Playwright Portrait, Alena Smith, Excerpt from The Lacy Project

Alena Smith, Playwright 2009

pswb©2012

The Lacy Project

HARRIET

Ah, the way that tatting makes your bustle shimmer ... oh would you ever allow me to borrow your dress?

OLIVIA

Poor Harriet. I’m afraid such an exchange would be impossible. For our gowns are sewn to our very skin.

HARRIET

Ah, ‘tis true. Such is our lot.

OLIVIA

Plus, even if I could get it off, my gear would not flatter you. For you have a fat cloth tummy, whilst I have sensuous plastic curves.

HARRIET

You are indeed quite plastic. You are plastic from your teeth to your toenails. Your very soul is plastic, dearest Olivia.

OLIVIA

Oh, yeah? Well, thank you, Harriet. I like totally take that as a compliment.

Playwright Portrait, Lynn Rosen, Excerpt from Apple Cove

Lynn Rosen playwright 2006

pswb©2012

APPLE COVE

Characters in this exchange:

Duke, a security guard at Apple Cove - a gated community, formerly swamp

Edie King, a housewife, newlywed, and new resident of Apple Cove

DUKE

Negative. Not new here, born here. My house was down the road. But my home, my escape, was this swamp, where I’d swing on vines tree to tree. My Ma would find me sleeping on a bed of moss, caked in mud, crawling with life. This very spot, your spot, was the thickest, the lushest. But that’s all past. All replaced by this house, this subdivision where I’d be trespassing if it wasn’t, weren’t, if it weren’t for my official capacity. I could run wild here before, I could roar! But now what does a person do when they get that urge to break free?

(Edie kneels and prays.)

DUKE

You pray, you wear a uniform, you suppress.

(He picks her up. Edie is in his arms.)

DUKE

But if the urge returns? If the urge returns, what do you do? Do you break free, Mrs. King? Do you let go?

Playwright Portrait, Kate E. Ryan, Excerpt from Free Adaptation of Women of Trachis

The Playwright Kate E. Ryan, 2006
pswb@2012

free adaptation of WOMEN OF TRACHIS

CHORUS
One time I sat down in elementary school and I sat at the hard metal desk with the hard fake-wooden metal top and I wrote out all of my letters, one after the other, a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y and z. It was at night and nobody else was at school and it was in my dream.
And another time we were making snow animals at school it was an art project and it was so cold but so fun.
I made mine out in the front of the school but off to the side right in front of our classroom window actually and it was a, um…
Kangaroo. With a little pouch and my friend Jessie made a baby kangaroo and stuck it in there when I wasn’t looking.

Playwright Portait, Alvin Eng, Excerpt from The Last Emperor of Flushing

The Playwright Alvin Eng, 2006pswb©2012

The Last Emperor of Flushing

The Last Emperor:

“O.K., I wasn’t really an Emperor. But like China’s legendary ‘Last Emperor,’ Aisin Gioro Pu Yi, I am the last of my line and kind here in Flushing. Like Pu Yu, I spent the first half of my life being the Guardian and figurehead of a lifestyle that no longer existed by the time I finally left this childhood palace. Although Flushing is now New York City’s second Chinatown, aka “The People’s Republic of Floo-Shing,” when I was a young Emperor, we were one of a fistful of Chinese families here. The Flushing of my youth was still basking in the afterglow of the post World War II suburban baby boom. That boom was celebrated at the 1965 World’s Fair, held right here in Flushing Meadows Park. This World’s Fair was the zenith of “The American Century” when anything was possible. In this euphoric mood, Flushing immigrants were the last wave who would give up everything. They would forsake their customs, their language—many would have changed their appearance if they could––just to get a whiff of ‘The American Dream.’”

Playwright Portrait, Mark Schultz, Excerpt from Everything Will Be Different

The Playwright Mark Schultz, 2006

pswb©2012


Everything Will Be Different:  A Brief History of Helen of Troy

FRANKLIN
I think. Charlotte. You know. I think that. Maybe beauty is the thing that’s always leaving. That’s always being lost. That you always have to say goodbye to. You know. And what’s hard is that, for all the goodbyes, it's never gone for good. It just keeps leaving. And leaving. And leaving. And you just have to keep letting it go. And that’s life.

_______

Playwright Portrait, Erin Courtney, Excerpt from Black Cat Lost

The Playwright Erin Courtney, 2006
pswb©2012

BLACK CAT LOST

SON

Why are they wearing hats?

MOTHER‚

So the evil spirit can't sneak up on them.

SON

Oh and what's that?

MOTHER

That's a dead body. They are lifting it up into that cave.

SON

And what are those?

MOTHER

Those are bones.

Playwright Portrait, Courtney Baron, Excerpt from A Very Common Procedure, 2006

The Playwright Courtney Baron, 2006

pswb©2012

A VERY COMMON PROCEDURE

 

Anil: If I stretch out my hand, palm open, like this. (They all unclench their fists, following Anil's lead, they slowly open their hands, fingers outstretched in almost a waving position.) From the tip of my middle finger to the tip of my thumb is how big the trunk of your baby's body was at birth. Her heart, the size, essentially, of the pad of my thumb,

Michael: Small.

Carolyn: Yes, Michael, small.