolt's most successful stage production, receiving several Tony nominations for its Broadway production.
Vladimir Mayakovsky
In an avant-garde verse tragedy, a poet-protagonist confronts the urban crowd and its coming revolt of things, presenting himself as a new prophet amid grotesque bodies, electric-age symbols and the poor city's damaged inhabitants.
Volpone
In Venice, the wealthy Volpone pretends to be dying so that Voltore, Corbaccio, and Corvino will bring him gifts in hopes of inheriting his fortune. With his servant Mosca, he exploits their greed, but his deceptions ultimately unravel and the plotters are punished.
Von morgens bis mitternachts
A bank cashier, stirred by an Italian visitor, leaves his provincial town to test whether money can give him a fuller life. His search ends in disillusionment and death.
Vortigern and Rowena
The story begins as the King of the Britons Constantius offers half his crown to his adviser Vortigern for his loyal service. Vortigern immediately plots the king's murder to take the crown for himself. Meanwhile, the court Fool warns two of Vortigern's children, Pascentius and Flavia, of the bad times ahead and the three of them leave the court with Flavia in drag. Constantius' sons Aurelius (Ambrosius Aurelianus) and Uter (Uther Pendragon), studying in Rome, receive word of Vortigern's treachery and go to Scotland to raise an army against their father's killer. In response Vortigern summons an army of Saxons, led by Hengist and Horsus, to defend him from the Scots. He falls in love with Hengist's beautiful daughter Rowena, and proclaims her his queen, much to the chagrin of his wife Edmunda and his two remaining sons, Wortimerus (Vortimer) and Catagrinus (Catigern), who flee. Vortigern's family eventually all join Aurelius and Uter's army, and Aurelius and Flavia declare their mutual love. In the end the Saxons are routed and Aurelius defeats Vortigern but spares his life, and then marries Flavia. The final speech is delivered by the Fool, who admits that the play is not very tragic, as "none save bad do fall, which draws no tear".
Vražda v salonním coupé
On an international express, celebrated inspector Trachta and a police apprentice investigate after a businessman dies following treatment for a toothache. The detective play also frames the case with lectures debating the fictional Czech detective’s criminal-investigation work.
Vrăjitoarele
A children's dramatic love story told through folk mythology, characterized as more folkloric than its companion play Șarpele Marao.
Věc Makropulos
Famous singer Emilia Marty intervenes in a century-old inheritance dispute, displaying impossible knowledge of the families involved. She reveals that she is Elina Makropulos, who has lived for more than 300 years through a potion of extended youth; as the others debate immortality's value, Emilia explains her apathy and Kristina destroys the formula.
Věrní abonenti
A married couple renews their theatre subscriptions but ends up seated apart. The husband falls for his attractive new neighbour, turning a seating mishap into a crisis that forces him to reconsider his marriage and his own identity.
W;t
The action of the play takes place during the final hours of Dr. Vivian Bearing, a university professor of English, dying of ovarian cancer. She recalls the initial diagnosis of Stage IV metastatic ovarian cancer from her oncologist, Dr. Harvey Kelekian. Dr. Kelekian then proposes an experimental chemotherapeutic treatment regimen consisting of eight rounds at full dosage. Vivian agrees to the treatment. Over the course of the play, Vivian reflects on her life through the intricacies of the English language, especially the use of wit in the metaphysical poetry of John Donne. Throughout the play, she recites Donne's Holy Sonnet X, "Death Be Not Proud," while reflecting upon her condition. (In the revised edition of John Donne's Holy Sonnets, "If Poysonous Mineralls" and "Death Be Not Proud" are sonnets IX and X, respectively.) As a professor, she has a reputation for rigorous teaching methods. She has lived her life alone, is unmarried and without children, her parents are deceased, and she has no emergency contact. Vivian recalls undergoing tests by various medical technicians and being the subject of grand rounds. She remembers sharing a love of language and books with her father. She flashes back to her experiences as a student of Dr. E. M. Ashford, an expert on John Donne. Bearing later finds herself under the care of Dr. Jason Posner, an oncology research fellow who has taken her class on John Donne. At the hospital, she recognizes that doctors are interested in her for her research value and, like her, tend to ignore humanity in favor of knowledge. Gradually, she realizes that she would prefer kindness to intellectualism. Vivian reaches the end stage in extreme pain as Susie Monahan, a nurse at the medical centre, offers Vivian compassion and discusses with her the option of exercising her final option, "do not resuscitate" (DNR), in case of a severe decline in her condition. Vivian decides to mark the DNR option. Dr. Ashford, in town for her great-grandson's birthday, visits the hospital after learning of Vivian's cancer. She comforts her and offers to read a Donne sonnet, but Vivian, scarcely conscious, declines. Instead, Ashford reads from Margaret Wise Brown's The Runaway Bunny, which she had bought for her great-grandson. Dr. Ashford kisses a sleeping Vivian, quotes Hamlet, and leaves. While on a routine visit, Jason notices Vivian has stopped breathing and has no pulse. He immediately calls in a "code blue" and begins CPR, despite the DNR order. Susie enters on hearing the code blue announcement, attempts to stop Jason's efforts, and calls to cancel the code. The resuscitation team arrives with a crash cart and attempts to revive Vivian while Susie tries to intervene, repeating that Vivian is DNR. Jason eventually admits his mistake, and upon examining the chart, the team quickly stops. The play ends as Vivian, unclothed after her death, walks from her hospital bed "toward a little light".
WEER
A one-performer romantic comedy in which Natalie Palamides plays both members of a couple, using her left and right sides for the male and female roles. The title echoes the couple’s repeated “we’re” and a mispronunciation of “deer.”
Waiora Te Ūkaipō - The Homeland
In 1965, a Māori family displaced from its tribal land gathers on a South Island beach to celebrate Rongo's birthday. Their hope that Hone will be promoted collapses when they learn his employer will offer only a bonus; the family tensions deepen as the ancestors' presence, a fire accident, Rongo's crisis and an impending volcanic eruption expose what the family has left behind.
