Craig Sodaro
Craig Sodaro is one of Eldridge Publishing's most popular and prolific playwrights with over 60 titles currently in print. Most of his work is ideal for children's theatre and school performances, and several plays have been turned into musicals. His audience participation plays are extremely well received. For community theatre plays he writes under the pen name of Sam Craig. Mr. Sodaro taught for 33 years in public schools, but now writes full time. He and his wife Sue have four grown daughters. Here he speaks in his own words about his love of writing. "I always wanted to write. From the first time I read my first full-fledged book - a long-forgotten mystery - I wanted to be an author. I've always had an imagination that runs overtime. My mind has always been more interested in the possibilities of what if two times two equaled five rather than four. "I grew up in Chicago, but I don't think the Midwest has had a great deal of influence on my writing. I was fortunate enough to travel as a youngster, and the places we visited - the West, East, and South, all seemed steeped in atmosphere and dramatic possibilities. Eventually, I traveled to Alaska, Europe, and Africa, and each experience planted seeds for future stories. "I wrote my first play in high school - an anti-administration absurdist comedy performed in my last period art class. Our teacher turned a deaf ear to the proceedings, but we all caught her laughing. I liked this idea of audience response, and during college, I entered a playwriting contest. I won the fifty dollar prize and saw my characters come to life under the blue, red, and amber stage lights. I knew that this was the direction my writing obsession would have to take. "Success on stage would have to wait for a number of years, however, since I married, began teaching, and had four children and received many, many rejections slips. Eventually I found a formula that worked: large cast mystery with mainly female parts, one setting, and a lot of one-liners. Since then, I've written a hundred and thirty plays, many of which have been published and/or produced. I've had the thrill of walking down 54th Street in New York to a flag-adorned theater where one of my plays premiered. I've received terrific letters from kids who have had parts in the plays I've written, and I've found myself in Amazon.com. "Once in a while people ask me how I write so fast. I guess it’s that I have a lot of stories to tell. And idea will grab me, and then for quite some time—even while working on another script—I’ll keep thinking about the characters and develop the major plot points in my imagination. Once I sit down to the computer to write, the characters really tell the story almost too quickly for me to write down what they’re saying. And that's what I think playwriting is all about. It's telling a story in the simplest but most dramatic way possible. There's a ninety minute or so limit on reaching the climax, and for literature that's quick. I write fast simply so I can find out what's going to happen at the end, just like anybody who watches the play."
Nun of Your Business
Comedy by Craig Sodaro
64 pages
5 m, 14 w, 1 flexible part
If you're ready for some hard-nosed action, spying, deceit involving a stolen painting, a shady real estate deal, and an auto repair shop that's more a chop shop, stop in at the convent of St. Fermilda. The Sisters of Faith, Hope, and Charity are in the midst of all kinds of intrigue and they're not even sure how they got there! But don't think because they took vows of reverence and poverty that they'll let some hard-nosed hoods get the best of them. After all, the Sisters have work to do for the poor in this rundown neighborhood, and they're bound and deter...
Pocahontas
Classic by Craig Sodaro
67 pages
11 m, 13 w, doubling possible
Bring the exciting, inspiring story of the most famous Native American woman to life on your stage. This play is filled with challenging characters who played important parts in a turbulent, fascinating life - Powhatan, the chief; John Smith, the fearless adventurer; Capt. Argall, the greedy sea captain; Governor Gate's three lively daughters; and Pocahontas, the princess who longs for a world beyond the forest where her people live. The story is woven through the memories of an old woman who takes her granddaughter on a walk in the forest. The representation...
Til Death Do Us Part
Comedy Mystery by Craig Sodaro
67 pages
5 m, 11 w
You are invited to the most offbeat wedding of the season, where murder takes center stage and all the guests are suspects. Neither the groom's parents nor the bride's former boyfriend want the marriage to happen. The family lawyer has a little something up his sleeve and it might involve an enigmatic guest who dies mysteriously before revealing who she really is. When the lawyer is also murdered, amateur sleuth Miss Peabody conducts an investigation punctuated by the traditional wedding events in which the audience can also participate, such as throwing the ...
Fairy Tale Christmas
Comedy by Craig Sodaro
34 pages
4 m, 10 w, 3 flexible
Holiday cheer is driving Queen Malvinia crazy! The former evil stepmother of Snow White’s story is now somewhat reformed, and rules over the kingdom of Happily Ever After. But ever since all the traditional fairy tale characters began getting along, demand for the Queen’s various potions on her website have fallen off drastically. So she’s thought of a new way to boost sales. With the help of Cinderella’s stepsisters, and Wolfgang Amadeus Toothful, alias the Big, Bad Wolf, she throws a Christmas Eve party. Though the Three Little Pigs try to keep the mood hap...
Phantom of the Soap Opera
Comedy Mystery by Craig Sodaro
64 pages
8 m, 9 w, extras
A mysterious phantom, who inhabits the depths of a TV studio, creates murder and mayhem to seize a beautiful soap opera heroine, for whom he has an obsessive love! Laid-back police detective Digby Wright does little to allay the fears of the troupers, somewhat of a shaky group to begin with! There's Daphne Davis, a haughty actress whose career is moving fast --downhill; Quentin Harris, a former football hero who drops the ball when it comes to his lines; Lily Ponds, a scatterbrained secretary who can't remember the director's name; Addison Meriwether, the upt...
Every Baby-Sitter's Nightmare
Comedy by Craig Sodaro
60 pages
7 m, 10 w
Baby-sitting the three Taylor kids isn't a job, it's a matter of survival of the fittest. They delight in terrorizing their newest sitter, explaining their secluded home is haunted by a ghost, and that an "ax murderer" has just escaped from jail and is heading their way. Adding confusion is a dizzy aunt, who pays a surprise visit; the dad's boss, whom the kids knock out thinking he is the escaped convict; the boss' domineering mother; and the sitter's offbeat boyfriend, who wants to "rescue" her. The kids lay a trap for the convict and bring about a hilarious...