Nikki Harmon
Nikki Harmon’s plays run the gamut from social/political satires, to theatre for young audiences, to murder mystery comedies, and have been produced in India, Botswana, So. Africa, England, Australia, China, Thailand, and throughout the U.S. and Canada. Among her awards, she has been a Finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, and has won the University of Central Missouri's National Theatre for Young Audiences Playwriting Competition (three times). Nikki studied in Paris at the Sorbonne and at the Institut Britannique, at the Universitie de Montpellier, and is an alumna of Carnegie Mellon, the University of Miami, and Pasadena Playhouse College of Theatre Arts. Along with her writing, she’s also a Stage Manager, Lighting Designer, Casting Director, and pen & ink/watercolor artist, and a long time member of Actor’s Equity and the Dramatists Guild. Nikki has worked on Earthwatch projects in Kenya, Peru, Italy, Namibia, Thailand and the U.S., on wildlife conservancies and archaeological digs. (Pictured: Nikki with a rescued giraffe on an Earthwatch Project at Lewa Wildlife Conservancy, in Kenya.)
Coat...and its Curious Travels
Comedy by Nikki Harmon
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....
Day the Cow-Dreamer Ran Away and Other Tales of Wonder
Fantasy by Nikki Harmon
41 pages
1 m, 1 w, 3 flexible
Here is a troika of short, story-theatre plays that will take you on three very unusual journeys. First stop is a town where the cow-dreamer ran away... and we all know that without someone to dream cows there simply are no cows. Then we travel to a farm where the devil comes to call every day at noon. Only the dog knows who he is, and it's up to her to save the farmer and his wife. Finally, we visit a marsh and find out what happens when the Sun gets so curious about the Earth that she comes down to see what it's like for herself. Because the narration fills...
New York Stories
Adaptation by Nikki Harmon
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...
Murder in the 1st Person Singular
Comedy Mystery by Nikki Harmon
54 pages
5 m (one non-speaking), 3 w
It's a chilly, rainy night at the Stonebridge School for Proper Young Ladies as the English teacher, the home ec. teacher, the athletic coach, the butler, the head of the alumnae and a mafia hit man break into the dean's study to kill him. The trouble is they each find him already very dead with a noose around his neck, two suicide notes in his pocket and a Japanese ceremonial dagger in his back. Now it's Detective Bliss' job to find out who did what, with what, when, and why. Meanwhile, the suspects are trying to bump each other off. And who is that mysterio...