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One Day More from Les Miserables via Playbill

One Play More

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #28
We started with a “Brave Little Soldier” so let’s end with a “Coward Big Pacifist”.

Bonus points to anyone who knows how many bonus points they have
and incorporate that in the play.

(Note: Mine is an extremely loose interpretation)

 

One Day More from Les Miserables via Playbill

 

ONE PLAY MORE

Excerpt:

ME:

So, this nightmare challenge… I have zero ideas. I mean, I have vivid dreams, but I’m not willing to share them with a bunch of strangers. And even if I was, I know how to write them in narrative form, but as a play? The things I envision I don’t even know how to stage without a ton of technology.

GURU:

Well the brief did say we had an unlimited budget.

ME:

But an unlimited budget can’t make the impossible possible, can it? Anyway, I’m too stupid for this challenge. Is day three too soon to quit.

GURU:

Yes.

ME:

If I ask you the same question on day twenty-three will you have the same answer?

GURU:

Yes.

 

To read the entire play, click the link below:

2018-28 – ONE PLAY MORE

Copyright: baldion / 123RF Stock Photo

Up In Smoke

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #27

Pick a previous challenge and do it again.

I picked #5 – the provided first line challenge. Except it ended up not being the first line.

So, this is also the “adapt a previous work of your own” challenge, since this was originally a piece of flash-fiction.

 

 

Copyright: <a href='https://www.123rf.com/profile_baldion'>baldion / 123RF Stock Photo</a>

UP IN SMOKE

 

Excerpt:

SAUL (gesturing at the item):

Is that it?

GERTL:

What, this? It’s just a lipstick, see?

GERTL makes a show of opening the tube of lipstick and applying some to her lips, using the compact mirror for guidance.

GERTL:

Do you like the color?

SAUL:

It’s a little dark for a girl like you.

GERTL (laughing):

Right, because I’m still twelve to you.

SAUL:

No! Not twelve. Sixteen, maybe.

GERTL:

Got a thing for jailbait, Saul? I never would’ve thought…

SAUL (embarrassed):

Easy, sweet-knees, I’m just playing with ya. (beat) Shall we get to business?

SAUL pulls a cigar out of his pocket, and reaches for paraphernalia waiting on the table. He clips it, lights it, and takes a puff.

 

To read the entire play, click the link below:

2018-27 – Up In Smoke

Ice Cream Parlor Chairs

Be Seated

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #26
Choose ten inanimate objects, go through a five-step process that helps you select one.
Write a play about it.

 

Ice Cream Parlor Chairs

BE SEATED

 

Excerpt:

WHITE:          Fine. You go first.

BLACK:          Well…

WHITE:          Come on. Don’t get your wires in a twist. You want my confessional, put your money where your support spiral is.

BLACK:          Well, like you, I started in the restaurant. When was that? The thirties? The forties? I don’t remember much except a lot of red sauce and soldiers.

WHITE:          Yeah… soldiers and their girls. It was sweet, all that young love.

BLACK:          If you say so. A lot of those boys never came home again, or they came home wrong.

WHITE:          True. But a lot of them got married and started families. I ended up with one of the daughters of the restaurant owner. I thought you did, too?

BLACK:          Yes. I was put on the landing next to an empty milk bottle – one of those big, black, metal ones. I was never sure if he was meant to be intimidating or reassuring. Mostly, he was boring. Never wanted to chat. Just wanted to sit there and be stoic.

 

To read the entire piece, click below:

2018-26 – Be Seated

Weather Man via Flash Prompt

The Weather Man

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #25
Every writer has started working on something and then gave up halfway through.
We all have somewhere an incomplete idea or play.

Your challenge for today, should you choose to accept it,
is to find one of those ideas and complete them!

 

About the play:

Since I don’t have any scripts that meet this requirement, or any incomplete stories that I wanted to turn into scripts, I took a piece of flash-fic that I wrote a while ago and expanded it into a play.

Weather Man via Flash Prompt

THE WEATHER MAN

 

Excerpt:

CONSTRUCTION WORKER:

Hey, yo! It’s the weather man! Sam, Sam the weather man! Whatcha got for us today?

FOREMAN:

Joe, get back to work. Poor S.O.B. can’t help his obsession.

SAM:

It’s not an obsession.

FOREMAN:

Kinda surprised you have your kid with you, Sam. She have any clue about Daddy’s empty bottles?

