Take Ten: New 10-Minute Plays
Eric Lane and Nina Shengold
Vintage, 1997
Monologues – female
- “Siobhan” – young F, in recovery, working as a temp;
in an automat.
good language, lots of variety, sassy; theme who are we, how do we find out
what we are; pretty interesting, tempting; p. 3; 6 pages, maybe 6-7 minutes.
- “Mrs. Sorken” by
Christopher Durang – mature woman, addresses a
theatre audience about theatre; part of a longer play; pretty
spacy lady; talks about word origin; thinks
carrying a purse is important; fairly interesting; p. 31; 5 pages, maybe 7
minutes.
- “Shasta Rue” by Jane Martin – great role for a black
F; woman finds her beauty, challenges local beauty contest (Louisville); p.
153; 6 pages, maybe 7-8 minutes.
Monologues – male
- “A Sermon” by David Mamet
– lots of talk about violence; F-word; reference to homosexuality; it didn’t
appeal to me; p. 147; 4 pages, maybe 6 minutes
- “Gas” – Puerto Rican M with little brother in Desert
Storm; at gas station pumping gas; pump runs
blood at the end; could change ethnicity??; fairly interesting; serious; p.
235; 6 pages, probably 9-10 minutes.
2 female
- “Anything For You” – proposal of a lesbian fling by
married friend, turns out other F loves proposer;
sex talk; good drama; p. 11; 8 pages, maybe 6-7 minutes.
- “Railing It Uptown” – on a subway; one woman threatens
and scares the other; much talk of hemorrhage; not really appealing; p. 125;
11 pages, probably 10 minutes.
- “The Spirit Is Willing” – 2F + lots of shoppers at the
New Age gathering; large shadow of a wing at the end; a trans-sexual New
Ager meets a woman she knew in high school; very
good dialog, good drama; p. 212; 8 pages, probably 10 minutes.
2 male
- “Flop Cop” – cop and playwright; could be interesting
but may be too precious and inbred; cop policing bad theatre tries to halt
playwright, silence bad plays before they are created; in the end playwright
kills cop; p. 21; 8 pages, probably 10 minutes.
- “A Bowl of Soup” – part of a play with 10 10-minute
pieces; older brother tries to console younger on death of his male
lver; older does almost all of the talking; good
character and lines; p. 117; 5 pages, probably 7 minutes.
- “Phone Sex and a Dumb Show” – peeping tom (voice only,
on phone) talks to gay lover of male who was taken away ill; dramatic and
interesting but subject matter (voyeurism, gay sex, masturbation) may be a
problem for actors, audience; p. 253; 5 pages, maybe 5 minutes.
- “The Janitor” by August Wilson – most of the lines are
the janitor’s, second character coming in only at the end; might have
possibilities but seemed thin; p. 335; 2 pages, 3-4 minutes.
2 actors; 1 male, 1 female:
- “Brother” – wedding preparations of good sister and
slacker brother; vignette rather than a play, really; good interaction
between the 2; p. 39; 9 pages, easily 10 minutes.
- “The Man Who Couldn’t Dance” – good drama; former
boyfriend visits woman and baby in her house in Connecticut, woman’s husband
and boyfriend’s date off stage; p. 79; 11 pages, probably at least 10
minutes.
- “Stars” – on a penthouse terrace after a party; lots
of talk about oral sex; man says he tricked a woman and then married her;
woman says she betrayed husband with a man with a tiny penis who later
committed suicide; p. 139; 6 pages, maybe 8 minutes.
- “Ferris Wheel” – 2 strangers caught on a
ferris wheel, she afraid of heights and he, in
empathy, stopping smoking; good dialog, interesting play; p. 161; 15 pages,
probably 15 minutes.
- “That Midnight Rodeo” – Missouri husband and wife
weigh abortion and loss of chance to win in rodeo; okay play; nice contrast
in characters; good issue; p. 201; 8 pages, probably 9-10 minutes.
