This year's collection of Best Short Plays supports editor Delgado's belief that 'some of the most imaginative, humorous, touching and powerful characters, situations, and ideas are skillfully compacted into today's one-act plays.' Murray Schisgal's delightful character comedy, A NEED FOR BRUSSELS SPROUTS, opened on Broadway in the 1982-83 season, starring Anne Jackson as the tough lady cop and Eli Wallach (her offstage husband) as the lonely down-at-the-heels actor cited for disturbing the peace. The highly acclaimed Irish novelist Jennifer Johnston returns to this series with the disturbing play ANDANTE UN POCO MOSSO which shatters the tranquility of a chamber music rehearsal with the turbulence of Belfast. Martin Jones' OLD SOLDIERS - a tragicomedy focusing on the illusions of a World War I veteran - has won a number of awards in regional and national competitions. Tom Huey makes his publishing debut here with IT AIN'T THE HEAT, IT'S THE HUMILITY. A native of Alabama, Mr. Huey has a keen ear for individual and social differences in Southern speech patterns. These nuances are powerfully evident in the play through the characters - a retired Southern judge and his Black gardener. CONFLUENCE by John Bishop was first produced in 1982. The three characters - a former Pittsburgh Steeler, his actress girlfriend, and a Hall-of-Fame 3rd baseman now confined to a wheelchair - develop an understanding that makes their present limitations and future expectations more bearable. AM I BLUE is a tender and riotous tale of a naive college freshman expected to prove his manhood at a New Orleans bordello. Instead, a far more engaging evening unfolds with a daffy Southern belle. Time magazine reviewer Richard Corliss describes playwright Beth Henley's characters as 'the most engaging bunch of eccentrics since the days of the young William Saroyan.' Prolific writer and award-winner Norman Holland is back in his 45th year of play publication with MORE LIVES THAN ONE - a clever, witty recounting of Oscar Wilde's last days in prison. Saul Zachary's award-winning play THE COLOR OF HEAT depicts a middle-aged husband and his wife attempting to revive their forgotten romance with a titillating voyeuristic report on the activities of a younger couple. IN LOSS OF MEMORY, playwright, librettist, screenwriter, and director Arthur Laurents offers a bittersweet portrait of a lonely American in a chance encounter with an Israeli officer. In his fanciful tragicomedy of a woebegone vaudevillian and his trained chicken, CHARLIE THE CHICKEN, playwright Jonathan Levy provides a meaningful glimpse into the master-slave relationship. Versatile actor, director, and playwright Ken Jenkins demonstrates his mastery of the monologue form in RUPERT'S BIRTHDAY. The play is a vivid miniature of an eccentric farm woman whose teenage experience of assisting in the delivery of a calf provided her with a transcendental revelation.

The Best Short Plays, 1983 (Best American Short Plays)

Literature & Fiction

Ramon L. Delgado

Dramas & Plays

Players Press

Editor Ramon Delgado dedicates this year's collection of Best Short Plays to the Actors Theatre of Louisville, which has contributed significantly to the popularity of the one-act play through its annual SHORTS festival. Four plays in this volume made their debuts at 'Shorts' festivals. Lee Blessing's NICE PEOPLE DANCING TO GOOD COUNTRY MUSIC is a character comedy about a young novice who has left her religious order to start a new life with her liberated aunt, owner of a rowdy bar in Texas. This play premiered at the 'Shorts' festival. THE OTHER WOMAN by Casey Kelly is a moving story about the transformation of a young girl from a child to a woman and the reaction of her parents to the changes taking place in their only daughter. David Higgins' PARTNERS was a hit at the 'Shorts' festival and won praise from Newsweek theatre critic Jack Knoll, who called it 'an explosive vignette about three young dope-dealing friends who've become murderous enemies through the vicissitudes of the underworld.' PRESENT TENSE was written by John McNamara when he was only eighteen years old. The play, which was described by Robert Massa of the Village Voice as 'a monologue with fantasy vignettes in the James Thurber-Woody Allen vein,' was selected for production by the Dramatists Guild in its annual festival of works by young playwrights. Romulus Linney's F.M., a story of the discovery of a Faulknerian talent in a college creative writing course, opened to a standing ovation at the Philadelphia Festival Theatre. Critic Nels Nelson of the Philadelphia Daily News hailed Linney as 'a luminous creative spirit touched by so superior a gift that we would cheerfully knight him on the spot.' Jerome McDonough's JUVIE, a powerful play about the devastating effects of juvenile delinquency, uses ensemble and multiple role-playing techniques to achieve its impact. This style has proved popular with high school and college performers. BARTOK AS DOG by Patrick Tovatt won critical acclaim at the 'Shorts' festival and was repeated in the Actors Theatre of Louisville's Humana Festival of New American Plays. Louisville Times critic Dudley Saunders described the play as 'an amusing tale about a young man who just wants a non-demanding meal ticket job so he can dabble in his hobby. But the world is outraged by and suspicious of such lack of ambition.' IN PLACE, by Obie award-winner Corinne Jacker, is the story of a former literature professor, a soon-to-be-divorced woman, and a pragmatic boardinghouse proprietress all trying to survive in Las Vegas. IN PLACE is Miss Jacker's third work in the Best Short Plays series. Harry Kondoleon's SELF TORTURE AND STRENUOUS EXERCISE is a ludicrous, original comedy about two couples who batter each other's egos with the vigor of primal therapy. Said New York Daily News critic Don Nelson: 'The effect is a style that might have emerged had Noel Coward written for the Theatre of the Absurd.' Ken Jenkins' monologue CHUG was performed by the author in the 'Shorts festival. Jay Carr of The Detroit News called it '...a shaggy frog story in the Mark Twain tradition.' Jenkins is a Rockefeller Playwright-in-Residence at the Actors Theatre of Louisville.

The Best Short Plays, 1984 (Best American Short Plays)

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Ramon L. Delgado. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Ramon L. Delgado

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Ramon L. Delgado. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Best Short Plays, 1983 (Best American Short Plays)

The Best Short Plays, 1984 (Best American Short Plays)