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| A Fifty-Minute Cymbeline by Shakespeare, abridged Bill Tordoff |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 14. Minimum Female roles = 3. Minimum total with doubling = 17. Minimum total without doubling = 29. Chorus. Thre are 29 speaking roles (with considerable doubling possible), plus a non-speaking chorus with plenty of roles on offer! |
| Run Time | Around 50 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Abridgement of William Shakespeare's 'Cymbeline', with the original text cut down to 50 minutes or so.
(The abridgement is copyrighted, so we charge for scripts and copying rights, but performances are royalty-free.) |
| Synopsis | Posthumus Leonatus has married Imogen, daughter of Cymbeline, the King of Britain, without permission. That gets Posthumus banished, leaving Imogen behind. Meanwhile, the King's second wife is trying to engineer her son's route to the throne. An Italian braggart causes a rift between Posthumus and Imogen, and with Cybeline's court in disarray, the Romans mount an invasion. How then can the kingdom be saved? |
| 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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| A Fifty-Minute Henry VI Part 2 by Shakespeare, abridged Bill Tordoff |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 21. Minimum Female roles = 4. Minimum total with doubling = 25. Minimum total without doubling = 47. Chorus. As with most of the history plays, the cast of characters is huge, with over 40 speaking parts, but lots of doubling is possible. |
| Run Time | Around 50 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Abridgement of William Shakespeare's 'The Second Part of King Henry VI', with the original text cut down to 50 minutes or so.
(The abridgement is copyrighted, so we charge for scripts and copying rights, but performances are royalty-free.) |
| Synopsis | Subtitled 'Cade's Rebellion'.
The wars with France are over, but there's trouble brewing for King Henry within his own court. There's the Duke of Suffolk, trying to manipulate the King through Henry's wife, Margaret , there's the Duchess of Gloster trying to put her husband, Henry's uncle, on the throne, and there's a growing faction around the Duke of York and his two sons, Edward and Richard Crouchback. Matters come to a head with a rebellion led by Kentish tradesman Jack Cade. |
| 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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| A Fifty-Minute Henry VI Part 3 by Shakespeare, abridged Bill Tordoff |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 21. Minimum Female roles = 3. Minimum total with doubling = 24. Minimum total without doubling = 41. Chorus. As with most of the history plays, the cast of characters is huge, with over 30 speaking parts, but lots of doubling is possible. (They are also mainly male, but don't let that put you off.) |
| Run Time | Around 50 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Abridgement of William Shakespeare's 'The Third Part of King Henry VI', with the original text cut down to 50 minutes or so.
(The abridgement is copyrighted, so we charge for scripts and copying rights, but performances are royalty-free.) |
| Synopsis | The Wars of the Roses in full force, with the Duke of York rebelling against the weak Henry VI. York is killed, but his three sons continue the fight. |
| 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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| A Fifty-Minute Henry VIII by Shakespeare, abridged Bill Tordoff |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 20. Minimum Female roles = 4. Minimum total with doubling = 24. Minimum total without doubling = 40. Chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 50 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Abridgement of William Shakespeare's 'Henry VIII', with the original text cut down to 50 minutes or so.
(The abridgement is copyrighted, so we charge for scripts and copying rights, but performances are royalty-free.) |
| Synopsis | We meet Henry VIII when he has been king and married to Katharine of Aragon for some 20 years. The court is under the sway of the manipulative, acquisitive Cardinal Wolsey, but Henry falls for Anne Boleyn (or Anne Bullen, as Shakespeare calls her) and in the ensuing turmoil he ditches both Wolsey and Katharine. |
| 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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| A Fifty-Minute Richard The Third by Shakespeare, abridged Bill Tordoff |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 21. Minimum Female roles = 4. Minimum total with doubling = 26. Minimum total without doubling = 48. Chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 50 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | Abridgement of William Shakespeare's 'The Life and Death of King Richard III', with the original text cut down to 50 minutes or so.
(The abridgement is copyrighted, so we charge for scripts and copying rights, but performances are royalty-free.) |
| Synopsis | Richard the Third, from the winter of discontent to the kingdom for a horse, as the last of the Plantagenets intrigues and murders his way to the English throne, only to be confronted by the army of the Earl of Richmond - one Henry Tudor.
