One Act Plays

[joshwriting]

(cross posted, partially, from Sheroes)

I'm teaching a Play Directing class to 6 high school students this Spring. We're considering doing a night of one act plays as an adjunct to the course.

Do you have favorites, new or old?

Did you do/see it/them straight up or done with a twist? (inverted genders, serious play done for laughs, etc.)

A side question is if you've ever a) taken a play to a Drama Festival, or even b) gone to watch a Drama Festival?

Thanks!

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One Act Plays that have caught my eye, so far:
The Fifteen Minute Hamlet, by Tom Stoppard
http://www.samuelfrench.com/store/product_info.php/products_id/3934

Your Swash Is Unbuckled (Baker's Plays has a typo in their version of the typo) by Jeff Goode
http://www.bakersplays.com/store/product_info.php/cPath/7/products_id/1769?osCsid=b464e20596ce9bcf705b240fde3afa9d

Wurzel-Flummery, by A.A. Milne
http://books.google.com/books?id=AZUOAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=wurzel-flummery&lr=&as_brr=1&ei=NIZrSc8GnMAy9qallQQ

Chamber Music, by Arthur Kopit
http://books.google.com/books?id=eGTDI9j3BKcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=kopit&ei=wI1rSZXcHImsNtystZ4I#PPA6,M1
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Full length plays that came up and looked entertaining, while I was looking:
Iliad, Odyssey and all of Greek Mythology in 99 Minutes or Less by Jay Hopkins and John Hunter
http://www.samuelfrench.com/store/product_info.php/products_id/7268

Ham/thello, The Moor of Denmark by Jeff Goode
http://www.bakersplays.com/store/product_info.php/products_id/1845?osCsid=b464e20596ce9bcf705b240fde3afa9d

Romeo and Julius [Caesar] by Jeff Goode
http://www.bakersplays.com/store/product_info.php/products_id/1770?osCsid=b464e20596ce9bcf705b240fde3afa9d

Comments

[flabosib.livejournal.com]

There was a one-act that HSSP did a LONG time ago, but I can't remember the name of it--it was an all-girl cast though and one of the characters was catatonic.

Personally, I like mixing up genders and playing for the laughs. Life needs more laughs.

[flabosib.livejournal.com]

Also, our high school did one-acts every spring and my class really got into it every year. We won all four years!

[joshwriting.livejournal.com]

I would bet large amounts of money that you are thinking of Chamber Music by Arthur Kopit, with Amelia Earhart, Joan of Ark, Queen Isabella, and others.

http://books.google.com/books?id=eGTDI9j3BKcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=kopit&ei=wI1rSZXcHImsNtystZ4I#PPA6,M1

And that, too, is one of the plays I have been thinking about from having seen the same HSSP production of it that you did!

[awomanthatsblue.livejournal.com]

I did that play in college! It's lots of fun. I was the catatonic Queen Isabella, and I still use her monologue for auditions.

The other one-acts I've been involved in (and there have not been many) were definitely too raunchy for high school.

[flabosib.livejournal.com]

I'll bet you're right--I really enjoyed the production I saw.