SAM (patiently):

They’re not empty. I’ve captured two squalls just this week.

FOREMAN:

Right. Squalls in bottles. As if. Look maybe you should try catching time. You know, like the song. (Sings) If I could keep time in a bot-tle, the first thing that I’d like to dooooooooo.

SAM:

Time is just an artificial construct. Weather? Weather is real.

To read the entire piece, click the link below:

2018-25 – The Weather Man

Floating Woman, by Nuchtchas

Body Positive – a (Really Long) Monologue

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #24
So, as you’ve gathered, I’ve been thinking a lot about the idea of whether art should be truthful, or indeed should attempt at representing truth (or perhaps it does so inherently), and if it does, why? And what does it even mean to be truthful? Perhaps it’s all nonsensical.

Sebastian! What’s the frigging challenge?”
oh… uhm… I have no idea!

 

About the play:

One of my favorite ways to relax during the summer months is to float in my swimming pool, under a canopy of trees, watching the birds flit from branch to branch. I’ve been nursing a knee injury that’s been coming and going for months, and then over Christmas, I slipped on my deck, pulled my hamstring, and re-injured it It’s only now that I’m finally able to sit for more than half an hour at a time, and while soaking in bubble baths with lavender-scented epsom salts has helped, it’s not the same as floating. At the same time, a friend on Facebook mentioned that she’d recently hurt her hip while in a theatrical production and mentioned floating as a way to take stress off her hip. That gave me the inspiration to make my character an actor in a show. My friend Nutty, fellow fat woman, is a phenomenal artist, and every year she observes Lent as a period of daily creativity. She’s also an eloquent speaker and writer on the subject of loving your own body, no matter the size, something I know I still struggle with, as do many, many women. This character is mostly me, with a dash of Nutty and a few other friends. (Except I’ve never had children.)

About the art:

I sent Nutty a copy of this play – which is really a monologue – and asked her if she’d let me use on of her nudes to help illustrate it. She did, but then she said, “but your piece has inspired today’s art.” And so, around one am Sunday morning, she sent me this link. I asked if I could use the piece, and she responded that she hoped I would. And so, we’ve created an infinite loop of mutual inspiration. Please visit Nutty’s site for more awesome pieces of art.  Click here for DAILY CREATIVITY.

Floating Woman, by Nuchtchas

 

BODY POSITIVE

 

Excerpt:

I mean, let’s be honest, I’m not in my twenties anymore. Hell, it’s been a while since I’ve seen thirty. Or forty. I’ve had a child – nursed her – I’ve never completely gotten over my love affair with carbs. I hate working out. I have dance training, but I’ve never been a natural dancer, and there’s a reason I play character parts.

My body shows all of that. My body is the reason.

But even without that…. Even without just one of those things, I’ve always been the girl – the woman – who was teased for being fat. Who had to wear a bra at the age of eight. Who is always too short and too loud and too hairy and too busty and too round.

(I mean, seriously, in the event of a water landing, my tits are built-in flotation devices).

To read the entire play, click the link below:

2018-24 – Body Positive

 

Copyright: kentoh / 123RF Stock Photo

Utopia Rising

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #23

…And besides, who even wants to write about the real world?! We’re writers, creators of worlds. We should make things up. Why would anybody be interested in art that’s “true”?! (still brewing here…)

Plus, I think we all deserve a good holiday! If only we had a skill that can help with that! Oh wait … we do!!!

So let’s create the best word ever! I think we can all do with a nice Utopia, right?

Copyright: kentoh / 123RF Stock Photo

UTOPIA RISING

 

Excerpt:

BASIL:                        (patiently) Elizabeth, I have asked you more than once not to use the word ‘glitch’ in reference to your brother’s condition.

ELIZABETH:             He’s not my brother; he’s a Synth.

BASIL:                        I am also a Synthetic being, and yet I am still your father.

ELIZABETH:             That’s different.

BASIL:                        Is it? Elizabeth, the fact that your mother and I have chosen to expand our family by creating George does not mean that we love you any less. You are our daughter, and you are precious to us.

ELIZABETH:             I know but… it’s bad enough, Dad, hearing kids talk about how mom is married to a robot.

