60 pages
5 m, 5 w
No one could be more meek than poor Henry Jeckyll, scampering to and fro to the whims of both his fiance and his mother. So when he invents a potion to make weak men brave (well, it started out curing seasickness), what better subject to use it on than himself? It not only makes Jeckyll more aggressive, but allows him to grow a lot more hair. After only one treatment of his potion, he soon finds himself dodging the police and explaining just how that horse got in his surgery. Throw in a wise-cracking servant, a whining fiancee, an overbearing mother and a man...
48 pages
4 m, 6 w, extras
“Now, my friends… do you like stories about rousing sword fights? Do you like stories about fire-breathing dragons? Well, this story has absolutely none of that!” says Christophe as the townspeople of a small European village gather to hear this itinerant storyteller. Soon the villagers clamor to tell their own stories. And the seemingly silly and simple tales, infused with the villagers’ personalities, become important lessons of patience (“No More Than a Tiger’s Whisker”), friendship (“Birds of a Feather”), and love (“A Ring of Truth”). The villagers add no...
58 pages
5 m, 3 w (all play multiple roles)
On the campus of a small liberal arts college, one dormitory has served as a home to students for over a hundred years. The play opens in the present when two college freshmen, Jake and Clay, become roommates during the year before the dorm is scheduled to be torn down. Their story is interwoven with a century of college antics and hijinks, hopes and tragedies, as the previous residents act out their moments in the same dorm room. We meet the dormitory's occupants from the early days of the century, the Great Depression, the second World War, the early days o...
63 pages
2 m, 2 w
The problem with many plays where things have to go bump in the night is that things have to go bump. Not in "Hector's Warehouse and Other Ghost Stories." Four friends tell five ghostly stories using the most potent special effect of all: the audience's imagination. Using only chairs and candles (plus some well-timed blackouts), the characters re-enact their own eerie experiences and generate plenty of spine-tingling moments for us along the way. In "Toni's House," Phyllis takes us to a house she lived in with footsteps above and a fear-inducing basement belo...
70 pages
4 m, 5 w, 1 flexible, optional 1 boy
Armed with a sharply judgmental attitude and a pair of binoculars, homeowner Leona Crump is consumed with anxiety over her new neighbors. Will they be California beatniks? Or paroled drug pushers? Or more frightening yet, perhaps someone with children?! Her worst fears are realized when an odd-ball "hill-folk" family move in across the street. She quickly realizes that neither God, nor her favorite telephone psychic, has prepared her for the series of showdowns set to take place in her living room. Gafina Hambefferschmidt, an obnoxious, gum-chewing woman, tog...
42 pages
3 m, 4 w
In this hour-long play, timid and somewhat nerdy Arthur Miller (no relation to the playwright) has inherited a century-old mansion from a distant cousin. On arrival he finds more than he bargained for - the ghosts of three relatives who died there more than 70 years ago, and the ghost of their killer, the schizophrenic Uncle George. But these ghosts are not content to rattle chains. They enjoy "life" by re-enacting their deaths, sometimes two or three times a night, each time funnier, faster, and more melodramatically than the last! As they explain to Arthur,...
68 pages
Flexible cast (40+) to a minimum of six (4 m, 2 w)
Beguiled in early childhood by his nursemaid's grim and ghoulish stories, Charles Dickens harbored all through his life a fascination with ghosts, apparitions and chilling coincidence. This play is a collection of eerie tales from the greatest storyteller of all. The stories are a lively mixture of comedy, pathos, and the supernatural and include: "The Signal-man," "The Bagman's Uncle," "The Letter From Afar," "Trial for Murder," "The Queer Chair," "Sisters From Perth," "The Portrait Painter," and "The Lawyer and the Ghost." These stories are perfect as a new...
44 pages
Minimum 2 m, 7 w; maximum 3 m, 12 w, 1 flexible
Getting old feels like the end … especially for Margo. She’s worked hard to build her career and her life with husband Lars. But her 30th birthday isn’t what she planned. Already late to her own party, she and Lars quickly eat the last of the food before greeting guests. In hindsight, the crab salad may have been a little off … Apparently WAY off! Now they must start over in the after-life. But before they can rest in peace they must find a house and help the occupants. With the help of a celestial guide, they view three houses. There’s the far-out beach bung...
62 pages
Flexible cast minimum 4 (3 m, 1 w) maximum 37 (28 m, 9 w)
Here are ten short views of turn-of-the-century New York through the eyes of O. Henry, the master of the twist ending and chronicler of everyday people from young shop girls with enormous dreams to the ne'er-do-wells with plans for the easy life. Among the people you'll come to know and almost love are: three of the dingiest and laziest musketeers you've ever seen, plotting to relieve a hard-working wife of a whole dollar she earned scrubbing clothes; a young gentleman with a sudden insurmountable problem in giving away a "mere one-thousand-dollar" inheritanc...
75 pages
1 m, 3 w and flexible extras
Miss Ida Ingram's dying wish was to have her ashes scattered over the Grand Canyon - no small request for the two remaining sisters, Isabelle and Imogene, as they are elderly and have never before ventured out of South Carolina. Into the picture comes a long-lost nephew, Brandon, who agrees to drive his maiden aunts to Arizona to give himself time to think through his own mid-life crisis. Leigh Ann, a young neighbor woman who was practically raised by the elderly triplets, soon catches up and joins them on this incredible trip where they meet everyone from a ...
64 pages
5 m, 5 w
"I wish just once we could have a family get-together without somebody getting tied up!" This plaintive request, yelled at the top of her lungs by Aunt Clarise, gives you a pretty good idea of how family reunions go for this particular gang. Peri has taken her husband Graham to the family lake house to finally meet the clan. And Graham was looking forward to it. That is, until he gets overcharged by the taxi service, takes a large swig from the Major's private stock and has a wax apple stuck in his mouth, only to be dislodged by a slap on the head. It's littl...
43 pages
4 w, 4 m for small cast; 8 w, 7 m, 2 flexible for large cast
Melisande dreams of catching a unicorn, Ana dreams of capturing the perfect sunrise, River dreams of finding the all-consuming love of his life, while Kristi seeks to unlock her love. These are just a few of the stories of love lost and found in “A Day of Dreaming.” We meet young people with powerful dreams which they write in a Dream Journal that is nestled in a covered bridge (which exists today in Winterset, Iowa). There is always the hope that if they write down their dreams, they will come to fruition. The stories run the gamut from forging new connectio...