Wait Until Dark
Susy Hendrix is a blind Greenwich Village housewife who becomes the target of three con-men searching for the heroin hidden in a doll, which her husband Sam unwittingly transported from Canada as a favor to a woman who has since been murdered. "Roat" leads his companions into thinking that they are going to be rich and will get the heroin soon enough, but in the end he murders all of his partners after they outlive their usefulness. The trio tries to convince Susy that her husband will be suspected of murdering the woman, and the only way to protect him is to give them the doll, which connects him to her. Little do the men know that Gloria, a little girl in the upstairs apartment, has stolen the doll after finding out it was not a gift for her. One of the men poses as Sergeant Carlino, a strange police detective, while another poses as Mike, an old friend of her husband dropping by for a visit. Susy relies on "Mike", and he eventually begins to feel sympathy for her. "Roat" poses as both the elderly Mr. Roat and his "son", Roat Junior. Roat Senior ransacks Susy's room and steals a wedding photo from the bedroom. He threatens Susy's and her husband's well-being, so she calls the police. Her call is intercepted by "Mike", and Susy is visited by "Sergeant Carlino". Gloria returns and admits her theft of the doll, and Susy hides it. Susy contacts "Mike" to ask for help now that the doll is found. Gloria has been watching the nearby phone booth used by the con-men, and she alerts Susy that all three of the men she has been dealing with are tricking her. Susy sends Gloria to meet her husband on his way home from work, and begins planning to handle the intruders. Roat kills both of his partners after the men discover Susy has the doll in the apartment. He spills gas around the apartment to destroy any evidence. Susy turns off all the lights so that "Roat" cannot see her. "Roat" uses matches to see until Susy douses him with the gasoline. He uses the refrigerator light to see, threatens Susy, and tries to kill her. She ultimately defeats "Roat". Sam bursts in with the police and finds that Susy has already dealt with Roat. He sees that Mike is also dead. Gloria yells at the police when they appear too patronizing to Susy and defends Susy's ability to take care of herself. After the police leave, Susy and Sam embrace.
Waiting for Gillian
Waiting for Gillian is a 1954 play by the English writer Ronald Millar. It is based on the 1951 novel A Way Through the Wood by Nigel Balchin. It was first staged at the Manchester Opera House before transferring to St James's Theatre in London's West End where it ran for 101 performances. The cast included John McCallum, Googie Withers, Frank Lawton and Norman Pierce. The play was staged by the Edinburgh Gateway Company in the autumn of 1955.
Waiting for Lefty
At a meeting of New York taxi drivers, union boss Harry Fatt opposes a strike while workers recount episodes of exploitation, job loss, discrimination, and betrayal. Organizer Agate urges them to act without waiting for their elected chairman Lefty; when they learn Lefty has been shot, the drivers unite and call a strike.
Waiting for the Parade
Five women in wartime Calgary manage volunteer work, family pressures, loneliness, and public expectations while men serve overseas. Their differing experiences expose the emotional costs of maintaining the home front.
Waiting in the Wings
At The Wings, a charity home for retired actresses, May Davenport is furious when her old rival Lotta Bainbridge moves in. Amid a fundraising show, a fire and the residents’ changing fortunes, the women gradually reconcile; when Lotta’s son invites her to leave for Canada, she chooses the community she has made at the home.
Waiting to Be Invited
In Atlanta in summer 1964, a group of Black women test the end of segregation by trying to be served at an all-white lunch counter.
Walden
In a near-future with worsening climate change and refugee crisis, and where synthetic foods, cloning, and war are common, Cassie, a NASA astronaut returned from a year-long lunar mission, visits her estranged fraternal twin sister Stella, and Stella's partner Bryan, at a remote cabin. Stella, a former NASA architect, designed a Mars habitat called Walden while at the agency. Cassie is about to begin training for a mission to Mars, where she will live in the Walden habitat. Stella, while still believing in NASA, now favors prioritizing the Earth, while Bryan is an "Earth Advocate" activist, and they argue with Cassie about space colonization. A love triangle develops.
Walk about the Villages
A writer returns to his home village and becomes entangled in a dispute with his brother and sister over their parents’ house. The dramatic poem is the final part of Handke’s Slow Homecoming tetralogy.
Wall
A monologue about Israel's security barriers in the West Bank and Gaza, conceived as a companion to Hare's monologue Berlin and its discussion of the Berlin Wall.
Wallace
After defeat against the English at the Battle of Falkirk, Scottish war leader Wallace manages to escape to the apparent safety of a glen. There he is betrayed by Montieth who hands him over to the English. As Wallace goes resignedly to his execution, his wife Helen dies of grief in the arms of his ally Douglas
Wallenstein
Schiller’s three-part drama traces General Wallenstein’s defiance of Emperor Ferdinand II during the Thirty Years’ War, the divided loyalties of his commanders and the tragic collapse of his military and personal circle.
Waltz of the Stork
Waltz of the Stork is an American semi-autobiographical play written and originally performed by Melvin Van Peebles. It also featured his son Mario Van Peebles. The play originally ran for four months in 1982. It ran from January 5, 1982, to May 23, 1982. The song "The Apple Stretching", featured in this play, was later covered by Grace Jones, and released as a single. In 2008, a film based on the play, Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha, was released, directed by Van Peebles.
Wang Dan
Five actors portray different stages of Wang Dan’s life at once: childhood, activism during the 1989 movement, imprisonment, exile, and an idealized poetic self. Their dialogue and imagery of a playground and carousel explore the tension between ideals and reality and the lasting emotional effects of exile.
War Horse
A foal is auctioned for sale in Devon, the United Kingdom. Hoping to give it to his son Billy, Arthur Narracott bids on the foal; instead, his brother Ted competes with him and bids 39 guineas—an exorbitant amount that Arthur can't meet – and wins the foal. Ted is the local drunkard and thought to be a coward, for refusing to have fought together with his brother in the earlier Boer War in South Africa. At the auction, Ted used money reserved to pay his farm mortgage. Ted's wife Rose fears they will lose their farm. Their son Albert promises to raise the foal and train him for sale. The boy names the foal Joey, and forms a strong bond with the horse during training. Jealous of his cousin Albert, Billy convinces his father to get Ted drunk and make a bet: if Joey (bred and trained as a hunter, not a plough horse) can be taught to plough within a week, Arthur will pay Ted 39 guineas, the auction price. If Joey won't plough, Billy gets the horse. Albert successfully teaches Joey to pull the plough and gets to keep him. News of the outbreak of World War I reaches Devon. When Ted sells Joey to the cavalry, Albert is crushed. Captain James Nicholls, who often sketched Albert riding the hunter, promises that he will personally look after the fine horse. At the same time, Arthur enlists Billy to fight despite his protests. Arthur gives Billy his grandfather's knife for protection. Joey and Topthorn (another army horse) are shipped to France. The charges of the British cavalry are overwhelmed by the fire from German machine guns, representing their new technology. During the first charge, Nicholls is shot and killed. Billy is assigned to ride Joey into battle and is captured by German troops. Nicholls's sketchbook is sent to Albert, who learns Joey is serving "unprotected" in France. He lies about his age, enlists in the army and goes to France. There he befriends Private David Taylor, a fellow soldier. The Germans have taken Billy to a French farm being used as a makeshift hospital. He is killed brandishing his knife. Emilie, the girl of the farm family, is nearly killed in the altercation. German officer Friedrich Muller is reminded of his own daughter left in Germany. He and Emilie share a love of horses and, with Emilie's mother, they take care of the horses Joey and Topthorn, which are being kept to pull an ambulance for wounded soldiers. When a shell kills most of his comrades, Friedrich switches his coat and identity with an enlisted medic, hoping to survive to return home. His subterfuge is discovered but Friedrich enables Emilie and her mother to escape. When the Germans force the two fine horses to work as draft horses, Joey inspires Topthorn to pull in order to survive. Once enemies, the two horses become friends, but Topthorn dies from exhaustion. As Friedrich mourns the horse, a tank attack hits his group, killing him and causing Joey to flee in escape. He is caught in barbed wire in No Man's Land between the enemy lines. The Germans and British each send out a man under a white flag to aid the horse. Winning a coin toss, the British take the injured Joey back to camp. Albert and David's infantry division encounter Emilie, who is alone and traumatized; they take her to British headquarters. On the way, Albert sees a dead horse with Billy's knife in him. Believing that the horse is Joey, Albert is broken. Recognizing Joey's name, Emilie tries to talk to Albert, but David is shot and killed, and Albert temporarily blinded by tear gas. Emilie does not have the chance to tell him about his horse. Behind the lines, in a British encampment, Albert tells his story to a nurse just as the damaged Joey is brought to the camp by soldiers. The soldiers prepare to kill the injured horse, but Albert whistles and Joey responds to him. Learning the full story, the soldiers agree to let Albert care for Joey during their joint convalescence. The horse and farmboy return home safe to Devon at the end of the war.
