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| A Forty-Minute Winter's Tale by Shakespeare, abridged Bill Tordoff |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 9. Minimum Female roles = 6. Minimum total with doubling = 15. Minimum total without doubling = 28. Chorus. The characters are adults plus one child and, famously, a bear, whose only role is to exit in pursuit of Antigonus (for an offstage lunch appointment - although only one of the parties is hungry.) |
| Run Time | Around 40 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Abridgement of William Shakespeare's 'The Winter's Tale', with the original text cut down to 40 minutes.
(The abridgement is copyrighted, so we charge for scripts and copying rights, but performances are royalty-free.) |
| Synopsis | Leontes, King of Sicilia, suspects his wife Hermione of having an affair with Polixenes, the King of Bohemia. (Herminone and Polixenes are innocent.) Polixenes escapes Leontes' wrath, but Hermione does not and is imprisoned. Hermione gives birth to a daughter, but Leontes does not believe the child, Perdita, to be his and sends her abroad. She is abandoned on the coast of Bohemia (a feat which would be frowned upon these days, owing to Geography) and Perdita is brought-up by a Shepherd. Time (making a guest appearance) moves the play on sixteen years, and Florizel, son of Polixenes, meets and falls in love with Perdita, the shepherdess, thus setting-up the inevitable reconcilliation and happy ending. |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| Forty-Two by Amanda Giles |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 1. Minimum Female roles = 1. Minimum total with doubling = 4. Minimum total without doubling = 5. No chorus. The voice of the App could be recorded or played live. The angels are written male, but since they are angels this scarcely matters. |
| Run Time | Around 12 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Short comedy play for a couple of pieces of furniture, four actors and the gentle voice of a phone app. (British English, using 'lounge' for 'living room' and including slang for a cigarette which might confuse speakers of other varieties of English.) |
| Synopsis | Jemima has just woken up from her meditation cd session to find three strange men in her living room. Well, not men, they're angels, summoned by the cd she has just listened to. They have answers for Jemima, but she won’t like them... |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| The Four Yorkshiremen of the Apocalypse by Damian Trasler |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 4. Minimum Female roles = 0. Minimum total with doubling = 4. Minimum total without doubling = 4. No chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 4 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Short comedy sketch. No set requirements (could be done on an open stage or front-of-curtain). |
| Synopsis | Famine, Pestilence, War and Death meet to plot the demise of mankind - although their manner seems unexpectedly familiar. |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| Fragrant Friend by Frank Gibbons |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 2. Minimum Female roles = 0. Minimum total with doubling = 2. Minimum total without doubling = 2. No chorus. The 'action' takes place in a queue of people in a Post Office, to there are opportunities for non-speaking extras if you so desire. |
| Run Time | Around 4 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Short comedy sketch. No set or props. |
| Synopsis | Two old comrades meet... and one wishes that they hadn't... |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| Framed In A Window by John Chambers |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 1. Minimum Female roles = 0. Minimum total with doubling = 2. Minimum total without doubling = 2. No chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 32 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | A two-handed, one act play, with a single set and containing strong language. |
| Synopsis | Mo, the janitor in the Texas School Book Depository, is startled to come across a figure sitting in the notorious window, holding a very familiar rifle. Is it really the ghost of Lee Harvey Oswald? |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| Frankenstein Abridged by Richard Brinsley Peake ab. Dwayne Lawler |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 7. Minimum Female roles = 2. Minimum total with doubling = 9. Minimum total without doubling = 9. No chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 39 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | One-act melodrama. Multiple scenes, but mainly indicative settings. |
| Synopsis | 'Presumption, or, The Fate of Frankenstein' by Richard Brinsley Peake was the first adaptation for the stage of Mary Shelley's pioneering novel. Dwayne Lawler's abridgement has reduced it from 5 acts to 1 and cut the characters from more than 15 to a total of 9.
Peake's adaptation tweaked the novel's plot (not least to reduce locations), nevertheless, the core plot of Frankenstein is here and cutting it down hasn't removed the impact or significantly dampened the themes. |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| Frankenstein's Last Chance by Geoff Bamber |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 6. Minimum Female roles = 4. Minimum total with doubling = 16. Minimum total without doubling = 16. No chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 42 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | A one act comedy melodrama, for school-age, youth performers. |
| Synopsis | Having given up his medical practice to concentrate on his career as an inventor, Doctor Viktor Frankenstein desperately needs to raise funds to pay for his daughter's forthcoming wedding. Success at the annual Mad Scientists' Convention would be well-rewarded, but Viktor finds himself singularly short of inspiration until... No, that would be absurd - wouldn't it? |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| Franny and Jonty’s Christmas Cook Off by Cheryl Barrett |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 1. Minimum Female roles = 1. Minimum total with doubling = 2. Minimum total without doubling = 2. No chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 7 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Comedy sketch. (Set in a kitchen, but only indicated by a table and a couple of chairs.) |
| Synopsis | A charming bon viveur and his once celebrity chef wife are no longer feted by TV companies. To restart her career, Franny has agreed to front a cooking programme for a new streaming channel. After so long away from the limelight, Franny resorts to 'dutch courage' to calm her nerves. |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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Freshly Laid by Frank Gibbons
Best Seller |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 0. Minimum Female roles = 3. Minimum total with doubling = 3. Minimum total without doubling = 3. No chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 4 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | A short comedy sketch, set in a park - simple bench setting. |
| Synopsis | The elderly ladies are catching up with the latest - on hens, ducks, and possible other roostings. |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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Freya's Necklace by Jonathan Edgington
Selected for and performed at the 'Time For Something New' playwriting festival 2018 at the Bread & Roses Theatre, London. |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 0. Minimum Female roles = 3. Minimum total with doubling = 3. Minimum total without doubling = 3. No chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 12 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | A comedy sketch with a single (charity shop) setting. |
| Synopsis | Just a normal day in a charity shop? Probably, until Freya the Norse Goddess of Love and War enters on a bit of a mission. |
| Price | For scripts and live performance rights, please click on the Price Link to find the cost. For scripts and lockdown videos/streaming rights, click here |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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