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The Filming of Das Kapital by Vithal Rajan |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 5. Minimum Female roles = 0. Minimum total with doubling = 5. Minimum total without doubling = 7. No chorus. Two of the characters make a brief non-speaking appearance (and therefore could be regarded as optional). |
Run Time | Around 25 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | A combination of Indian storytelling and chess! Simple props, but needs a means of displaying the chess moves to the audience. |
Synopsis | Game Nine in the Varadachary Chess Cycle. A Bollywood producer has plans to make a film of the life of Karl Marx, part of which is played out through a chess game. An amateur theatre group - including the author! - runs through the script (and the chess game), criticising the producer's distortions of history! |
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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First Drop of Rain by James Brosnahan Screenplay version placed in the Semifinals (top 1%) of the Austin Film Festival. |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 4. Minimum Female roles = 5. Minimum total with doubling = 9. Minimum total without doubling = 10. No chorus. Cast of 4 women, 2 12-year-old girls (one with doubling) and 4 men. |
Run Time | Around 125 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | Full-length historical drama. An entertaining exploration of the characters and the times. (First published 2021, revised edition published 2024.) |
Synopsis | When an aspiring author sets out to write her first novel, the gendered prejudices of 18th Century London come for her, leaving her to decide between marrying her suitor in surrender or being as brave as the female protagonist she has written. Based on the true story of Frances Burney. |
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 |
Awards | Click here to see the awards won by (productions of) this script. |
Click here to read the script or Click here for more details. |
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The Flag by Neil Walden |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 1. Minimum Female roles = 2. Minimum total with doubling = 3. Minimum total without doubling = 3. No chorus. |
Run Time | Around 25 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | Easy-to-stage one-act drama for three actors in one simple office set. |
Synopsis | A school in 1930s England is set to welcome an ambassador from Nazi Germany, whose child is one of the pupils. Headteacher Mrs Mayhew wants to fly the Nazi flag for the visitor's arrival, but young teacher Miss Tait raises an objection. A good period drama with a sharp focus on an area of pre-WW2 history that's often overlooked - how a lot of British people were generally welcoming towards the Nazis, or at least apathetic about their politics, in the years before the war. It also has some relevance to the contemporary debates around flags. |
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 Forty-Minute Henry VI Part 1 by Shakespeare, adapted by Bill Tordoff |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 17. Minimum Female roles = 2. Minimum total with doubling = 19. Minimum total without doubling = 31. Chorus. Shakespearian theatre, history and war conspire to leave few female roles. Don't let that put you off! |
Run Time | Around 40 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | One-act adaptation of Shakespeare. Other plays in this series are abridgements. This is an adaptation (Bill Tordoff felt that it worked better with the verse form used throughout), hence both script and performances are subject to copyright licensing. |
Synopsis | Subtitled 'The Wars Of Henry VI And Joan Of Arc'. Henry V has died, but his dukes continue to prosecute his war in France. Joan of Arc arises to lead the French. The English lose ground as they bicker amongst themselves and the first quarrels of the Wars of the Roses begin. Henry V1 is crowned and the fortunes of war change again... Despite all the fighting and infighting, the play also has room for some moments of broad comedy. |
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 Forty-Minute King John by Shakespeare, abridged Bill Tordoff |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 19. Minimum Female roles = 4. Minimum total with doubling = 23. Minimum total without doubling = 33. Chorus. Characters include Arthur, aged 8 and Blanche, aged 14. |
Run Time | Around 40 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | Abridgement of William Shakespeare's 'King John', with the original text cut down to 40 minutes or so. (The abridgement is copyrighted, so we charge for scripts and copying rights, but performances are royalty-free.) |
Synopsis | War amongst the descendants of King Henry II with Henry's wife, the powerful Eleanor of Aquitaine, supporting her son, King John, whilst the King of France, mendaciously, backs Arthur, the young son of John's elder brother. John's treatment of the captured Arthur causes his barons to rebel and join forces with a French invasion. |
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 Gentlemen of the Press by Stuart Ardern |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 3. Minimum Female roles = 3. Minimum total with doubling = 6. Minimum total without doubling = 6. No chorus. |
Run Time | Around 20 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | A very short humorous costume drama. Two simple sets. |
Synopsis | During the Napoleonic wars, two junior officers are sent out to find men to fill the complement of their ship. One of them has other motives. |
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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God's Minstrel by Joseph P. Ritz |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 4. Minimum Female roles = 1. Minimum total with doubling = 5. Minimum total without doubling = 11. No chorus. Four of the characters are intended to be doubled by one actor (though they need not be). The roles of Clare's Cousin and the Soldier are optional. |
Run Time | Around 70 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | You can think of this either as a short two-act play, or a long one-act play. Single set. |
Synopsis | Mixed in with a little tale from modern times, this is the story of how Francis of Assisi became a saint. A moving and honest telling. |
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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Good King Richard by Ian Dixon Potter |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 10. Minimum Female roles = 3. Minimum total with doubling = 13. Minimum total without doubling = 17. No chorus. |
Run Time | Around 108 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | A full-length historical drama. (A lot of locations, but simple to stage, give or take the butt of malmsey.) |
Synopsis | After the death of Edward IV, his brother Richard becomes Lord Protector and then King. Richard III is determined to be a good king, but his principles - out of place in the royal court - enable challengers including Henry Tudor to plot his downfall. A counterpoint to Shakespeare's Richard III (which was based on the testimony of Richard's greatest enemy), Good King Richard sets the historical record straight. |
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 Handfast by Louise Wade |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 4. Minimum Female roles = 2. Minimum total with doubling = 6. Minimum total without doubling = 6. No chorus. |
Run Time | Around 24 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | A one act play, of historical interest, with a flexibility of settings. |
Synopsis | The joining of a young couple in marriage is assisted by William Shakespeare, but the results of the wedding could have come from one of his plays - a miserly father-in-law, refusing to pay the dowry his new son expected, and a trial. |
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 Heretic Queen by Vithal Rajan |
Roles | Minimum Male roles = 5. Minimum Female roles = 0. Minimum total with doubling = 5. Minimum total without doubling = 6. No chorus. Two of the characters are boys (age unspecified). |
Run Time | Around 30 minutes. [Estimated!] |
Music | None. |
Style | A combination of Indian storytelling and chess! Simple props, but needs a means of displaying the chess moves to the audience. |
Synopsis | Game Eight in the Varadachary Chess Cycle. The painter El Greco challenges the Lord High Admiral of the Spanish navy to a chess match on the eve of the launch of the Armada to invade Queen Elizabeth's England. (The other El Greco - the chess master - takes notes!) |
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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