War and Peace
A stage adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's novel, collaboratively adapted by Alfred Neumann, Erwin Piscator and Guntram Prüfer.
Warenar
In Amsterdam, Warenar is so obsessed with a pot of inherited gold that he neglects his pregnant daughter Klaartje. A servant’s theft of the treasure throws him into panic, while the young lovers’ future becomes entangled with his eventual release from greed.
Warn That Man!
Warn That Man! is a 1941 comedy thriller play by the British writer Vernon Sylvaine. A comedy-thriller, its plot concerns an attempt to kidnap wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill from an English country house. Having debuted at the New Theatre, Oxford, it then ran for 352 performances at the Garrick Theatre in the West End between December 1941 and September 1942. Amongst its cast were Gordon Harker, Veronica Rose, Basil Radford, Ethel Coleridge and Judy Kelly.
Warp!
David Carson, an everyday bank teller, learns that he is Lord Cumulus, "avenger of the universe". against antagonist Prince Chaos. In this world, he encounters the sage Lugulbanda, who sends him on his quest aided by the leather-clad Amazon warrior Sargon. They battle Valaria the insect sorceress and Chaos' henchman, the purple ape Symax.
Warwick Pageant
This large-scale historical pageant used ten episodes to dramatize Warwick's history from Roman and Briton encounters through Queen Elizabeth's 1572 visit. The outdoor performance combined scenes of rulers, battles, civic events and processions, performed by a large community cast.
Was geschah, nachdem Nora ihren Mann verlassen hatte; oder Stützen der Gesellschaften
Jelinek follows Nora after she leaves her husband, tracing the social roles projected onto her as wife, mother, worker, lover, and businesswoman. Her attempt to escape an upper-class domestic role exposes how a small capitalist elite controls political and economic institutions, while her ambitions also entangle her in exploitation.
Waste
Independent politician Henry Trebell pursues a bill to disestablish the Church of England, but an affair with Amy O'Connell leads to scandal, her death after a botched abortion and his suicide.
Watch on the Rhine
It is 1940, in late spring. For the past 17 years, the German-born engineer Kurt Mueller and Sara, his American wife of 20 years, have lived modestly in Europe and raised three children. He has been deeply involved in anti-Fascist activities in Spain and Germany. The Muellers and their children Joshua, Babette, and Bodo are visiting Sara's wealthy relatives, the Farrellys, her brother David, and mother Fanny, in Washington, D.C. Sara tells the Farrellys she and her family hope to live peacefully in the U.S. The Farrellys have another houseguest, Teck de Brancovis, an impoverished Romanian count "with good manners and odious character" who has been conspiring with the Germans while living in Washington. He searches the Muellers' bedroom and in a locked suitcase discovers a gun and $23,000 intended to finance underground operations in Germany. The Muellers learn that Max Freidank, a member of the resistance, has been arrested in Germany. Because Freidank once rescued Kurt from the Gestapo, Kurt plans to return to Germany to assist Max and those arrested with him. Teck threatens to expose Kurt's plans to the Nazis unless they pay him $10,000 to keep silent. Kurt kills Teck. David and Fanny agree to help him escape capture by the American police. The play ends with Kurt saying goodbye to his wife and children and voicing his hope that they'll all be reunited someday in a freer, better Germany.
Watchlist
Basil Pepper falls for animal-rights activist Delia Dengel, who draws him into confronting climate collapse and his own complicity. As Delia’s plan develops, Basil’s friend and mother try to pull him away, while government agents circle and the characters face choices between dissent, silence, and self-interest.
