ONE ACT PLAY – AWARD WINNING ONE ACT PLAYS
One act play won the Lace Market New Writing Competition in Nottingham UK (2014)
We are greeted by a middle aged couple in bed, roused from their slumber by Dvorak’s New World symphony, synonymously paired with Hovis to us Brits, bedecked in nightcaps that even Mrs Bennet would shy away from. Broad Yorkshire accents start the piece right from the off, each character’s monologues displaying to the audience their ideas of culture. The woman describes Les Miserables and the benefits of beards, the man speaks of the latest production of Two Gentlemen of Verona.
The stereotypical Northernisms continue with talk of whippets, flat caps and pipes, peppered with ‘by gums’ and ‘by ‘ecks’. That is until one of the characters shatters the fourth wall by pointing out the audience sitting in front of them. Thus the play starts to descend into unfamiliar territory. The characters discuss the existence of their creator, i.e the playwright himself. Growing ever more bold in their gestures towards their maker they dare to dream of a world outside the bed they woke up in. Even their dreams are clichés, dropped into their head by the writer, with talk of a house in the mountains by babbling brooks.
The dialogue descends into a sort of stream of consciousness ramble we might find in Joyce, about how they have come to exist and the basic differences between masculinity and femininity. This mirrors one of the woman’s first remarks at the beginning when she says that only a man could have created such a cruel existence. Here is when the play reaches its climax, a cruel twist at the end proves the woman right when they come to escape…
Author: Matt Fox
Genre: One act comedy-drama
Type: Award winning one act plays
Cast: Two: 1M 1F
Ages of the actors: Adult (middle aged)
Length: 30 minutes
Set: A couple in a bed with fake legs (pillows)
Level of difficulty: 8/10 – engaging the audience and keeping their attention in this dialogue driver play
Read a Sample of the Script
Cost is $10 for this award winning one act play