PLAYS FOR THREE is a unique anthology of 23 outstanding plays for three actors by an exciting mix of established and emerging playwrights. Everyone’s heard that “Two’s company, three’s a crowd.” That may be true on a date, but on stage, three is a magic number. Add a third character to any interaction and the dramatic possibilities increase exponentially: suddenly there’s competition, intrigue, shifting allegiances, comic misunderstandings, secrets and lies. Triangles make excellent drama, and three-handers offer the kind of substantial and challenging roles that actors love. Plays for Three offers six full-length and seventeen short plays featuring dramatic trios of every sort. Rob Ackerman Pete Barry Stephen Belber Cesi Davidson Adrienne Dawes Philip Dawkins Catherine Filloux Madeleine George Amlin Gray Frank Higgins Cory Hinkle Wendy Kesselman Eric Lane Kitt Lavoie Mark Harvey Levine Matthew Lopez Donald Margulies Anna Moench A. Rey Pamatmat David Riedy Nina Shengold Stephen Webb Craig Wright

Newly repackaged, three plays by Federico García Lorca In these three plays, Federico García Lorca's acknowledged masterpieces, he searched for a contemporary mode of tragedy and reminded his audience that dramatic poetry—or poetic drama—depends less on formal convention that on an elemental, radical outlook on human life. His images are beautiful and exact, but until now no translator had ever been able to make his characters speak unaffectedly on the American stage. Michael Dewell of the National Repertory Theatre and Carmen Zapata of the Bilingual Foundation of the Arts have created these versions expressly for the stage. The results, both performable and readable, have been thoroughly revised for this edition, which has an introduction by Christopher Maurer, the general editor of the Complete Poetical Works of García Lorca.

This latest volume in a series of short play anthologies compiled by Deb and Norman Bert provides roles for almost any mix of students in an acting class. The plays range in mood from serious and heavy to dark or satiric comedy to farce. The heart of the book includes fifteen scripts for two actors. Also included are five monologues and five three-character plays. The playwrights are icons of the American avante garde, writers who have contributed much to regional theatre over recent years. An excellent resource for classrooms and festival competition use.

Three delightful one-act plays set in and around New York, in which sophisticated characters confound one another in ways only Woody Allen could imagine Woody Allen’s first dramatic writing published in years, “Riverside Drive,” “Old Saybrook,” and “Central Park West” are humorous, insightful, and unusually readable plays about infidelity. The characters, archetypal New Yorkers all, start out talking innocently enough, but soon the most unexpected things arise—and the reader enjoys every minute of it (though not all the characters do). These plays (successfully produced on the New York stage and in regional theaters on the East Coast) dramatize Allen’s continuing preoccupation with people who rationalize their actions, hide what they’re doing, and inevitably slip into sexual deception—all of it revealed in Allen’s quintessentially pell-mell dialogue.

Collected from theaters across America, this new ten-minute collection of 23 plays reveals the power and pleasures of this tightly knit form. Plays for 3 Actors:Shot Americans (3W) by Kayla CaganLarry Gets the Call (2W, 1M) by Matt CasarinoShades (1W, 2M) by Mark Harvey LevineEvery Man (2W, 1M) by Michael NiedermanMolly Whuppie (2W, 1M) by Don NigroIt's Called Development (3W) by Anne PhelanAn Ongoing Examination of the True Meaning of Life (2W, 1M or 1W, 2M) by S. W. SenekPistachio Stories (2W, 1M) by Laura ShamasThe Searcher (1W, 2M) by Frederick StroppelMore (1W, 2M) by Jeff TabnickWeird Water (1W, 2M) by Robert Lewis VaughanDead Boy (2W, 1M) by Craig WrightPlays for 4 Actors:Vinny's Vision (4M) by Jim GordonBetting the Karmic House (1W, 3M or 2W, 2M) by Bill JohnsonInfant Morality (3W, 1M) by Craig PospisilHow to Speak Man (4M) by Sharyn RothsteinRemind Me Again (3W, 1M) by Sharyn RothsteinHell Hath Three Furies (3W, 1M) by Aoise StratfordA Moment of Your Undivided Attention (3W, 1M) by Alina TrowbridgePlays for 5 Actors:Tina at the Times or Below the Fold (2W, 3M) by Wendy MacLeodPlays for 6 or More ActorsToys in Babeland (1W, 8M) by Delilah GomezAt the time (5W, 3M) by Winter MillerSmall World (3W, 3M) by Tracey Scott WilsonD. L. LEPIDUS is a freelance critic and editor who has covered the New York theater scene for more than twenty-five years. Since 1993, his work has appeared in theater columns for Chelsea Clinton News and the Westsider.

23 short length plays for a cast of one, two, or three. 5 minutes acting time for each character. Performance times vary from 8-15 minutes.

The plays in this volume of 5-Minute Plays are geared toward adults. Some are comedic, some are dramatic, some are realistic in style, while others are more unconventional. Their length makes them perfect for scene work in class. A few of the plays are written by playwrights who have established quite a reputation with their full-length plays, such as Don Nigro, Lee Blessing, Y York, and Sheila Callaghan. But most are by what I call exciting up-and-comers, such as Nicole Pandolfo, Merridith Allen, Andrew Biss, Adam Kraar, Stephanie Hutchinson, Judy Klass, John McKinney, Scott C. Sickles, Graham Techler, Eric Grant, Deanna Alisa Ableser, Kerri Kochanski, Lisa Bruna, and Grace Trotta.