- “Love Poem #98” – Emmanuel longs for whore who has
razor blades behind her eyes; he says his wife has razor blades behind her
eyes (same actor plays both female roles); wife is good girl, bore lots of
children, is pregnant, works now because E. lost his job; E. kills himself
at the end; light cues are involved; not very interesting except for the
doubling; p. 315; 5 pages; ca. 7 minutes.
3 actors; 2 male, 1 female:
- “Philadelphia” – a badly altered state is called a
“Philadelphia”; euphoric state is an “LA”; funny play; good interactions,
good complications; p.65; 11 pages, 10-12 minutes.
- “Helen at Risk” – in a prison rec
room; creative teacher Helen is demonstrating mask-making; inmate kills
guard with a paintbrush in his eye; dramatic, violent; mime of orgasm; good
satire of psycho-babble; very powerful play; p. 339; 7 pages, about 9-10
minutes.
3 actors; 1 male, 2 female:
- “Hold for Three” – on a beach, holding breath 3
minutes while the moon rises over the horizon; funny, fast-paced; p. 93; 6
pages, about 7 minutes.
- “Yesterday’s Window” – lyrical play with Asian woman,
non-Asian woman playing 6-year-old, African American male (don’t have to be
these ethnicities); lots of abstract, impressionistic dialog; p. 178; 9
pages, about 10 minutes.
- “Two Eclairs” – 2 sisters
in love triangle with husband of older sister; older tries to throw younger
out, then finds out husband loves her; okay play; problem prop is huge wing
husband is building in the apartment; p. 193; 7 pages, 7 minutes.
3 male:
- “Judgment Call” – umpires practicing calls in spring
training; good play; variety of characters; some moving and many funny
moments; p. 301; 11 pages, probably at least 10 minutes.
4 actors; 1 male, 3 female:
- “The Battle of Bull Run Always Makes Me Cry” – 2
married friends meet to find out about single woman’s date; male is on stage
as partial recreation of the date, so the construction is adventuresome;
wonderful high context dialog; funny play; p. 221; 12 pages, maybe 12
minutes.
- “Breakfast Cereal” – 3 females either play young boys
or play female cop disguised as young boy; 20-year-old male terrorizes young
boys; cop lures him and arrests him; brutal subject matter; calls for blood
and light cues; p. 323; 10 pages, probably 10 minutes.
4 actors; 2 male, 2 female:
- “Brights” – 2 couples in a
car think they are being followed; funny fear; good dialog; p. 277; 10
pages, probably 10 minutes.
4 female:
- “R.A.W. (‘Cause I’m a Woman)” – 4 Asian females; calls
for music; has lots of sex talk; monologues; might be interesting, would be
difficult to act effectively; p. 289; 10 pages, ca. 15 minutes.
5 actors; 4 male, 1 female:
- “Welcome to the Moon” – man comes back to his home
town bar to find old girlfriend; 2 male friends discover they have loved
each other; funny play, good complication and interest; p. 261; 14 pages,
probably 15+ minutes.
5 actors; 2 male, 3 female:
- “Duet for Bear and Dog” – F plays bear, M plays dog;
dog trees bear; Russian cosmetologist; animal rescue workers; pretty good
but some of the dialog is stiff; p. 243; 9 pages, 10 minutes.
6 actors; 4 male, 2 female + a wrapped corpse +
playwright voiceover:
- “Reverse Transcription; Six Playwrights Bury a
Seventh” by Tony Kushner; not really appropriate for class because of all
the playwright talk; p. 101; 20 minutes long.
8 actors; 5 male, 3 female + couple of tourists at the
end:
- “ New York Actor” by John Guare;
fast action, lots of complications and talk; funny; critic and wife are at
restaurant also; 2 actors think they have same part; lots of theatre talk;
p. 51; 11 pages, probably 13 minutes.
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