School

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...

48 pages

1 m, 2 w, 10 flexible, 1 offstage voice

Ten dim-witted people have been invited to an old house on Dunce Island with the ultimate purpose, unbeknownst to them, to be murdered. Apparently, because of his or her dumbness, each was responsible for the earlier death of someone else. Now, one by one, they themselves are done in according to a silly nursery rhyme hanging over the fireplace. Because they’re not the brightest bulbs in the box, the poor victims are murdered rather easily by such things as vacuum cleaner hoses and live alligators. After several murders take place, they become suspicious of e...

79 pages

6 m, 10 w, much doubling possible

“So you want to commit a murder.” This is the first line in a book purchased by Myron Bernhart. And here’s a guy who knows his books since he’s collected some rare ones and proud of it. That is until his nagging wife, Marge, decides to sell them. He tries to reason with her but is argued down, not only by her but the Civic Arts League, her cronies who, of course, meet constantly at their house. When all else fails, Myron realizes it’s time to take drastic action and plans it all out. Of course, his imagination tends to wander a bit--from German psychiatrists ...

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...

79 pages

3 m, 3 w

Randolph Gaston has been murdered, and everybody is after the insurance money (including the deceased). The characters we meet are the grieving widow, the girl next door, the family maid, the minister, the French inspector, and the confused boyfriend -- BUT everyone isn't necessarily who they seem to be. A series of double (and double-double) crosses, mistaken identities, fake accents, hidden bodies, and phony mustaches all add up to a completely intriguing comedy.

64 pages

5 m, 5 w

Gerald and Cristine Dandridge always give a Halloween party for their friends. This year, however, they're having the party at their country house. It's a nice little fixer-upper with all the conveniences and one haunted scarecrow. At least, that's the story that came with the house. The night of the party things barely get under way when someone notices the scarecrow has vanished. And when it finally DOES turn up, it's carrying an axe. Yes, sir, this time it's personal! Int. set.

64 pages

5 m, 7 w

Heather Pallfeather is a modern-day damsel in distress whose stepfather just kicked the bucket. Or did somebody kick it for him? With this crazy family it's hard to tell! To get some straight answers she hires Jack Sparks, a private eye, to act as her fiance and accompany her to the estate for the reading of the will. Sparks thinks himself a pretty shrewd cookie...until the lights go out and he starts to crumble. Throw in the mother who gets lost in her own house, a cousin who's married to a known convict, interchangeable twins, a stepsister who's looking for...

76 pages

5 m, 8 w

Who killed Osgood Buckely-Lodge? His widow admits her actions killed her husband. But she says it was a trap and anyone who had stepped into the room that night would have been the murderer. Is she telling the truth or setting yet another clever trap? Perhaps the murderer is Osgood's eccentric sister, Olga, or the spoiled, lazy children, Simon and Jasmin. Then there's still the eerie butler and his sarcastic wife. To add more confusion, not one but two mysterious strangers in trench coats appear at the mansion during a thunderstorm. To catch the murderer amon...

76 pages

8 m, 14 w, chorus

The students of Hilltop High are excited! They're going to put on a musical of "Romeo and Juliet." However, the director, Miss Peggy Donahue, pressed into service by a principal eager to please his superindendent, is horrified. Twenty years before, when she was a student at Hilltop, she starred in a disastrous production of Shakespeare's "Scottish Play," and she believes the curse lingers on. Sure enough, everthing that can go wrong, does. The set for the balcony scene collapses, Juliet breaks her leg, her replacement develops laryngitis, and the semi-deaf co...

58 pages

4 m, 9 w, 1 flexible

Katherine and Jonathan Prescott are hysterical when their cousin Lino, a famous Italian botanist, cancels his visit at the last minute. Katherine had planned for him to be the guest speaker at an important flower society fund-raising dinner. Her brother, Jonathan, had wanted Lino to impress his upper-crust girlfriend. So when Jonathan's long-lost but quick-witted friend Robert shows up, Jonathan convinces him to play Lino. Trouble is, Robert's Italian (limited to pizza menus) and knowledge of plants (they're green) could torpedo this sophomoric plan. Of cours...

32 pages

5 m, 4 w

Have you ever asked yourself, “What was I thinking?” Well, Spencer and Olivia are doing just that – while on their first date!  Their conscious minds (played by two separate actors) are present on stage, sharing their thoughts (often contradictory thoughts!) on the conversation. Things get off to a rocky start, the usual awkward silences ensue, but the complications really begin when both their exes show up. Furthermore, Olivia produces her checklist of grueling questions for Spencer to test whether he is “boyfriend material.” The date concludes with Olivia m...

77 pages

Flexible cast of 13

The event begins in your theatre which is supposed to be the theatre of Pendleton Academy. Its millionaire founder, Anthony Pendleton, has passed away and the heirs learn that if they can find and follow specific clues, they will inherit the entire estate. Then comes even more startling news. Pendleton was murdered and chances are one of those present killed him and may kill again to gain his fortune. With this in mind, the heirs leave the theatre and split into three groups to search for clues. Members of the audience must choose which group to join. Three s...

73 pages

9 m, 11 w

Several guests go to a remote ski lodge for a mystery weekend during which actors, posing as other guests, simulate a murder which the real guests try to solve. The event is barely under way when the host is murdered, the cable car is sabotaged, and the phone lines are cut, stranding everyone with a killer. Suddenly, a thrilling weekend becomes the height of danger. Among the guests are a famous mystery writer, a former TV detective and his starlet girlfriend, a Texas millionaire and his beauty queen wife, a couple on their honeymoon, and a mysterious bandage...

23 pages

4 m, 3 w

Investigator Keith Schwartz has been sent to look into the alleged suicide of Mr. Nazareth, a patient at the Fallen Oaks Correctional Facility for the Criminally Insane. But there are complications: The body has disappeared from the morgue, staff and patients are hiding something, and even the head psychiatrist seems reluctant to talk. Schwartz interviews the patients to discover what really happened that night. This one-act, single set drama is both a whodunit mystery and a retelling of the gospel for a modern audience.

33 pages

4 m, 4 w, 6 flexible, doubling possible

Charleston, South Carolina, sometime after the Civil War. A poor woman borrows a diamond necklace from a wealthy friend to wear at a party. She hopes that this outing will change the circumstances of her life and fortune, and that the other guests will see that she and her husband really belong within the ranks of the upper classes. But things go awry, and she loses the necklace. Pride will not allow her to tell her friend of the loss. Instead, she has another necklace made to match the one that was lost, and she and her husband spend the next 12 years paying...