Community

67 pages

3 m, 3 w

Lois Lancaster is a big-city journalist writing about the current state of mental health facilities. Her research takes her to a hospital populated with a unique group of quirky inmates who imagine they are crime-fighting superheroes. Speed Freak thinks he can run at incredible speeds, while Dim Bulb, the most enthusiastic person on the face of the earth, thinks he has the ability to turn off lights with his brain. Mental thinks she can read minds, despite being prone to sudden outbursts of bizarre non-sequiturs. Kevin, much less quirky and flamboyant than th...

56 pages

3 m, 3 w

Lacy Casey is socially awkward, has a goofy sense of humor, and has raised clumsiness to an art form. If you look in the dictionary under "adorkable," you'd find a picture of Lacy.  Her friends Sue and Trevor love her quirkiness and accept her for who she is. When Lacy goes out on her first date with Bryce, she assumes it will be their last date. After all, her ungraceful mannerisms practically destroy their dinner, and he keeps calling her by the wrong name. But he comes back for more ... Meanwhile, Trevor harbors a ...

72 pages

3 m, 9 w

The Peaceful Glen Memorial Players are about to mount a new production, but this time, it's a fight for their lives. It's not just the usual hand-to-hand combat between board members Duncan and Hope for the last donut. This time the company is about to lose their building. According to the late Archibald Donnelly's will, they could keep the building as long as they do "quality productions." Oh, they have tried, in their own left-field way, to do the classics. "Isn't it true," family heir Blair Beesley asks, "that you did 'Twelve Angry Men' with five actors an...

69 pages

6 m, 5 w

Two young innkeepers, Alex and Rolly, are struggling to make a success of a once-elegant hostelry in the Hamptons, but it's tough, especially with the owner Lucinda Pickle breathing down their necks. Of course it doesn't help that the hotel's permanent resident, Mrs. Prescott, collects pet mice; that the hotel chef, Cookie, is given to bursting into tears and resigning; and that a petty criminal, Willis the pickpocket, is looking for a place to hide out. When Hollywood horror movie producer Julian K. Silverblatt checks in with his vain bodyguard and his sneez...

63 pages

6 m, 7 w

See the butler and maid help the Cummings pack. See the butler and maid escort the Cummings out the door. See the butler and maid turn to each other and embrace because they are actually two aspiring actors, Billy and Wendy, who now have the Cummings estate to themselves! One week of acting rich! Unfortunately for them, they won't be alone and they aren't the only ones acting. For all kinds of weird and hilarious reasons, the neighbor is posing as a cleaning lady; the Cummings' daughter is acting like a family friend; the jewel thief is acting like a long-los...

61 pages

5 m, 6 w

Ideal comedy for community theatres! Ned is the 30-ish son of Ma and Pa Boodle whose efforts to introduce girlfriends to his family don't turn out very well. His family is somewhat "colorful"-his mother is a June Cleaver type at her homiest; his father is pretty clueless his grandpa manages a cat (rescue) house; and his sister Lulu is a hypochondriac with an equally germ-o-phobic boyfriend, Luke. Also there's the ever-helpful Jack, who resides in a cardboard appliance box in the middle of the Boodle living room, and the neighbor, Mrs. Doodah-Doodah. But Ned's...

55 pages

4 m, 5 w, 2 girls

J. D. Morse has been looking high and low for a special Christmas gift for his grandson. Finally, as a last resort, he wanders into Nick's Emporium, an old-fashioned store chock full of all sorts of gifts and knickknacks. He has a hard time explaining to Nick what he's looking for, but finds himself falling under the old storekeeper's spell. Just when Morse is about to buy something, he runs to the street to chase kids away from his car. When he returns, he finds the store suddenly dark and quiet. A policeman then shows up to run him off because, "This place ...

