Composers and their stage works 



 

Love Minus

Play. Mary Gallagher. 2 men, 2 women. Unit set

Karla, a would-be novelist, and Nick, a soap opera actor, meet by chance in a park overlooking the Hudson River. Their encounter leads on, in short order, to a rendezvous at Karlas apartment, and the exciting possibility that true love might have come along at last for both of them. But Nick, cautious that real friendship and mutual respect might be dashed on the shoals of physical passion, begins to retreat - leaving Karla confused and hurt. She gets little comfort from her brittle, man-hungry friend, Lydia, who sees sex as an end in itself, and prefers the clandestine company of other women's husbands. Nor is Nick given much support by his easygoing roommate, Alan, a fellow actor who returns in disarray from a disastrous tour with a children's theatre company. Nick wants to work things out with Karla but can't seem to understand his own motives; Karla is ready to take up again with Nick but doesn't know how to cope with his (and her) sense of withdrawal. Matters are further complicated when Nick meets the tipsy Lydia in a bar and, not knowing of her connection with Karla, goes home with her; while Alan and Karla also find solace in each other when Nick fails to show up at her apartment but Alan does. Eventually, after a series of vacled, cleverly constructed scenes, replete with sharp and continuously amusing dialogue, an accommodation of sorts is reached - with all four principals hardly the richer but certainly the wiser for their experiences.
ISBN: 0-8222-0696-X

The Love of Four Colonels

An adult fairy tale: Peter Ustinov : Comedy 6M 6F 2 Interior sets

In the conference room of a four-power zone in Germany, four Colonels, representing their respective countries: the United States, England, France and Russia, are apparently getting nowhere with their negotiations except deeper into a mess of red tape. A man - called the Wicked Fairy - drops in on them and invites them to accompany him to a nearby castle, which they do. Soon joined by the Good Fairy at the castle they discover The Sleeping Beauty. Each of the Colonels sees her as his own particular ideal - the Frenchman as an 18th Century lass of the boulevards, the Russian as a flaxen-haired figure out of Chekhov, the Englishman as something virginally Elizabethan and the American as a moll in an all-night dive. The Colonels each get a chance to waken and claim her, but they all fail, surrendering the illusion that they had long cherished. The American and the Frenchman, however, decide to stay at the castle for the next hundred years and take another chance at making their dreams come true.
ISBN: 0 85676 064 1

Love of the Nightingale

Play. Timberlake Wertenbaker
M 12 F8, with doubling. A bare stage.

In this treatment of the Philomele myth, war hero Tereus takes his Athenian wife Procne to live in Thrace. She becomes lonely and begs him to fetch her younger sister, Philomele, from Athens to be her companion. During the arduous return journey Tereus rapes Philomele and then cuts out her tongue. Despite Tereus's claim that Philomele died at sea, the two sisters are finally reunited, whereby, through a disturbing puppet show, Philomele reveals her horrific ordeal. The sisters wreak their revenge in true tragic style.

Love on the Dole

Drama. Ronald Gow and Walter Greenwood
M7 (17, young, middle-age) F7 (16, 20, middle-age). One interior, two exteriors.

Mr and Mrs Hardcastle's daughter Sally works at a mill and is the chief breadwinner. She is in love with Larry Meath, an excellent young fellow, and presently they get engaged. He is killed in a riotous street meeting, and Sally's burden becomes worse than ever. At last, desperate and shattered, she becomes the mistress of a prosperous bookmaker, whereupon her father turns her out of his wretched home. A vivid depiction of unemployment in a northern manufacturing town. Period 1934
ISBN 0 573 01252 0

Love Rides the Rails or Will the Mail Train Run Tonight?

Melodrama. Morland Cary. 7 men, 5 women (extras). Several settings.

