Play it Again, Sam. Comedy. Woody Allen
M3 (young, 28) F8 (young). A living-room with platform area.

Allan has this thing about Humphrey Bogart. His wife has left him and his friends have been trying to fix him up with beautiful dates, but he is so gauche they always end abysmally. His daydreams of Bogart and the beautiful people are always rudely shattered by real life. And when he falls for his best friend's wife things really seem black. But the homely hero is saved and is left to dream of being greater things.
ISBN 0 573 61404 0

Play On! Comedy. Rick Abbot
M3 (20, 25) F7 (17, 22, 35, 42, middle-age); or M6 F4 if preferred. A stage in a community theatre.

A theatre group try desperately to put on a play, amid all kinds of maddening interference from its authoress, Phyllis, who keeps revising the script until almost opening night and during the actual performance anything that can go wrong does. At the curtain call Phyllis decides to give a speech on the state of the modern theatre and what befalls her is the madcap climax to this hilarious romp.
ISBN 0 573 61361 3

The Playboy Of the Western World J.M. Synge
7m 5f extras. Classic tragi-comedy. Single interior set.

A stranger, Christy, arrives in a village bar in the West of Ireland claiming to have killed his father. The locals are impressed - some can even directly relate to the deed - and Christy is lauded as a folk hero. He can't believe his luck, and confidently pursues the affections of the barmaid Pegeen, until the arrival of his not-so-dead father takes the wind out of Christy's sails ... First performed in 1907.
ISBN 1 85459 210 6

Playhouse Creatures. Play. April De Angelis
F5 (16, 20s, 50, 60). Simple settings.

Of vital importance to the development of English drama was the entrance of the first actresses upon the English stage. April De Angelis has taken five actresses- Nell Gwyn, Elizabeth Farley, Rebecca Marshall, Doll Common and Mary Betterton - and given us a fascinating look at the precarious lot of actresses in the Restoration period. A moving and often comic account of a true story, with some earthy language! Period 1669
ISBN 0 573 13007 8

Playing Sinatra. Play. Bernard Kops
M2 F1. A living-room.

A powerful psychological drama set in an oppressive old house in London, where grown-up siblings Norman and Sandra resist their lonely future by living out their fantasies in the music of their idol, Frank Sinatra. Norman, an agoraphobic bookbinder, works at home and heats microwave meals to perfection; Sandra, with outside job and interests, longs to break free of her existence. But the option of leaving her mentally-disturbed brother and running off with the "mystic" Phillip proves less than straightforward ... This tense play's clammy grip never slackens.
ISBN 0 573 01863 4

Playing the Wife. Play. Ronald Hayman
M2 (20s, 52) F2 (20s, 40s). A stage.

August Strindberg directs two actors in an autobiographical play detailing his difficult, stormy relationship with his first wife Sid von Essen. Sid is played by Harriet Bosse, with whom Strindberg falls in love and marries; Strindberg himself is played by Bengt Anders, an earnest, ardent young actor who is also in love with Harriet. This impressive drama about a sensitive, driven, turbulent and mystical playwright uses a fictional play-within-a-play device to brilliantly approximate the environment in which Strindberg lived and worked.
ISBN 0 573 01867 7

Plaza Suite. Comedy. Neil Simon
M3/2/2 F1/2 An hotel suite.

The comedy consists of three separate plays all occurring in the same hotel suite, and all parts can be played by separate artists. In the first play, Visitor from Mamaroneck, a middle-aged couple revisit the hotel room of their honeymoon - but the arrangement does not end as romantically as might have been expected. Visitor from Hollywood recounts the meeting of two old flames and what can happen under the influence of repeating magic Hollywood names. The last play, Visitor from Forest Hills, tells of a mother and father and their daughter who has locked herself in the bathroom and refuses to come out for her wedding.
ISBN 0 573 61407 5

The Plough and the Stars. Tragedy. Sean O' Casey
M9 (25, 40, middle-age) F6 (15, 20, 23, 40). Three interiors. One exterior.

To the Irish Citizen Army 'The Plough and the Stars' symbolises their futile patriotism. To all the slum dwellers the Easter rebellion brings the realisation that there is no help against the strength of the English forces. This tragic satire ends amid a scene of final desolation where two Irishmen sit playing cards until they are rounded up by the King's soldiers. Period 1915-16
ISBN 0 573 01344 4