Water by the Spoonful
Set seven years after Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue, the play features veteran Elliot Ortiz, who was wounded and has returned to his home town of Philadelphia. He works at a sandwich shop and cares for his ailing aunt Ginny, who raised him. He is coping with recurring bouts of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), characterized by visions of an apparition, a man who continually offers a hand and repeats an Arabic phrase. Elliot's cousin Yazmin, a Swarthmore College music professor in the middle of a divorce, introduces him to Professor Aman, from Swarthmore's Arabic Studies department. Elliot wants to decipher the phrase the ghost repeats, but does not want to share its origin. Aman says that he will translate the phrase if Elliot agrees to contact a filmmaker friend of his who is making a documentary about the Iraq War. When Elliot accepts, Aman reveals that the phrase means, "Can I please have my passport back?". Odessa is Elliot's birth mother and Ginny's sister. She had given up her son because of her crack addiction. In recovery, she uses the alias Haikumom to moderate an anonymous online message board for recovering addicts. These include Orangutan and Chutes&Ladders. Haikumom and Chutes&Ladders are delighted by the appearance of Orangutan, who has not logged into the site for three months. She tells them that she is 90 days sober and has moved to Japan to meet her birth parents. Fountainhead, a wealthy Philadelphian addict-in-denial, arrives and sows discord on the message board. Odessa wants to welcome him, but Orangutan and Chutes&Ladders doubt his intentions, especially when he seeks help to avoid telling his wife about his addiction. After Fountainhead and Odessa leave the chatroom, Orangutan encourages Chutes&Ladders to visit her in Japan, but he refuses. He fears that the awkwardness of the meeting and the break from the routine he has built for himself might threaten his 10-year sobriety. When Ginny dies, Elliot and Yazmin have limited funds to pay for her funeral, and they start seeking money from the rest of the family. While this is happening, Odessa meets Fountainhead at a diner to discuss rehab and treatment options. Yazmin and Elliot arrive and confront Odessa for her failure to contribute to her sister's funeral. Elliot reveals to Fountainhead that Odessa had a daughter who died of dehydration from the flu at the age of two. He blames Odessa, claiming that she was too busy getting high on crack to give his sister the "water by the spoonful" she needed to survive. Shamed, Odessa gives Elliot permission to pawn her personal computer for Ginny's funeral expenses. He and Yazmin go to Odessa's apartment to retrieve it. Elliot logs in and poses as Haikumom on the message board, where he insults Orangutan. Yazmin grabs the keyboard to explain it is Haikumom's son using the computer. Orangutan tells them that Haikumom has always spoken very highly of Elliot on the site. She had regretted her absence from his life due to her addiction. Orangutan posts that she plans to visit her birth parents' address, but Chutes&Ladders attempts to dissuade her. He suggests that the emotion of the visit might make her want to use again. Orangutan says that she prefers uncertainty about the future to Chutes&Ladders' strict routine, and leaves for the train to Kushiro, where her birth parents supposedly reside. That night, Odessa relapses and the hospital calls Fountainhead, whom she listed as an emergency contact without his knowledge. In the morning, Orangutan reveals that she did not take the train to her birth parents. Chutes&Ladders says that he has decided to face his fears and has bought a ticket to Japan. Fountainhead enters the chat with the news about Odessa, and Chutes&Ladders convinces him that he now has a duty to care for her. Fountainhead agrees and calls his wife, giving her the credentials to his profile on the message board, so that she can find out about his addiction struggles. Orangutan and Chutes&Ladders meet in person in Japan. Yazmin and Elliot travel to Puerto Rico where they scatter Ginny's ashes. Yazmin plans to purchase Ginny's house there and to start a family. Elliot vows to pursue his acting dream in Los Angeles.
Waterloo Bridge
American chorus girl Myra Deauville is stuck in 1917 London at the height of World War I, unable to find work and book passage home. She resorts to prostitution to support herself. She meets her clients on Waterloo Bridge, the primary entry point into the city for soldiers on leave. There she meets fellow American Roy Cronin, a young soldier in the Canadian Army on convalescent leave after being wounded in France, and impressed by his innocence, invites him to her apartment for tea instead of soliciting his business. Afterwards she sends him away. The next day Myra's friend and neighbor Kitty finds Roy waiting for Myra in her room. Unaware that Kitty is also a prostitute and that their landlady, Mrs. Hobley, has been forced to run her house as a brothel because her husband is a prisoner-of-war, Roy is persuaded that Myra needs his protection. Kitty hints that Roy should ask Myra to marry him and tries to convince Myra to accept a proposal, justifying the idea as an expedient of survival. Rationalizing that Myra will make a soldier happy for a few days, Kitty tells her that she owes it to herself as an honest resolution to a predicament she did not create. Mrs. Hobley learns that Roy is flush with back pay and encourages Myra so Roy will pay her delinquent rent. The gullible Roy is worried that he will be sent to Camp Bramshott at any moment to prepare for return to the front and proposes. Myra accepts, but then sneaks away when she feels guilty. Restored to duty, Roy assigns part of his pay to her and names her as the beneficiary of his life insurance. Mrs. Hobley, in need of self-justification, tells Roy that her "Christian duty" compels her to warn him that Myra is a "harlot". Roy accepts the truth as a reality of the times and rejects her warning. Crossing the bridge on his way to the railway station, he meets Myra again and makes her promise to accept the allotment and sign for the life insurance benefit. After he leaves for Bramshott, Myra remains on the bridge, lighting a cigarette, just as a German air raid begins, and she is killed.
Waters of the Moon
The routine of a modest West Country hotel is disrupted when a car breaks down nearby and the wealthy, vivacious Helen Lancaster, her husband and daughter become snowbound. Their arrival unsettles the hotel's isolated guests and reshapes their relationships.
Watsonville: Some Place Not Here
At a California cannery, workers strike for better wages and rights while the Latino community is divided by anti-immigration legislation. Protest theatre and hunger strikes accompany the struggle, which intertwines labor, immigration, gender, sexuality, and spiritual visions. Moraga draws loosely on a cannery strike, an earthquake, and a reported vision of the Virgin of Guadalupe.
Way Upstream
Set aboard a hired cabin cruiser on an English river, the play follows a power struggle that culminates in a violent overthrow of a tyrannical captain. Alistair and Emma make a new start at the end. Ayckbourn rejected readings that treat the action as a direct political allegory.
Way to Heaven
Set around the 1944 Red Cross visit to Theresienstadt, the play follows the inspector, the camp commandant and Jewish prisoner Gershom Gottfried, whom the commandant forces to stage an opera for the visitors. The staged scenes conceal the deportations and death-camp reality that the prisoners know lies beyond the charade.
Ways and Means
Ways and Means; Or, a Trip to Dover is a 1788 comedy play by the British writer and theatre manager George Colman the Younger. It premiered at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket in London with a cast that included John Bannister as Sir David Dunder, John Palmer as Random, James Brown Williamson as Scruple, James Aickin as Old Random, Howard Usher as Paul Peery, Lydia Webb as Lady Dunder and Elizabeth Kemble as Harriet. Its Irish premiere was at the Crow Street Theatre in Dublin on 24 April 1793.
Ways and Means
Heiress Stella Cartwright and her gambling husband Toby face debts and eviction from their French villa. When a disgraced chauffeur breaks in to rob them, Stella turns the encounter into a scheme to rob their guests and recover their money.
Ways and Means; Or, a Trip to Dover
Two young men, Random and Scruple, fall in love with sisters Kitty and Harriet. The sisters’ father, Sir David Dunder, unwittingly brings the couples together, then interrupts their attempt at a double elopement.
We Are Not Alone
A skeptical performer investigates UFO sightings, extraterrestrial encounters, and the communities that believe in them. His journey through conflicting accounts explores the desire for evidence, connection, and a place in the universe.
We Are Proud to Present a Presentation About the Herero of Namibia, Formerly Known as Southwest Africa, From the German Südwestafrika, Between the Years 1884–1915
Actors rehearse a presentation about the Herero genocide in German colonial Namibia, confronting how they represent the violence and how the rehearsal affects their relationships.
