Full Length (11-20 Actors)

65 pages

5 m, 9 w

Here is an outrageous comedy for community theatres that puts the audience on the hot seat! A series of sixteen, quick-paced scenes illuminate the joys and tribulations of the modern theatre-going experience. In "An Audience of One," a single theatre patron delivers an impassioned monologue to convince the actors to perform the show just for her. The scene, "What the Crowd Is Thinking," allows us to hear the real thoughts of an audience sitting through an uninspired performance. In "Uber Ushers," a band of ushers, driven to the brink of madness by the boorish...

61 pages

4 m, 10 w

When movie mogul Mandrake Masterfiend, producer of the schlockiest horror movies in history, invites some of Hollywood's craziest characters to his birthday party, the evening's a killer--literally. That's because he also invites Rona LaMona, the most vicious gossip columnist in the business who writes weekly under the title "The Poisoned Pen," to stir up the pot a bit. Though the actors, designers, and directors of some of Masterfiend's greatest successes enthusiastically reenact some great scenes from his movies, they suddenly find themselves playing suspec...

77 pages

Flexible cast of 20 (doubling possible)

It's called Camp Paradise and no wonder - it's a fine arts, a computer, and a nature camp all rolled into one! Join the artistic, the scientific, and the plain ol' back-to-nature types for a unique summer in the deep woods. Custom-design this play to your specific needs and tastes with the 21 different scenes ranging from campfire ghost stories to a first summer love. All the feelings that camp can generate - from homesickness to hilarity - can be found here. The play ends with a feeling of camaraderie as the cast sits around a campfire on their last night to...

68 pages

Flexible cast, 10 to 50

Picture yourself in your own family album with this incredibly funny, sometimes touching, always entertaining play. Pick and choose from some 20 different scenes about family life to design a play that makes your drama family unique. The scenes are in four groups, "Getting Along," "Bustin' Loose," "Problems and Opportunities," and "Life and Death." Some of the scenes are just plain fun, like "TV Wars" and "Name That Stress." Other scenes capture the heart, as "The Funeral" and "Senior Split." Rap numbers bridge your acts while an opening and closing family "p...

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....

50 pages

6 m, 6 w

Miss Duncan, the Stratford High School drama teacher, has always wanted to direct "Hamlet," but from the very start her production is doomed. The lead actor is a prima dona who exasperates his peers. The other actors are either jealous that they weren't cast in different roles, or clueless. On opening night the costumes still haven't arrived, the makeup is lost, and the actor who is to play Horatio calls from the hospital just before his emergency appendectomy. A member of the cast has a cousin who is a professional actor who recently performed in "Hamlet." W...

76 pages

5 m, 4 w, 5 flexible

Kathy, the stage manager, has the play’s first line: “I hate opening nights!” From that point on we see everything that could go wrong in the course of a performance happen to a group of dedicated high school actors and techies. Mistakes, miscues, dropped lines, forgotten entrances, missing props, and a tricky light board you name it, it happens in this frenetic play. As we watch chaos reign in the tech booth and with the actors backstage, we also see what calamities occur onstage in the “play within the play.” It all makes for non-stop hilarity as the proces...

71 pages

4 m, 8 w, 4 flexible

At the end of the 1940s an old theatre building is about to be torn down. As the theatre’s acting troupe is packing up the props, costumes and set pieces, an old magician’s trunk is wheeled onstage. Suddenly, members of the company are turning up dead. Margaret, the director’s assistant, is the only witness to these crimes, and no one will believe her! Can she solve the mystery, or at least convince her fellow cast and crew about the sinister happenings, before the entire company is doomed? And when ghosts from the past mysteriously return, will former victim...

71 pages

3 m, 12 w, 2 flex and ensemble cast of 5 or more

Amelia Jones’s life is falling apart. Her father has left, her mother is usually drunk, and her brother, a high school senior before being expelled, must now try to support the family, such as it is. Then there’s Courtney and her posse who are dedicated to bullying Amelia, who finds herself with few friends. Now, another challenge. In a long-standing school tradition, each freshman must make a presentation on an American hero. Failing to choose a hero for herself, Amelia is assigned the historic female pilot, Amelia Earhart. Soon Earhart begins showing up in ...

80 pages

6 m, 10 w, 2 flexible

Flashback to 1955, the stormy evening before the 33rd annual Knotting Bake-Off, brought to you by J & J Toothpaste. The contestants have gathered at the Knotting Inn down at the Jersey Shore, each hoping that their perfectly crafted baked good will win the coveted blue ribbon. It seems someone’s dessert is more deadly than tasty, though, when they discover an entire gaggle of bratty students have been poisoned during a press conference. It is clear that someone at the inn has a sweet tooth for murder. But who could the culprit be? The egotistical bake-off...

65 pages

6 m, 14 w

A quintessential 1950s mom, June Seevers, and her committee are working hard to win the "Small Town USA" title and a cash prize for their town of Sunnydale. The judges are due in two days to verify that it is, indeed, an All-American, apple pie-eating, crime-free hamlet. Did we say crime free? Then what about the mysterious customer at the Malt Shop who falls over dead during the committee's final meeting? It looks like he was poisoned, and the victim's sister may be a committee member! But who? With the help of her family, the prissy librarian, and even the ...

76 pages

6 m, 8 w, 1 flexible

Trudy, new to the theatre scene, has just been hired as stage manager for an upcoming play at a small community theatre. The problem is Trudy is inept, clumsy, and more than that, she's a jinx. The cast agrees that Trudy is a modern-day gremlin who is cursing the show and that she must go once and for all. So, why doesn't the director fire her? Because Trudy is the theatre owner's only niece. Realizing that throwing her out isn't an option, they resolve to de-hex her instead in order to make the theatre a safe haven once again. An old book of theatre supersti...

51 pages

7 m, 8 w, 2 flexible

Because of a miscommunication with the principal, high school drama teacher Mr. Morris finds himself with only ONE DAY to cast, stage and perform the school play. In desperation, he turns to two of his best students, Paul and Laura, to take charge and co-direct the show, unaware that the two are in the middle of a nasty break-up and are no longer speaking. Things go from bad to much, much worse when Paul and Laura, practicing with their friends independently, don't realize they are rehearsing for DIFFERENT SHOWS, "Little Orphan Annie" and "Annie Get Your Gun....

74 pages

8 m, 8 w, 2 flexible

All the fun and nostalgia of the '50s make this play a winner! Judy Harding's life as a 16-year-old isn't too sweet right now. Her dad can't find the money to fix up the family's soda shop; her older brother is flunking out of school; and her younger brother has retreated into a fantasy world of comic book superheroes since their mom died. To add to the dilemma, Judy has a major crush on a new student who's a mysterious loner. Enter Angela, a bumbling angel-in-training who must earn her halo by helping the Hardings. But when the shop is hit first by a fire an...

63 pages

9 m, 9 w, extras, doubling possible

Here are three updated tales of horror. "The Monkey's Paw," by W. W. Jacobs, tells the story of a family destroyed by a grisly talisman that promises to grant three wishes. When a college-aged daughter is crushed while chiseling a huge marble tombstone, her parents wish her alive - at first. "The Tell-Tale Heart," by Edgar Allan Poe, is set in a contemporary prison where clinical experts delve deep into a killer's scarred psyche, only to discover that the motiveless murder is anything but. "Midnight Wax," by L. Don Swartz, is the story of an ambitious reporte...