Open Forum

Happy Summer everyone.

The two high schools in my school district are coming together to present a 10 Minute Play Festival.  I am looking for the BEST suggestions for our high school actors. Something fresh and funny or with a bit of a dramatic punch.

Also the other director and I are looking at possibly doing a scene together. We are both "larger than life" personalities.  I am looking for some 10 minute play that involves competitive dads or coaches....something that would present a fun rivalry on the stage between two drama directors.  Thank you in advance for any ideas/suggestions.

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James McCulloch
Port Huron MI
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See the short plays of David Ives.  Also, "Almost Maine" is a very popular go-to spot for 10 minute plays with a dramatic punch these days.  Each scene has 2 people (one scene has 3) and "They fell" could be your competitive dad scene for two people with larger than life personalities.

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Stephen Benjamin
Director of Theatre Arts
Garfield Heights OH
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Our Thespian Troupe produces a collection of 7 to 8 10-minute plays each spring.  One of the problems we confront is that the major publishing companies normally charge $30 to $45 per play/scene per performance in addition to the price of the scripts of a complete work, such as those written by David Ives.  That makes it cost prohibitive for us to produce so many works at a time in our 150 seat theatre.

In the past several years, our Thespians have found some really nice 10-minute plays published by Heuer.  (www.hitplays.com)  They are able to read the complete plays on the web site, and they tell me they frequently read 20+ plays before finding one they want to direct.  I LOVE that, because it is an extension of our class reading and analysis of dramatic works.  They offer very reasonable packages that include scripts for all the characters and director, an online link to the play (which makes it convenient to print a stage manager copy,) and royalties for performances, for $30 to $35 per play.

We also have a strong playwriting unit in each theatre class, so a couple of plays each year come from that.   

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C. J. Breland
Asheville NC
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There are many 10 minute play collections. Just finished this one:

The Best American Short Plays 2003-2004

I found about four in this collection alone that I am interested in pursuing. As pointed out, doing several 10 minute plays can start to get expensive. I have been building up my play writing by students in my Creative Writing class and Theatre classes, which last year yielded about four productions (four plays also entered the district IE competition, and received Critics Choice for the district, which was nice). 

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Phillip Goodchild
Theatre Arts Instructor/Assistant Department Head of English
Hillsborough County Schools
Ruskin FL
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