We Bombed in New Haven
We Bombed in New Haven is a 1967 play by Joseph Heller. An anti-war black comedy, it is thematically linked in part to Heller's famous novel Catch-22. The play opened on Broadway at the Ambassador Theatre on October 16, 1968, and closed on December 29, 1968, after 85 performances. The play is heavily metatheatrical, being not only staged at but also set at the Ambassador Theatre, the actors playing actors appearing in a play at the Ambassador. This play-within-a-play concerns a strategic bombing squadron; the squadron commander frequently steps out of character to reassure the audience that they are only watching a play. This conceit is carried to the point where the actors themselves exhibit confusion over whether they really are actors playing airmen, or actual airmen. For instance, in the second act, Henderson (played by Ron Leibman) is scheduled to be killed – he knows this, being familiar with the script, and is not worried; but then later, a corporal is killed on a mission, and Henderson is unable to find him offstage. Henderson worries that the corporal really has been killed, and that perhaps the "play" is reality. This "phantasmagoric world in which actors might not know where the grease paint ended and the blood began", where the audience is led to believe in both levels of reality as the borders blend and blur in manner reminiscent of the works of Luigi Pirandello, is used by Heller to satirize and excoriate the moral blindness that leads people to treat war as spectacle, equating the real death and suffering of war with the deaths of actors in war movies. New York Times theatre critic Clive Barnes gave the play a mixed review ("I would call it a bad play any good playwright should be proud to have written, and any good audience fascinated to see"); the New York Post was more enthusiastic ("An exceptional quality of imagination that is at once comic, bitter and moving, and it is immensely effective in dramatic terms"). The title of the play is ironic with a double meaning. In 1967, plays frequently opened in New Haven, Connecticut for a tryout run before moving to Broadway (perhaps via Boston or Philadelphia), and "bombed in New Haven" would describe a play that was found there to be too flawed to make it to Broadway. And the airmen do literally bomb in New Haven (as well as other targets such as Minnesota and "Constantinople") in the course of the play, reason for these seemingly absurd targeting orders from the High Command never being given. Prior to its Broadway opening, the play was premiered in New Haven by the Yale Repertory Theatre in 1967 starring Stacy Keach, Estelle Parsons, and Ron Leibman (who went with the play to Broadway). In the original Broadway production, players included Ron Leibman, Anthony Holland, Jason Robards, Diana Sands and William Roerick. Although its eleven-week run was respectable, the play is generally considered to have not been a success, but a Broadway revival was staged in 1972 at the Circle in the Square Theatre, featuring Steven Keats and James Doerr, and the play has been occasionally staged at various venues throughout the rest of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first.
We Happy Few
A group of women form a professional theatre troupe and tour Shakespeare plays around Britain during World War II, facing the practical and personal challenges of keeping the company alive.
We Interrupt This Program...
During the performance, a group of criminals takes the audience hostage in an effort to force the release of an imprisoned accomplice.
We Swear
Matt and Naomi revisit the promises they made after marrying, as they find themselves back in Toronto facing a corporate gig and a wedding they never planned.
We Thieves Are Honourable
A botched robbery at a suburban home drives this comedy by Enrique Jardiel Poncela.
We Want You to Watch
Pig and Sissy try to eradicate internet pornography, using extreme tactics including kidnapping the Queen to demand a ban and trying to make an American hacker shut down the internet. The play critiques pornography while describing itself as pro-sex.
We Were Dancing
At a dance on a South Pacific island, married Louise falls for Karl and plans to leave with him for Australia. After talking through the night, they realize their feelings were fleeting and part amicably.
We Will Never Die
This dramatic pageant uses narration, actors, prayers and music to call attention to the mass murder of Europe’s Jews. Its sections evoke a roll call, Jews in war, the Battle of Warsaw and the ghetto, concluding with remembrance.
Weapons of Happiness
A strike at a London crisp factory forms the main plot, interwoven with the imagined survival of Czech communist minister Josef Frank in the 1970s and his hallucinations of Stalinist Czechoslovakia. Brenton frames the drama as a British epic theatre work with limited naturalism and long speeches.
Weather Girl
California weather presenter Stacey maintains a cheerful on-screen persona while struggling with alcoholism; as she reports on wildfires, her past begins to upend her present.
Weatherwise
Lady Warple’s trance makes her behave like a dog whenever anyone mentions the weather; a household attempt to cure her ends in fatal violence.
Wedding Band: A Love/Hate Story in Black and White
In 1918 South Carolina, Julia, a Black seamstress, and Herman, a white baker, have been together for ten years but cannot marry under anti-miscegenation laws. When Herman falls ill, racial hostility and fear of legal consequences keep Julia’s neighbors and his family from helping; after his death, Julia gives their planned escape tickets and wedding band to a neighbor facing her own marriage barriers.
Wedding Bells
Wedding Bells is a 1919 comedic play which played on Broadway. The play was written by Salisbury Field and staged by Edgar Selwyn, and opened on Broadway on November 12, 1919 at the Harris Theatre. It played through April 1, 1920, for a total of 168 performances. Prior to opening in New York, initial performances occurred in Washington, D.C. Wallace Eddinger and Margaret Lawrence played the lead roles. The play received generally positive reviews, and Burns Mantle included the play on his list of best plays of the season. It was adapted into a silent film released in 1921 featuring Constance Talmadge. It also was staged in London, and subsequent to a touring production after closing on Broadway, other productions of the play in the United States were mounted into the 1930s. Aside from appearing in editions of Burns Mantle's best play lists, the play has subsequently received little attention.
Wedding at Aulis
As the Greek fleet waits to sail for Troy, Agamemnon faces a demand to sacrifice his daughter, Iphigenia. The promise of a wedding draws her into a conflict between military ambition, family loyalty, and the cost of war.
Wedlock of the Gods
Widow Ogwoma falls in love with Uloko and becomes pregnant before completing the traditional mourning period for her husband, Adigwu. Their relationship clashes with expectations that she marry her late husband’s brother, while both families condemn them; Odibei ultimately poisons Ogwoma, and Uloko kills her before taking the same poison.
Wednesday to Come
In early spring 1934, four generations of a working-class family gather at Mary's home while waiting for Ted. He arrives with a coffin: Ben has died by suicide while working in a Depression-era labour camp. The play follows the women as they confront the loss and the lives history leaves out.
Wednesday's Child
Wednesday's Child is a 1934 Broadway two-act drama written by Leopold L. Atlas, produced by H.C. Potter and George Haight, staged by Potter with scenic design created by Tom Adrian Cracraft. It ran for 56 performances from January 16, 1934, to March 1934 at the Longacre Theatre. The play was included in Burns Mantle's The Best Plays of 1933-1934. It was adapted into the 1934 film Wednesday's Child directed by John S. Robertson and starring Edward Arnold and Karen Morley with Frank Thomas Jr. recreating his role as Bobby Phillips. It was also adapted into the 1946 film Child of Divorce.