76 pages

5 m, 5 w, 1 girl

“Who IS that guy?” That’s what they’re asking each other at the local police station when Santa Claus shows up handing out gifts. This Santa seems to know them all so well…but they haven’t a clue who he is. It’s not like they haven’t seen people dressed for the holidays, especially since Earlene visits costumed first as an elf and then as a big bunny. Even Chief Culpepper has been known to don the Santa suit. As if this weren’t enough to keep them guessing, state investigator Russell Brooks arrives to check on some irregularities. It doesn’t take long for Bro...

59 pages

3 m, 5 w

Lord and Lady Lexington have picked a rather beastly night to throw a haunted house party in their newly acquired home, Foxworth Manor. Oddly, the guest list appears to be made up of disparate and desperate strangers. There's the pretty secretary, the acerbic gossip columnist, the local physician, the flighty real-estate agent and a handsome, but somewhat surly young man. Foxworth Manor has a tragic history, and this evening will prove to be no exception. As the storm rages on outside, the guests suddenly discover that not everyone is quite the stranger they ...

41 pages

13 m, 11 w, 4 flexible, extras, much doubling possible

Every month many look to their calendars and start counting down the days until the next holiday. But what about those who are working behind the scenes to make these holidays great? What about the everyday problems of Cupid, leprechauns, and the New Year's Baby? Do we ever stop to think about their needs? Their wants? No! And that's why they're on strike. Journey through the bizarre, strange, and riotously funny underbelly of the holiday world as the icons we all know and love go on strike in this comedy. See what happens when hunters try to shoot down Rudol...

59 pages

8 m, 14 w

When Max Holsten sets out for work leaving behind his briefcase and an unfinished breakfast, his quaint 1950s family is besieged by a series of misunderstandings that fester into conspiracy theories and suspicions. The extended family Max and his newlywed wife, April, have been living with are no comfort. April’s sister June has an obsession with pulp-fiction intrigue and leads April to assume the worst about Max. Making matters murkier, Grandma May, the aged and easily confused matriarch of the family, misstates all the facts. Max’s seemingly simple oversigh...

60 pages

5 m, 5 w

This is one club where members’ lives are not an open book! Tonight’s meeting of the Queen Anne Murder Mystery Book Club takes a dark twist when a threatening telephone call sets the group on edge. Suddenly all the lights go out and gentle Nellie is murdered. But who is the killer…and why? Do those eerie masks mounted on the wall or that unusual hanging mobile mean anything special? And then a rock with a message attached is thrown against the house jolting everyone even further. Inspector McAdoo follows the clues but soon another murder takes place. Accusati...

68 pages

3 m, 1 w, 5 flex; total of 9 with doubling, 42 w/o doubling

Ever forced to wait and wait…and wait? Want to scream at nonsensical bureaucracy? Then you’ll sympathize with Mr. Poosch who, after he accidentally leaves his well-made coat in the country to the North, finds tremendous hurdles when he attempts to get it back. First, he cannot obtain the right paperwork to travel, and then, when he finally arrives, it is Sunday and the country is closed on Sundays. A homeless man finds the coat and finds his luck turns around while wearing it. Meanwhile, poor Mr. Poosch finds himself broke, hungry, and laboring in the street....

51 pages

5 m, 5 w

Gideon Culpepper opens the Last Chance Inn and the guests pour in immediately! Dashing Horace Prickley agrees to help poor flower-peddler Flossie McDurdle become a lady, so she can win her heart’s true love, the spineless but wealthy Theodore Vanderthistle. Teddy’s scheming mother, Vedalia, has other plans though. She sends for Posey Lee Perriwinkle, a beautiful Southern belle who arrives via Pony Express as a mail-order bride. Unfortunately, Posey falls for Gideon instead. Meanwhile Horace finds that he is falling for Flossie and facing the dilemma of helpin...

48 pages

4 m, 3 w, 2 flexible, 10 or more zombies

The premise is simple: A group of students dig up a corpse as a prank but the dead get upset and rise from the grave, trapping the students inside the mausoleum. Which character has the power to stop the Zombie menace? The audience gets the opportunity to band together in groups to solve the mystery. This part of the play is called the Clue Quest and happens during the intermission. Clue Characters (Zombies) are scattered around the building at strategic locations to give clues the audience groups. All the clues lead to the identity of the character with the ...

