These are some selections that may be a little more 'mature,' but I loved reading them and there are some distinct possibilities (the descriptions were cribbed from descriptions online)
Three females only:
Halley Feiffer, 'How To Make Friends and Then Kill Them'
3w, bleak
"Left to their own devices by their alcoholic mother, Ada and Sam cultivate an insular world into which they soon draw a third wheel - a pockmarked, limping wallflower named Dorrie. In the years spanning childhood to young adulthood, these three troubled girls learn to lean on each other completely, finding ways to fill each other up and to tear each other down. But when a horrible accident turns their reality upside down, they find they must decide whether they will continue to foster their familiar, codependent cycle, or whether they will break free, with or without each other's aid."
Catherine Trieschmann, 'Crooked'
3f, (14, 40, 16)
Dramatic Comedy / 3f Fourteen year old Laney arrives in Oxford, Mississippi with a twisted back, a mother in crisis and a burning desire to be writer. When she befriends Maribel Purdy, a fervent believer in the power of Jesus Christ to save her from the humiliations of high school, Laney embarks on a hilarious spiritual and sexual journey that challenges her mother's secular worldview and threatens to tear their fragile relationship apart.other possibilities:
Sadie Hasler, 'Pramkicker' or 'Fran & Leni'
British playwright, so very salty language. 'Pramkicker' is a 2 hander, so that might count it out, and Fran & Leni is 2 central characters, plus a definite male, and an 'interviewer.' They're pretty raw but also hysterically funny.
Descriptions:
Pramkicker:
"I am the Edith fucking Piaf of the empty womb. Je ne regrettay fucking rien.
Jude has always known she doesn't want kids. Her sister Susie isn't sure if her ovaries are twingeing or if she just needs a wee.
One day, in a café full of 'yummy mummies', Jude loses the plot and kicks a pram. Then gets arrested. Then gets sent to anger management. Susie goes along for the ride and uses the opportunity to confess a secret.
This funny and touching play premiered at the Brighton Fringe Festival, before a critically acclaimed run at the Edinburgh International Festival Fringe, 2015. An unflinching look at what it means to be a modern woman, this programme text was published to coincide with a national tour in spring 2016."
Fran & Leni
I was the punk. I was born punk. But she was my rock. The only one I ever had.
1976. Fran and Leni meet in a North London comp.
Three years later they are The Rips.
Girls with guitars, bored of playing nice. Music, sex, fishnets, tits and spitting. A two-girl escape from everything sugar and spice.
Fran & Leni is punchy two-hander about punk rock and life-long friendship from the writer of the critically acclaimed Pramkicker. This edition was published to coincide with the play's production at Assembly, George Square, during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, after its world premiere at Latitude Festival 2016."
Pramkicker has played in Washington, DC, but I'd imagine that the subject matter/language might make it out of reach for high school audiences. Read them for yourself, though, because they're awesome.
Sarah Ruhl, 'Dead Man's Cell Phone'
"An incessantly ringing cell phone in a quiet caf. A stranger at the next table who has had enough. And a dead man - with a lot of loose ends. So begins Dead Man's Cell Phone, a wildly imaginative new comedy by playwright Sarah Ruhl, recipient of a MacArthur ''Genius'' Grant and Pulitzer Prize finalist for her play The Clean House. A work about how we memorialize the dead - and how that remembering changes us - it is the odyssey of a woman forced to confront her own assumptions about morality, redemption, and the need to connect in a technologically obsessed world."
Has possibilities, there are at least 3 strong female roles here, plus the dead man, Gordon, and his brother. Very arch, and with a difficult strain of humor that's proved really hard for a lot of my students to find, but when they find the sense of it, it is incredible to watch.
Ruby Rae Spiegel, 'Dry Land'
3F, 2M
Mostly centers around the 3 female parts, and there's apparently a 'live abortion,' so again, it might be difficult to swing for a high school audience, though the characters are high schoolers.
"THE STORY: Ester is a swimmer trying to stay afloat. Amy is curled up on the locker room floor. DRY LAND is a play about abortion, female friendship, and resiliency, and what happens in one high school locker room after everybody's left."
Very powerful, and funny dark, and pretty bleak. Definitely a challenging text.
Hope this helps and doesn't add too many more choices on your slate! Good luck in finding the right piece.
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Phillip Goodchild
Chapter Director, Ontario Thespians
Etobicoke ON
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Original Message:
Sent: 08-12-2018 08:48
From: Rob Kimbro
Subject: 3 Woman Plays
Hi, Josh. Good to hear from you.
All-girls school, but we sometimes bring in outside artists for male roles. So ONLY three women would be ideal, but 1-2 men isn't a deal-breaker, as long as the play isn't centered on those men. It's all too easy to find scripts with majority female casts where all the women are essentially there to tell the story of the one dude.
Thanks to everyone. I'm not actually directing this one, but helping a colleague cast a wider net, and these suggestions do that. Eleemosonary is definitely an option and I'm working my way through the others. Drowning Girls I know from a production here a few years back. A remarkable show but probably not a fit for this group. I'm also reading Lauren Gunderson's Emilie (3W 2M) (for those who are following looking for ideas).
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Rob Kimbro
Director of Fine Arts
Duchesne Academy
HoustonTX
Original Message:
Sent: 08-10-2018 10:53
From: Josh Kauffman
Subject: 3 Woman Plays
Do you mean ONLY three women, or FEATURING three women?
If it's only, 'Night Mother is great for two of them, if you're willing to split them up.
If it's featuring, you could go classic with Chekhov's Three Sisters, or contemporary-comedic with one of many plays by Jessie Jones, Nicholas Hope, and Jamie Wooten. I recommend The Red Velvet Cake War.
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Josh Kauffman
Teacher
Winfield AL
Original Message:
Sent: 08-01-2018 14:06
From: Rob Kimbro
Subject: 3 Woman Plays
We've got a high school advanced production class of three young women coming up this year and are trying to figure out a show for them to tackle. I'm looking for help brainstorming an initial list.
So, what are shows you've done or read that could be cast with three women? They're all good and up for a challenge.
Thanks!
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Rob Kimbro
Director of Fine Arts
Duchesne Academy
HoustonTX
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