Weekend
A Republican senator’s son brings home his Black girlfriend.
Welcome Home, Captain Fox!
Anthony Weigh transposes Anouilh’s amnesiac-soldier drama to 1950s America, reframing the story as a distinct stage adaptation.
Welcome to Thebes
In a contemporary reworking of Theban myth, the new president Eurydice seeks reconstruction aid from Athens after a civil war. The negotiations are destabilized by disputes over the burial of Polynices and a struggle by the former warlord Tydeus to regain power.
Well
Well is a play by Lisa Kron. It concerns relationships between mothers and daughters and "wellness", among other themes. It ran Off-Broadway in 2004 and then on Broadway in 2006.
Wenceslas Square
An American professor and his drama student confront the suppression of Czech theatre under Soviet occupation. Based on Shue's trip to Czechoslovakia with Nicholas Howey, the semi-autobiographical memory play follows an encounter with political oppression and the risks faced by artists who once treated theatre as revolution.
Wendy & Peter Pan
Told from Wendy Darling’s perspective, this reworking sends her and her brothers with Peter Pan and Tinker Bell to Neverland, where they meet the Lost Boys and battle Captain Hook. It explores darker elements of Barrie’s story and adds a fourth Darling child, Tom.
Werter
Werter is a 1785 tragedy by the British writer Frederick Reynolds. His debut play, it is an adaptation of the 1774 novel The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. It first appeared at the Theatre Royal, Bath on 25 November 1785. Its London premiere came at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden on 14 March 1786. The original Covent Garden cast included Joseph George Holman as Werter, William Davies as Sebastian, James Fearon as Leuthrop, William Farren as Albert and Ann Brunton as Charlotte. The Dublin premiere was at the Smock Alley Theatre on 2 December 1786.
West Pier
In a derelict warehouse at an abandoned port, businessman Maurice Koch, who has jumped into a river, is rescued by Charles and encounters his displaced family. Their meeting turns into a struggle over exchange and trafficking, where characters become both predator and prey and confront poverty, immigration and dignity.
Western Limit
A farming family struggles amid a drama described as raising thorny questions.
Westward Ho
In a satirical London comedy, merchant Justiniano disguises himself to test his wife and manipulate a circle of citizens and their wives. The wives plan an outing to Brentford with gallants, while their husbands suspect adultery; the trip instead exposes the husbands’ jealousy and leaves the couples reconciled.
Whale Riding Weather
Lyle, an aging queen whose life is declining, watches his younger lover Auto slip away with Jude, a man younger still whom Auto has just met.
What Did We Do Wrong?
A businessman turns hippie, provoking a generational conflict framed as a comedy. The play is set in the Davis family living room in present-day White Plains, New York.
What Do You Believe About The Future?
Ten unnamed teenagers take turns answering the title question during a philosophical conversation at a late-night co-ed sleepover.
What Every Woman Knows
The Wylies, a well-to-do but uneducated Scottish family, are concerned about their daughter, Maggie, a plain young woman who they fear will remain a spinster. One night the Wylies discover that a serious young university student, John Shand, has been breaking into their home so that he can read books from their large library. Shand is penniless and cannot afford to buy books for his law school education. Maggie Wylie and John Shand come to an understanding: that her family will fund his education if, at the end of five years, he agrees to marry her. John honours his commitment to Maggie, marrying her although he does not love her. Recognising her husband's ambition to become a Member of Parliament, Maggie quietly uses her intelligence and her connections behind the scenes to get John elected. She continues to foster his career, never allowing him to see that she is the power behind his rise to fame. Eventually John begins to believe that his wife is too plain for a man of his stature and position, and he takes up with Lady Sybil Lazenby, a beautiful, refined and high-born young Englishwoman. Maggie is prepared to let her husband go, if Sybil can help him more than she herself can. However, when Shand is preparing a speech that will make or break his career, he finds that Sybil is no help to him, and he realises that Maggie is his inspiration.
What Happened to Jones
Professor Ebenezer Goodly becomes entangled in a prizefight and evades police by returning home, where traveling salesman Jones arrives and disguises himself as a bishop. An escaped lunatic adds to the confusion.
What I Call Her
A young woman reconnects with her dying mother while trying to understand their estrangement. A controversial social-media post draws a stranger into a conflict over family, loyalty, and responsibility.
What I Did Last Summer
In 1945, fourteen-year-old Charlie takes a handyman job with an iconoclastic art teacher rather than spend the summer with friends. Her lessons and unconventional ideas change his plans for boarding school and provoke a clash with his conservative mother.
What If You Died Tomorrow?
A doctor turned novelist and a journalist leave their respective spouses to live together in an artists' colony. The play draws on Williamson's own experience as an engineer-turned-playwright living in an artists' colony after both he and his partner left their marriages.
What Lies Before Us
In the Canadian Rockies in 1885, railway surveyors Keating and Ambrose and their Chinese servant Wing are abandoned as winter approaches. An avalanche traps them, both white men fall gravely ill, and Wing is left alone after they die.
What Price Glory
Flagg and Quirt are veteran United States Marines whose rivalry dates back a number of years. Flagg is commissioned a captain in command of a company on the front lines of France during World War I. Sergeant Quirt is assigned to Flagg's unit as the senior non-commissioned officer. Flagg and Quirt quickly resume their rivalry, which this time takes its form over the affections of Charmaine, the daughter of the local innkeeper. However, Charmaine's desire for a husband and the reality of war give the two men a common cause.
What Shadows
A stage portrait of British politician Enoch Powell, played in the premiere by Ian McDiarmid.
What Strong Fences Make
Set at an Israeli military checkpoint just outside Ramallah, Horovitz’s short play stages a dramatic statement about a real-life situation he describes as anything but simple or clear.
What We Did Before Our Moth Days
Set in an "urban world of intelligent and somewhat gentle middle-class people", a father (Dick), mother (Elle), son (Tim), and the long-time mistress of the father (Elaine) tell the intertwined story of their lives.
What Where
A voice directs Bam, Bom, Bim, and Bem through repeated seasonal interrogations about an unnamed “it” and “where.” The controlling voice repeatedly restarts the action, and the characters vanish until Bam is left alone.
What You Will
The comedy contrasts the bitter satirist Lampatho Doria with the genial poet Quadratus through comic debates and vignettes; a subplot has boy pages tricking and humiliating fools.