Simon Darkway seeks to control, for his own vile purposes, the Walker Valley, Pine Bush & Pacific R.R. Opposing him are the gallant Truman Pendennis, the beauteous Prudence Hopewell, the Widow Hopewell, and staunch Harold Standfaster. Assisting him are Dirk Sneath, a viper of a man, and Carlotta Cortez, the sultry siren with a heart of gold. Swiftly and hilariously the plot unfolds, leading to a tremendous climax when the hero is bound by the villains to the tracks in the path of an on-coming train; but the heroine arrives in the nick of time. She stops the train and virtue stands triumphant while the evil-doers get their just deserts. The final scene closes in a blaze of glory as Prudence, flagging the on-coming train with her hastily discarded red skirt, bravely shouts, "Shall prudish modesty send those men to their. death? No, no, a thousand times No."
ISBN: 0-8222-0698-6

A Love Song For Ulster

Bill Morrison
8m 3E Drama. Flexible staging.

Three linked full-length plays that chronicle the history of an Irish family Protestant father, Catholic mother - from the North/South Partition in 1922 to the recent bombings and atrocities. 'If the woes of Northern Ireland have brought our theatre anything bolder or more ambitious, I have yet to discover it' The Times.
ISBN 1 85459 260 2

Love Upon the Throne

Patrick Barlow, (National Theatre of Brent)
2m. Comedy. Minimal set.

After such mighty theatrical milestones as The Charge of the Light Brigade, The Messiah and The French Revolution, the Artistic Director of the National Theatre of Brent, Desmond Olivier Dingle, presents a full and unexpurgated account of the romance, courtship and matrimonial proceedings of Charles and Diana - to be performed by two male actors. He has, in his own words, 'tastefully crammed these epic events into a single profound and unforgettable piece of theatre'. 'Grateful tears of laughter coursed down my cheeks... Pure joy' Michael Billington, Guardian. Love Upon The Throne premiered at the Edinburgh Festval 1998 before transferring to London's Bush Theatre and thence to the West End.
ISBN 1 85459 421 4

Love! Valour! Compassion !

Play Terrence McNally. 7 men. Unit Set

At a beautiful Dutchess County farmhouse, 8 men hash out their passions, resentments and fears over the course of 3 summer weekends. There's Perry and Arthur, a professional couple of long standing, whose relationship, while strained, always manages to settle into the loving routine of a couple grown too familiar with one another, but happily so. The owner of the summer house, Gregory, is an aging choreographer who dotes on his younger lover, Bobby, who is blind. Their relationship seems solid, until an irresistible dancer, Ramon, callously flaunts his sex appeal and manages to seduce Bobby on the first night in -the house. Trying to keep Ramon to himself is John Jeckyll, a soured ex-patriot Brit with a taste for melodrama - and cruelty. John rankles everyone around him, speaking the unspeakable in haughty nonchalance while probing the weaknesses of the others. The painful truth about his ire eventually becomes dear when he has to take care of his terminally ill twin brother, James. Unlike John, James inspires nothing but affection in those around him, and here lies both the crux of John's complaint and the source of one of the play's most blistering and revealing of monologues about the related questions of gay identity and self-esteem. Finally, there is Buzz, a maniacal lover of the musical theatre. Like James, Buzz suffers from AIDS, and he has resigned himself to a life of humorous anecdotes and comforting trivia. Strange things can happen, though, and against all odds, Buzz finds himself falling in love for what may be one last summer.
ISBN: 0-8222-1467-9

Loved

Play. Olwen Wymark
M3 (30s, 40s) F3 (19, 38). Various settings.

Amy and Lawrence, whose marriage is on the brink of collapse, invite Cissy to live with them. Gabriel, a friend of Lawrence's arrives, on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Amy's attempts to provoke an emotive reaction from those around her are ineffective. The break-down in communication is half-resolved and the play ends with Cissy personifying Lawrence's idea of hope as '... a rather plain but really very nice woman of indeterminate age sidling into a room dressed in a pink tutu ...'
ISBN 0 573 11247 9