 

To read the entire play, click the link below:

2018-23 – Utopia Rising

Copyright: dolgachov / 123RF Stock Photo

UnPlanned Parenthood

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #22

Compassion… understanding… open-mindness… aren’t we all so friggin’ awesome (!) But can we truly be tolerant and respectful of people who are wron… I mean, people who have views that differ from ours?
So let’s try and see the world from their point of view?

But – you have to make sure that you do this without being sarcastic, without trying to prove them wrong… but from an honest place of understanding and acceptance!

 

Copyright: <a href='https://www.123rf.com/profile_dolgachov'>dolgachov / 123RF Stock Photo</a>

UNPLANNED PARENTHOOD

 

Excerpt:

I know this is a contentious issue. I live in the world. But today my oldest daughter, Erika, asked me why I hate women when I told her she couldn’t donate her allowance to Planned Parenthood, and I want to try and give her an answer.

First, I don’t hate women. Erika’s mother was a strong, independent woman. When we divorced, it wasn’t because I was leaning more republican and she was leaning more democrat, although we were; it was because we’d gotten married when we were barely more than kids, and our needs and desires had outgrown each other’s. We’re still friends, and we’re both active in our children’s lives.

To read the entire piece, click the link below:

2018-22 – UnPlanned Parenthood

 

Copyright: sdecoret / 123RF Stock Photo

Lock Her Down

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #21
So let’s do that! Let’s write a play with the intention of offending others.
For bonus points – write something that offends you!
But like – TRULY makes you scream in anger and upset!

 

Copyright: <a href='https://www.123rf.com/profile_sdecoret'>sdecoret / 123RF Stock Photo</a>

 

LOCK HER DOWN

 

Excerpt:

CHARLIE:       Okay, let’s get started. Bill, it’s great that you’re allowed to talk to Bobby now. How do you feel about that?

BILL:               How do you think I feel. I’m pissed that I have to have permission to talk to my own kid…

CHARLIE:       Is that all?

BILL:               No, I…. I’m glad they’re letting me have the phone call. Even if it is only five minutes.

MARK:            Five minutes is five minutes more than I get.

SAM:               You did put her mother in the hospital for a month.

MARK:            Her bruises were so pretty, though. And the screams….

 

To read the entire play, click the link below:

2018-21 – Lock Her Down

Copyright: katalinks / 123RF Stock Photo

All I Am, All I Have

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #20
I’d like you to write about dates. Blind dates, speed dates, pub dates, stood-up dates and ‘my kids mustn’t know I’m here’ dates.
And for all you clever-clogs, if you’re writing about the fruit, then dates on a date.

 

Copyright: <a href='https://www.123rf.com/profile_katalinks'>katalinks / 123RF Stock Photo</a>

 

ALL I AM, ALL I HAVE

Excerpt:

HARMONY: I’d have picked a better place if I’d known you could spare the time. Usually you warn me you’re coming; you send a storm.

OSKAR: Yes, but no storm tonight. Is… date, not… tryst. Also, this place is where I want.

HARMONY: You chose it on purpose?

OSKAR: Is best place on earth to watch the moon and stars come.

HARMONY: I had it on good authority that I was your ‘moon and stars.’

OSKAR (simple, honest): No. You are breath and blood to me.

 

To read the entire play, click the link below:

2018-20 – All I Am

Copyright: kentoh / 123RF Stock Photo

I’d Do Anything for Love

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28 Plays Later – Challenge #19
Title Provided: “I’d do anything for love (but I won’t do that)”
For bonus points – stick a meatloaf in there somewhere!

 

Copyright: <a href='https://www.123rf.com/profile_kentoh'>kentoh / 123RF Stock Photo</a>

I’D DO ANYTHING FOR LOVE

Excerpt:

ZOE:               I may have ordered meatloaf, but it’s still replicated meatloaf. You know as well as I do that it’s not actually animal flesh, any more than you are.

BASIL:            That is true, but…

ZOE:               (bringing her tray to the table and placing a salad in front of BASIL. Both of them will eat their meals during the conversation.) I know, it’s the principal of the thing. From replicated meat to actual meat is a slippery slope you ‘have no wish to encounter.’

BASIL:            You are imitating me.

ZOE:               Yes, but I do it out of love… speaking of which…

BASIL:            (wary) Yes?

ZOE:               When were you going to tell me your mother was a Synth, like you?

 

To read the entire play, click the link below.

2018-19 – Anything for Love