Classics

32 pages

4 m, 2 w

Lord Bellinger and the Right Honorable Trelawney Hope, Secretary for European Affairs, visit Sherlock Holmes at 221B Baker street to have him find a missing document, which, if published, could lead to war. It had been kept in a dispatch box at the Secretary's home. Holmes suggests to Watson three possible individuals, any one of whom could have stolen the document to use for bribery. One of them, Lucas, is found murdered at his home, which Holmes visits with Inspector Lestrade. They find that the bloodstain on the carpet is not in the same position as the on...

51 pages

6 m, 6 w, 1 flexible

This beloved tale from Hans Christian Andersen gets an original spin when set in the kingdom of Pilsenferfer! The King and Queen think it’s high time their son Prince Albert found a bride and settled down. But shy Albert can’t stop collecting butterflies for his conservatory long enough to find and woo a royal maiden. And really, who needs to go to all that trouble when the lovely Anne, one of the Queen’s maids, shares his passion for butterflies AND sews the buttons on his coat. If only she were from royal linage like the other candidates, including the food...

60 pages

Flexible cast of 10 or more

This adaptation has kept alive the monsters and dragons that inhabited the original poem. However, it is told from the point of view of a Scop (Shope), a teller of tales, who had traveled and fought with Beowulf. The Scop is now a prisoner of the Saxons and while a prisoner tells this tale of courage to a priest who eventually agrees to preserve it by writing it down. The tale the Scop tells is substantially the same as the poem we know, however, the Christian ethic is removed and the tale is presented, as the playwright believes it originally was, with the g...

23 pages

4 m, 2 w

Adapted by Burton Bumgarner from the tale by W.W. Jacobs. A wife demands that her husband leave the house unless he can get help for his gambling problem. He murders her with a paring knife and tries to hide her body from the maid. While he's still frantically searching for his wife's car keys to dump her body, a burglar breaks into the house. Thinking fast, the husband tries to cover up the murder by framing the burglar. The husband calls the police and while waiting for them, scuffles in the darkness with the burglar and plants the knife on him. But things ...

35 pages

3 m, 2 w, flexible cast of 25, doubling possible

Deep in the forest on a cold winter's night, an owl tells his friends about another winter's night when a shooting star lit up the sky, fell to the ground, and left a human child in a hollow tree. A woodcutter, who sees the shooting star, finds the child, takes him home, and rears him as a member of his family. The Star Child grows up to be a very handsome young man, but he doesn't have compassion or kindness. He mistreats the poor and the sick, he hurts the animals of the forest, and he shows no love for the family that raised him. Eventually he loses his ha...

58 pages

Flexible casting: Minimal 3 m, 3 w.

By beginning the play with the arrival of the merchant and his daughter at the Beast's castle, this adaptation of the familiar fairy tale focuses on the many variations on the theme of love. Once the character referred to as “Beauty”' agrees to stay at the castle, the audience becomes involved in the changing relationship of the two central characters, leading to a bond of love that goes beyond surface appearances -- and that will outlast even death. It's a tale of happiness and sadness, of growing and changing. But in this version Beauty discovers her own co...

50 pages

Flexible cast, 5 m, 4 w, 9 flexible, doubling possible

(Based on Carlo Gozzi's "Il Re Cervo") King Seren depends on the uncanny ability of a magic statue to decipher a dishonest heart while trying to pick a queen for his kingdom. He desires nothing more that a young lady who truly loves him. When he finds her he calls for a royal hunt in the forest in celebration. The jealous Periglio is out to hunt kings and not stags. The spell of the court magician falls into the hands of the untrustworthy Periglio and he uses the spell to change the King to a stag and himself into the king. Chaos breaks out in the kingdom as ...

21 pages

3 m, 3 w

Adapted from the story by Edgar Allan Poe. A husband and wife are known for violent quarrelling, especially over their cat. Obsessed, the man tries to kill the animal but accidentally kills his wife. He covers up the murder until the cat's howls are heard from within the cellar wall.

37 pages

Flexible cast of 10

From the story "Kaa's Hunting" by Rudyard Kipling.  Deep in a jungle in India in the middle of the 19th century a tribe of monkeys come chasing in with the boy Mowgli in their midst. In the middle of their play, Kaa, the great python, terrifies them as well as Baloo, a great bear, and Bagheera, a panther, who are Mowgli's friends and protectors. Once out of harm's way, the two scold the boy and teach him how to make himself safe in the jungle. They fall asleep. The monkeys, eager to get Mowgli to make them huts like his, wake him and drag him off. Baloo and B...

37 pages

4 m, 3 w

Monsieur Harpagon is a miser, through and through. Although he has his beloved treasure buried in the garden to protect it from thieves, he abhors waste such as warmth and food! He tells his children, Elise and Cleante, they may only marry with his consent, and he looks for spouses for both of them with the help of Madame Frosine, a matchmaker. She quickly finds a future spouse for everyone, including Monsieur Harpagon. Little does he know Cleante has fallen for Marianne, who Harpagon himself plans to marry, and Elise has fallen for the penniless Valere. The ...

34 pages

3 m, 2 w

Helen Stone, a frightened and distraught young woman, has come to Sherlock Holmes for help following the recent death of her twin sister Julia. The young women were living with their stepfather, the austere and heartless widower, Dr. Roylott. They had returned from India to Stoke Moran, his family’s dilapidated country mansion, where wild exotic animals and gypsies now wander the grounds. Helen tells Holmes and Dr. Watson that the night Julia died, her sister had run from her bedroom screaming “the band, the speckled band.” Julia was soon to be married and wo...

21 pages

3 m, 3 w, 4 extras

Adapted from the tale by Guy de MaupassantAn arrogant hunter shocks his dinner guests by showing them his prized trophy, a human hand chained to a board and mounted on the wall of his library. The next morning the hunter's mother demands he make amends to the guests and remove the hand. But the police have now heard about it and plan to check it out. The hunter wants to hide the hand but admits to his maid he feels safer keeping it in sight. The hand is the only thing he fears because the person it used to belong wants it back. That night the hunter finds the...