43 pages

5 m, 6 w, 3 flexible parts

Villainous Bernard Blackburn is in debt up to his dark moustache, but he plans to wed innocent Polly Goodson to remedy that! She believes she is penniless, but actually her late father's insurance policy is very valuable. Blackburn is somewhat daunted when he meets Polly's eccentric family and disapproving maid, but he easily gets her boyfriend, John Trueheart, out of the picture by convincing him to go off to make his fortune before asking Polly for her hand in marriage. Luckily, Trueheart finds his fortune in a diamond mine and in a final blackout scene, ev...

70 pages

7 m, 8 w

Maura Milton applies for a bookkeeper's job at the home of one Tyrone Bartholomew. However, she soon finds out there isn't ONE Tyrone Bartholomew but many. The spry old actor flies from one character to another whenever dealing with the outside world - and that world seems to involve secret codes, hiding people, dodging gangsters with guns, and harboring a wild-eyed lady with an ax. Naturally, Maura starts to question her career choice. By the time the police turn out not to be the real police, Tyrone seems to be the only sane one around! Audiences will be ke...

63 pages

2 m, 4 w

Nola goes back to her parents' home after a disagreement with her boyfriend, Quincy, to sort through her problems in peace and quiet. What she finds instead is a circus of confusion. Her mother is dealing with repairs and redecoration of the house; her father refuses to help and escapes to work; and an energetic neighbor helps watch over Aunt Maggie, their somewhat vague relative who recently moved in after possibly poisoning her own cat ... and her late husband. Between the hidden money that turns up missing and Qunicy's arrival and bout with food (?) poison...

60 pages

6 m, 5 w

Raven and Lulu are two young women seeking refuge who become unexpected guests at Dracula’s annual Halloween party. Igor the hunchback and their host, Dracula, seem friendly but chills and laughter escalate as monstrous guests arrive. It becomes clear that Zack the Zombie, Frankenstein, and the mummified Egyptian Queen Nefertiti are not in costume but are real…and possibly dangerous. An out-of-season Ghost of Christmas Past even makes an appearance and takes Dracula on a journey of discovery. Will Dracula’s affection for one of the girls keep her safe, or is ...

75 pages

4 m, 5 w

The mistress of a Long Island estate is very rich, completely eccentric, and suspiciously homicidal, and yet she regularly gets lost in her own home. So how has she managed to get away with murder? Lady Di has accomplices of course! Four of them to be exact: Adeline, Lydia, Angel, and Felicity, each uniformed in a white apron, armed with a feather duster, and humorously dangerous as they have chosen to protect their employer from the police in order to perpetuate their very generous incomes. But when the body count takes a sudden jump, the camaraderie of the ...

72 pages

7 m, 12 w

How could a box of cornflakes almost start a world war? Writing an ad campaign for Hampton’s Medicated Cornflakes is tough, especially when you have to get paid immediately to not get evicted! That’s what faces Rosie, Max, and Sid, who hit upon the idea of quarantining their own office to keep out their demanding landlady. But when a man stumbles in, stabbed in the back, it’s a whole new ballgame. Now, nobody can leave since it’s become the scene of a crime. More police show up along with a legal secretary, a Russian travel agent, a handsome doctor, and worst...

72 pages

6 m, 6 w

This funny, fast-paced farce begins in 1933, at the end of Prohibition. Benito “Benny” Bellarosa, a New York gangster, is attempting to make good on his promise to become a respectable businessman and join the board of the New York Bank and Trust. Meanwhile, his rebellious daughter Rosalie concocts a plan to free herself from the confines of her room. She leads Benny to believe that she is “in the family way,” hoping he will allow her to leave the house and marry her boyfriend. Unfortunately, Rosalie’s lover disappears and Benny is left with more suitors (and...