What a Life
What a Life is a 1938 Broadway play by Clifford Goldsmith. What a Life is set in Central High School, with action primarily occurring in the principal's office. The main character, Henry Aldrich, "thinks he is dumb because his father won a Phi Beta Kappa key at college." During the play, Aldrich faces charges that he caused a disturbance in class and that he stole brass instruments from the band. He also has to deal with a student who bullies him. It languished for more than one year, but things changed when producer George Abbott took charge.
What the Butler Saw
Characters Dr Prentice Geraldine Barclay Mrs Prentice Nicholas Beckett Dr Rance Sergeant Match The play consists of two acts – though the action is continuous – and revolves around a Dr Prentice, a psychiatrist attempting to seduce his attractive prospective secretary, Geraldine Barclay. The play opens with the doctor examining Geraldine in a job interview, during which he persuades her to undress. The situation becomes more intense when Mrs Prentice enters, causing the doctor to hide Geraldine behind a curtain. His wife, however, is also being seduced and blackmailed, by Nicholas Beckett. She therefore promises Nicholas the post as secretary, which adds further confusion, including Nicholas, Geraldine and a police officer dressing as members of the opposite sex. Dr Prentice's clinic is also faced with a government inspection, led by Dr Rance, which reveals the chaos in the clinic. Dr Rance talks about how he will use the situation to develop a new book: "The final chapters of my book are knitting together: incest, buggery, outrageous women and strange love-cults catering for depraved appetites. All the fashionable bric-a-brac." A penis ("the missing parts of Sir Winston Churchill") is held aloft in the climactic scene.
What the Constitution Means to Me
Heidi Schreck performs as both her present self and her 15-year-old self, a Constitutional debate contestant, using her family history and personal experiences to examine women's rights, abuse, immigration, and constitutional protections. The performance ends in a debate with a local high-school student over whether the Constitution should be replaced, with the audience acting as jury.
What's Done in the Dark (Will Come to the Light)
When Mr. Brown faints before a trip, Cora rushes him to an emergency room where patients and staff face their secrets: a single mother's son is shot, a nurse learns her doctor-lover is married, and a patient couple discovers an STI. The eccentric Mr. Brown is revealed to have faked his illness.
What's Wrong with Angry?
Set against unequal age-of-consent laws and restrictions on discussion of homosexuality in schools, the play tells a love story between two British schoolboys, Steven Carter and John Westhead.
What's in a Name?
At dinner with his sister, brother-in-law and childhood friend, expectant father Vincent is asked to reveal the name he has chosen for his child. His answer plunges the family gathering into chaos.
Wheelbarrow Closers
In the present at the Grant household, a tough sales executive comes to grips with the problem of his own retirement.
When Angels Wept
A small group of survivors of the Our Lady of the Angels School fire confronts how the tragedy has affected their lives over the decades that follow.
When Dad Married Fury
Two brothers are upset when their father marries Fury, an American fundamentalist Christian half his age. The marriage ignites family conflict involving old resentments, including one daughter's belief that the father contributed to her own father's suicide.
When Knighthood Was in Flower
When Knighthood Was in Flower is a play in four acts by Paul Kester. It is based on the 1898 novel of the same name by Charles Major. The work premiered on Broadway at the Criterion Theatre on January 14, 1901. It ran for a total of 176 performances; closing in June 1901. The original production was produced by Charles Frohman and used sets by Ernest Albert, Frank E. Gates and Edward A. Morange. The costumes were designed by Mrs. Charles Hone and Harper Pennington. The cast was led by Bruce McRae as Charles Brandon and Julia Marlowe as Mary Tudor among others. Marlowe, however, was initially criticized for taking on a non-Shakespearean role as critics thought the work inferior to her usual repertoire. The play, however, was a huge popular and financial success for Marlowe and the show's producers both in New York and on national tour, and was subsequently revived on Broadway at the Empire Theatre in 1904.
When Knights Were Bold
British officer Guy De Vere returns from service in India to inherit an estate and baronetcy, encountering village eccentrics while his cousin Rowena falls in love with him.
When We Are Married
Alderman Joseph Helliwell and his wife, Maria, are joined at their house in Clecklewyke in the West Riding of Yorkshire by Councillor Albert Parker and his wife, Annie, together with Herbert Soppitt and his wife, Clara. They are celebrating their silver weddings, all three couples having been married on the same day in the same nonconformist chapel in Lane End, Clecklewyke. Their characters quickly become clear: Helliwell and his wife are easy-going, but he is self-satisfied and inclined to infidelity; Parker is a narrow-minded and parsimonious bully and his wife is under his thumb; Soppitt, contrariwise, is bullied by his domineering wife. The men are all prominent elders of Lane End chapel, and after the celebrations in the dining room, they gather in the sitting room, replete with port and cigars, to confront the chapel organist, Gerald Forbes, whom they intend to sack, because he has been seen walking out with young women, and, worse, is a southerner. Gerald turns the tables by revealing that on holiday he met a church minister, the Rev Francis Beech, who confided that thirty years ago, as a young minister at Lane End, he conducted four marriages – three of them on the same day – under the impression that he was qualified to do so, but, he later discovered, he lacked the requisite licence for it. The three men are horrified. Their marriage services, conducted by Beech, were invalid. They foresee a scandal, and dread the reaction of Maria, Annie and Clara: "Then t'balloon goes up properly. Talk about a rumpus. You'll 'ear 'em from 'ere to Leeds". Their anxiety is intensified by the discovery that a domestic servant, Mrs Northrop, has been eavesdropping and knows what Gerald has revealed. Worse, a reporter and photographer from the regional paper, Fred Dyson and Henry Ormonroyd, are on the premises, having come to report on the anniversary and take pictures of the three couples. The three men agree that Mrs Northrop must be bribed to secrecy, and the newspaper men bluffed and kept in ignorance. Mrs Northrop tells Maria, Annie and Clara what she has learned. The couples slowly adjust to finding themselves unmarried. The two downtrodden partners, Herbert Soppitt and Annie Parker, seem on the verge of rekindling the romantic feelings they had for each other before they paired off with Clara and Albert. Herbert rounds on the domineering Clara and asserts himself. Annie does the same to Albert. A convivial barmaid, Lottie arrives. It quickly emerges that she has in the past had an affair with Helliwell, and thinks she can assert the right to become his wife. She is an old flame of Ormonroyd, who tells her and the others that he is married, although he wishes he were not. The ceremony, he says, was at Lane End conducted by Beech. His wife – equally keen as he to become unmarried – has investigated and established that the four weddings conducted by Beech were legally valid because in those days nonconformist weddings had to be certified by a registrar, and this had been duly done. Finding they are married after all, the three couples look forward to a future without domestic tyranny or extramarital infidelity. Ormonroyd takes a group photograph of the three couples and looks forward to life as proprietor of a photographic shop, with the backing of Helliwell and his colleagues.