Historical footnote: Shakespeare derived this account from Henry Tudor's historians. In the view of the editor, this makes it unreliable history, but a cracking play! |
| 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 Good, The Bad, And The Ugly Sisters by Sian Lewis |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 5. Minimum Female roles = 8. Minimum total with doubling = 19. Minimum total without doubling = 19. No chorus. |
| Run Time | Around 50 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | One-act comedy play for kids, based on a collision of fairy tales. Two sets (probably set in separate areas of the same stage - a joke can be made about the journey time between the two). |
| Synopsis | A retired evil witch discovers her mirror has been lying to her for years - she's not the fairest of them all. She decides to get her revenge on everyone fairer than her- which is everyone. |
| 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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| Hamlet - What Was The Question? by Geoff Bamber |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 6. Minimum Female roles = 3. Minimum total with doubling = 21. Minimum total without doubling = 21. No chorus. The cast is top-heavy with male roles. In this version a number of parts (Clowns, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, Castle Guards and Narrators) can be played by either male or female performers without any need to amend the text. |
| Run Time | Around 50 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | None. |
| Style | One-act play for kids, adding some comic touches to Shakespeare's Hamlet. No specific set requirements. (Castle locations - make your own mind up about complexity!) |
| Synopsis | When the King of Denmark dies, Prince Hamlet, his son, assumes that he will succeed to the throne. Unfortunately his Uncle Claudius has other ideas and, by marrying the newly widowed Queen Gertrude, takes the crown for himself. When Hamlet learns through his father's ghost that Claudius and Gertrude engineered the King's death so that they could be together, the Prince seeks vengeance. His task is not aided by pressure being placed on him to marry the vapid Ophelia and Claudius' plan to have him killed by the sinister Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. The body count rises as Hamlet closes in on the evil Claudius. Will justice be done? Will our hero triumph? Will he ever answer that question? |
| 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 |
| Feedback | Click here to find out what other customers said about this script. |
| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| Harmony by Neil Armstrong |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 7. Minimum Female roles = 8. Minimum total with doubling = 21. Minimum total without doubling = 21. No chorus. Four of the roles are non-speaking. |
| Run Time | Around 50 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | Piano/vocal score for the song 'Harmony' is included with the Producer's copy of the script. |
| Style | One act play (with a song) for a youth theatre group. (Originally commissioned for the youth of the South Shields Customs House Theatre.) |
| Synopsis | Established as a haven or harmonious living, the village of Harmony is waiting for the prophesied visitors that will declare the village the happiest in the world and bring about world peace. But Lizzy and Bez have dropped in on the vital day, and they will change everything. |
| 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 |
| Extras | The following additional items are available (at extra cost) to go with this script:
** A 'backing track CD' with arrangements of songs from the show
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| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| Hats Off! - The Musical by Sue Gordon |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 2. Minimum Female roles = 5. Minimum total with doubling = 7. Minimum total without doubling = 9. Chorus. A nucleus of seven actors, backed by a chorus (with no size limitations) singing the songs. |
| Run Time | Around 60 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | Sheet music for seven songs (original lyrics to Victorian period music) is supplied with the Producer's copy of the script. |
| Style | Musical for children (could also be staged by adults for kids). Whilst by length we would class this as a one-act play, it is split into two acts and an interval is advised so that the single set can be redressed to mark the passage of time! |
| Synopsis | Mrs. Green is the real driving force behind 'Barker's Bonnets' a milliner's shop in Victorian England. However, she faces unemployment when Mr. Barker sells up to emigrate. A secret scheme is hatched to allow her to continue - and to thrive in the modern world of the 1870s. (The script tells an engaging story whilst exploring the novelties, inventions and social nuances of the Victorian world. This would fit well with the English National Curriculum Key Stage 2 History Topic, 'The Victorians'.) |
| 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 |
| Extras | The following additional items are available (at extra cost) to go with this script:
** A 'rehearsal CD' with piano arrangements of songs from the show
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| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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| An Heir for the King by Wesley A. Knoch |
| Roles | Minimum Male roles = 8. Minimum Female roles = 4. Minimum total with doubling = 25. Minimum total without doubling = 25. Chorus. Optional chorus size |
| Run Time | Around 60 minutes. [Estimated!] |
| Music | Full score set available with the Producer's copy. |
| Style | A one act musical, portraying rich and poor, generosity and meanness. |
| Synopsis | A caring old king who is feeling his age decides that for the good of his kingdom he needs to find an heir before it is too late. The question is: Whom will he choose? After deciding to adopt an heir, he embarks on a quest to a distant town in his kingdom - to meet their orphans. He comes across assorted characters who treat him quite differently. |
| 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 |
| Extras | The following additional items are available (at extra cost) to go with this script:
** A 'backing track CD' with arrangements of songs from the show
** Soundtrack CD - vocal performances of songs from the show
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| Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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