About the Book
Have you struggled to find short plays that challenge actors and directors for class and production?
Do you require plays that are 10 minutes in length for competitions or class work?
Are you interested in reading plays from some of the most exciting contemporary American writers?
This anthology solves the above problems for theatre teachers and their students, offering excellent, contemporary material written for high school and college age actors within the last ten years. Each play selected features a distinct and unique voice in this eclectic and diverse volume targeted toward college and high school age actors, directors, and audiences. In these pages, you’ll find a delightful mix of plays - comedic, dramatic, thrilling, coming-of-age, political, silly, and just plain strange - created in the last few years.
The 20 plays all feature no more than 5 characters, with a mix of gender roles for actors of different ages. Written by some of the most exciting contemporary voices in American theatre, they draw on themes that resonate with young people today and offer challenging roles that push and develop actors and directors.
Each play is formally inventive and expands the boundaries of traditional drama to offer scope for different styles of performance, meaning there is a range of material to suit different student needs. Expertly crafted to run under 15 minutes, these plays offer concrete teaching tools that can be enjoyed by performers of different abilities as well as audiences.
In addition, at the back of the anthology are materials that give readers insight into how the new work featured in the anthology was developed, and provides structures and ideas for developing your own original short plays.
Table of Contents:
Introduction
Part One: The Plays
1. penny’s, or whenever you need me, by Aniello Fontano
2. Creatures of the Earth, or Opposable Thumbs, by Emma Schillage
3. The Bechdel Tent, by Diana Small
4. Five Drives, by Beth Hyland
5. Cuzco, by Liliana Padilla
6. Wild Heaven, by Kristin Idaszak
7. Saturn Return, by Justin Aaron Halle
8. Yes Woman, by Emily Feldman
9. Spin Class, by Anna Moench
10. High Dive, by Will Snider
11. The Well Wishers, by Megan Tabaque
12. Seeds, by Cecelia Raker
13. Snail Mail, by Julia Izumi
14. Ends of the Earth, by Agyeiwaa Asante
15. Worm Play, by Catt Filippov
16. A Baptism at Second Reformed Church, by Alle Mims
17. Tot, by Eva Suter
18. Before I Landed On Your Tongue, by Daria Miyeko Marinelli
19. Forest Bride, by Dan Caffrey
20. Remembrance, by Luz Lorenzana Twigg
Part Two: Supplementary Materials
1. Developing new short plays for performance: the HIVE
2. Director and Playwright Connections: Making the Hive buzz
3. A letter to potential Hive playwrights
4. Hive ingredients to playwrights example: 2024, The Earth in Motion Plays
5. Building your own Hive
6. Notes on writing short plays from a Hive playwright and Westmont alumna
About the Author :
Mitchell Thomas is an award-winning actor, director, and professor at Westmont College, specializing in devised theatre and new plays. Since 2005, he has created or commissioned over 120 original full-length and short works. Mitchell has performed, directed, and taught workshops in Poland, Macedonia, Armenia, Romania, Georgia, Italy, China, England and the United States.
Review :
This rich collection of short plays offers an array of wildly imaginative and distinct new voices. It is a wonderful resource for students looking for plays that range from funny and whimsical to heartbreaking and inspirational, and delivers a multitude of unexpected and welcome perspectives.
The Future is Short is full of the best kind of plays, the ones that wrestle with what it means to live in the world right now. The writing is formally daring and theatrically bold. Though the plays may be short, each one is a full meal. They thrum with life and energy. The writing is at turns haunting and provocative, hilarious and profound. I wish this anthology had existed when I started teaching, and I’m so glad it exists now.
Most successful theatre artists I know began seriously practicing their craft in high school or college. The Future is Short fills a critical gap by bringing together contemporary, relevant, diverse short plays geared for this group by some of today's most exciting younger-generation playwrights. As theatre funding in high schools and colleges continues to be slashed, this invaluable volume will help launch the theatre makers who will be creating the future of our art form.
Far too many people don’t know what it’s like to be slapped. These plays woke me up. They shook me. The best of the theatre in punk-sized blasts. Buy a copy, tear it in half and find a teacher, an artist, a friend who wants to join the coming shake-up… These piping hot plays make me believe the future’s going to be more different than the past could ever manage to account for.
Reading The Future is Short… is a one of a kind one stop theatre shopping. Not only do you get exposed to some of today's most creative and original minds, you get a how to create your own hive - all for the price of one. But don’t be fooled - while acclaimed theater artist Mitchell Thomas makes this look easy, the work that it took to build this energized hive is beyond impressive, as are these resulting plays. This book is a gift to actors, directors, writers, educators, and plain old theatre-lovers; having taught, learned from, and been inspired by many of the playwrights in this volume, I can personally attest that while life might be short, your life will be richer, wilder, more poignant and playful after experiencing this book.
How well I remember being a theatre student, trying in vain to find material that spoke to me, my generation, my time. With this lively and necessary anthology, Mitchell Thomas gives young artists the chance to discover new theatrical pieces curated specifically for their needs. Long renowned for his work with playwrights at Westmont College, Thomas has given student actors and directors a diverse and compelling range of short plays by ascendant professional playwrights — dynamic works that will challenge them to engage with the characters of their age, the stories of their time. The Future is Short is a generous and timely gift to our field.
Here is a collection of plays as compact, pungent, and intense as chili flakes, fennel or other concise and mighty savors. The pieces are written quickly to teach fearlessness and trust. And the collection includes useful, equally concise notes that match the volume’s inspirations with practical provocations. The work covers a range of styles (absurdism, romantic fantasy, apocalyptic sci-fi), and conjures a range of moods (romantic, outraged, elegiac, forgiving). The complete, satisfying scripts offer production teams edifying challenges – calling for puppetry, rapid shifts in given circumstances, translation across ages and identities… The plays can float easily across the field, serving diverse collectives and reaching all sorts of audiences; young performers in particular will be able to: recognize themselves as rounded, complex social agents; play beyond their years and imagine their way into adult crises and accomplishments; project themselves beyond years altogether, into abstract, poetic spaces, full of movement and transformation. There are texts that require strong ensemble work, and others that celebrate personal uniqueness.
These are plays with shape, and core live-ness. The process is clear (but not restrictive), replicable, and generative of community. Something fairly massive and radically joyful has been accumulating over time at Westmont; this book invites a jump into the leaf-pile.