65 pages

Large, flexible cast

In Act One, "Voices From the Titanic," the stage comes alive with the passengers and crew who address the audience directly. We see the magnificent, "almost unsinkable" ship through the eyes of both the first-class and third-class passengers. When the ship's lookout, Frederick Fleet, spots the iceberg, all the officers are called upon to carry out the most dreaded command Capt. Smith ever had to issue: "Get the lifeboats ready!" The ending is an emotional powerhouse as the cast recites name after name of those who survived ... and those who did not. In Act Tw...

70 pages

3 m, 5 w

The director of the Moon Lake Community Theater, Missy Bailey, has dreamed about directing a production of a 1930s psychological melodrama called “Night Comes Early.” As a teenager she saw a professional production of the play and it had a lasting impact. Now that the opportunity has come, she encounters overwhelming obstacles: cast members who don’t know their lines, who drop out at the last minute, who have psychological issues, and workmen who can’t finish building the set. No one is ready on opening night, but the show must go on, even without enough acto...

62 pages

4 m, 6 w, 4 flex

“How’d you like to be on television?” This question, posed by future daughter-in-law Anne, takes Loff DuVall by surprise. After all, he and May June had been running the Hampton Court trailer park for more years than either would care to admit. The last thing he’d want now is to be in some reality TV show. In fact, he was hoping he and May June could get away for a while, take a long vacation from the place. He wouldn’t have to listen to Goose Halford’s long stories, such as how his grandpa has a metal plate in his head. “The kids used to catch him asleep and...

65 pages

5 m, 5 w, 7 flexible

Ernestine Webb is overwhelmed by the day-to-day pressures of managing the $77 million Webb fortune. When her slightly senile friend, Miss Pomfrey, visits bemoaning the loss of her beloved gerbil, and the heirs think it's Mother Webb who has died, Ernestine realizes that death is one way to get out from under all the hassles. She cooks up an elaborate plot to fake her demise. To see how much they've inherited, her greedy children fall all over each other in an attempt to find their mother's will and when they can't find it, they simply make up their own. Wild ...

41 pages

3 m, 2 w

Texas was never this fun - or this deadly! Jonas Carmody, President and Founder of Carmody Oil, is dead of natural causes at the age of 78, leaving an estate valued in excess of $30 million. The heirs apparent are in for a big surprise when they gather together with his friends and business associates for a memorial dinner in his honor. Unbeknownst to his eccentric family, a surprise reading of the will is on the menu, and murder is certain to be a la mode! As the story unfolds and the family unravels, it seems everybody wants more than their fair share. But ...

78 pages

Minimum: 4 - 11 m, 7 w. Maximum: 11 m, 19 w, 8 flexible.

“Miracle worker” Annie Sullivan Macy wakes on a lonely stretch of beach. A mysterious hermit encourages Annie to debate and share pieces of her life with him, including her greatest accomplishment, teaching the famous deaf and blind girl, Helen Keller. Like pieces of a puzzle, Annie’s memories spring to life, revealing hard-won victories, childhood horrors, and a rise to stardom. Annie discovers that she and Helen are forever connected, but who needs who? As Annie wrestles with this question, one more secret remains locked within her, and this mysterious man ...

69 pages

4 m, 6 w

Even though lovely young Julia works hard, she and her aunt will not be able to afford to keep their humble home, which sits at the edge of a garbage dump. If they lose their home, they’ll also lose the treasure Julia’s papa buried somewhere on the property that would take care of all their needs. (Hero Dan would ask his parents for money to help Julia, but alas, he too is an orphan.) As they try yet again to figure out the special riddle to the treasure’s location, a German Mennonite detective appears on the case and is soon followed by two old ladies with l...

64 pages

8 m, 6 w

What happens when two villains in a melodrama meet? The action begins when an English Vicar returns home from doing missionary work in America. Unbeknownst to him, he has brought back a map to a thriving gold mine in California. The Vicar is followed across the pond by the villainous Bart Lovelace and his accomplices who are trying to find the map. Meanwhile, an English villain, Agamore Primrose, has been courting one of the Vicar’s lovely daughters in hopes of gaining a small but handsome inheritance should the Vicar succumb to an untimely accident. During t...