When We Dead Awaken
Sculptor Arnold Rubek reunites with Irena, the former model whose image made his masterpiece, while his wife Maia seeks independence with the hunter Ulfheim. Rubek and Irena attempt to revive their artistic bond, but their ascent into the mountains ends in an avalanche.
When Winston Went to War with the Wireless
Jack Thorne’s play concerns the BBC during the 1926 general strike.
When You Comin' Back, Red Ryder?
The story starts out in a neat but rundown little diner just off the highway in the middle of nowhere, New Mexico. The protagonist, Stephen "Red" Ryder, is sitting at the counter after finishing his shift. He is smoking a cigarette and drinking coffee from a paper cup. Angel enters to start her shift. Red and Angel discuss various subjects including Angel's bumpy relationship with her mother, Red's aspirations of getting out of town, and how they'd both like to tell off their boss, Clark. Red claims he can't leave town as of yet since his stepfather has just left his mother. Lyle, the gas station attendant across the street, enters and offers to lend Red some money so he can buy a car to leave town. Red rejects the offer, haughtily. Richard and Clarisse, a white collar couple who are clearly not from these parts, enter and take a seat at the counter. Lyle leaves to help fill their car. Richard emphasizes that Clarisse is a classical violinist and talks about subjects well out of the realm of understanding for the local folk, much to Clarisse's discomfort. Teddy, a foreboding man dressed in fatigues, and his much younger girlfriend, Cheryl, enter and tell everyone their car needs a new part. Lyle offers to take a look but Teddy insists he not look in the trunk. Teddy states they're on their way to Mexico while taking on an obvious and badly-mimicked southern accent which comes and goes. He comes off as incredibly abrasive as he orders his food and makes small talk, prodding Angel, Red and Richard with increasingly uncomfortable questions, and his threats are often veiled by a joking manner. Richard, put off by Teddy, hurries Clarisse out only to return moments later because their keys are missing. Lyle approaches Teddy and admits he saw what was in his trunk (suggesting smuggled drugs). Teddy tells him he shouldn't have done that and Lyle agrees, but suggests that if Teddy were to have taken Richard's keys it would be a bad move since no one here wants any trouble. He pushes him to just take Cheryl and leave. Instead, Richard begins accusing Teddy of stealing his keys outright which Teddy answers by pulling out a gun. Teddy demands they empty the register and tells Richard to give him Clarisse's violin as well. Richard refuses and tells Teddy he'll just have to shoot him. The stage goes black as Teddy fires. Act two begins with the diner attendees tending to Richard's flesh wound. He's only been grazed in the arm. Teddy admonishes Red and Lyle for staring at Cheryl's breasts. He gives her his keys and tells her to follow Lyle to the car with the gun and make sure he repairs the car. In the meantime, Teddy begins to question the moral fiber of everyone there. He can see Clarisse and Richard's marriage is on the rocks and asks if she's happy with her husband parading her around and demanding she perform. Richard protests but makes no move to silence Teddy. Teddy then moves on to Angel, suggesting that her weight and lack of smarts will land her in the same spot for the rest of her life; unmarried and spending her evenings watching TV with Lyle. When Red protests, Teddy attacks his spinelessness. He pokes fun at Red for sporting 1950s greaser garb and "Born Dead" tattoo and suggests if he were a real man he would've gotten a tattoo with a girl's name on it and been out of this town a while ago. Teddy even becomes enraged at Red's self-appointed nickname, insisting that the real Red Rider would've knocked him flat. He then begins a series of demands for the others to reenact a scene from a cowboy TV show, which gets more and more uncomfortable. He threatens Red with violence if he doesn't pretend to ride around on a horse, "slap leather", and kiss his "best gal", (played by Angel), on the lips. Teddy even goes so far to demonstrate what a real kiss is on Clarisse, in front of a helpless Richard. Lyle comes back with Cheryl to let Teddy know the car is fixed. When Teddy suggests Red have sex with Angel, the others protest. Instead, Teddy insists they all dance along to the jukebox, forcing them to occasionally change partners. Teddy himself starts to dance which turns into a frenzy as he rips open Clarisse's shirt and roughly shoves her in front of the men, suggesting they ogle her like they previously did to Cheryl. Red attacks him only to be taken down immediately. Teddy tells Red to tape everyone's hand and wrists. He steals the money from Richards wallet before he leaves, but Cheryl is now seriously hesitating to follow him out. Teddy leaves without her. A little while later, Clark, the diner owner enters, frees the others, and tells Richard to call the police while he keeps Cheryl from running. He demands to know why Red let his diner get robbed. Red finally tells him off before accepting Lyle's loan and hitching a ride with Richard and Clarisse to leave the diner, and the town, for good. Lyle asks Angel if she'll be over to watch TV tonight and she says she should stay home and make amends with her mom. The play closes with her resuming her duties behind the counter.
When You See Me You Know Me
A selective history of Henry VIII emphasizing his conflict with Cardinal Wolsey and the birth and education of Edward VI; the king also goes among his subjects in disguise, with comic scenes involving his jester Will Summers.
When the Rain Stops Falling
Across four generations and two continents, an Australian family confronts abandonment, betrayal and inherited secrets. Gabriel York awaits his estranged son in a rain-soaked Alice Springs of 2039; the nonlinear action shifts among family members and earlier generations in Australia and London as they try to understand their shared past.
When the Robbers Came to Cardamom Town
In the peaceful town of Cardamom, three robbers repeatedly steal what they need. After they are arrested and treated kindly, they reform and become town helpers, saving the day by putting out a fire.
When the Spaniards Were Here
During the Spanish troops’ 1808 stay in Denmark, Hermania falls for Spanish officer Don Juan de Molina. When he loses a silver image of his mother, her Danish admirer Carl finds it; Don Juan ultimately betrays Hermania and returns to Spain.
When the World was Green (a Chef's Fable)
An Old Man imprisoned for a murder rooted in an old family feud is interviewed by a young woman claiming to be a reporter. Their eight conversations are interspersed with childhood-memory monologues by both characters.
Where Has Tommy Flowers Gone?
Tommy Flowers, a socially misfit young man and dangerous rebel, is portrayed amid divisions between youth and age, rules and freedom, with commentary on the era's sexual liberation. His homosexuality emerges over the course of the play.
Where Trouble Sleeps
In the 1950s near Travelers Rest, South Carolina, a carjacker targets Blaine’s Store in search of a hidden treasure chest. The play opens with the robber’s earlier hits in other cities, setting up the theft and the pursuit of the concealed prize.
Where the Blood Mixes
After more than twenty years away, Christine returns to her First Nations community to see her father, Floyd. Their reunion forces a family to face grief, separation, and the continuing effects of residential schools.
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