Meatballs are ready!

I just received my copies of the script for Million Dollar Meatballs. Pioneer Drama Service always does a good job with their artwork, but I especially love what they came up with here. You've got to wonder how those thieves intend to use those cooking utensils in their getaway.

The script has only been available since August, but it's already gotten a great response, with productions booked for this fall in Lanesville, IN, Fort Lupton, CO and Dysart, IA (and those are just the ones that popped up on my Google alerts). Break legs, everybody!

Auditions

Auditions for the world premiere of my new play The Last Radio Show have been scheduled for 1:00pm to 4:00pm on Sunday, October 18 at Library 21c in Colorado Springs. For complete information, please visit the play's blog.

Shenandoah gumshoe

You've got to love the passion and humor that went into this very professional trailer from Elkton Middle School in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. I love how this time the adults are getting into the fun, with the school's faculty making up much of the cast. Baby Bear's deafening footsteps are a hoot too.

Break legs, everybody!

The mummy awakes

I just received the contract for How I Met Your Mummy, my seventh play to be published by Pioneer Drama Service.

As previously mentioned, this play won the 2015 Beverly Hills Theatre Guild Play Competition for Youth Theatre. Like Kill the Critic! and Million Dollar Meatballs before it, How I Met Your Mummy is a farce in the classic sense, with snappy one-liners, hilarious mix-ups and tons of physical humor.

It may also be the easiest of my full-length plays to produce. There are few technical requirements and no need for a set at all. All of the action takes place around a single sarcophagus that can be as simple or as elaborate as you want. The only real challenge is the need to provide three similar-looking mummy costumes, only one of which needs to be changed into and out of during the course of the play.

When I was kid, I used to love watching old monster movies, especially funny ones like Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein or, yes, Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy. Well, this play is a throwback to those wacky comedies of old. It's about the world's most cowardly security guard, who must protect the O. Howe Dulle Museum's new mummy from being stolen, only to discover that there are, not one, not two, but three creepy mummies roaming the halls.

How I Met Your Mummy will be released in Pioneer's spring supplement this December. That catalog, by the way, will also mark the first appearance of my driver's ed comedy You're Driving Me Crazy.

I want to be a... director?

Back in 2012, I wrote a blog titled "I want to be a producer". It was my way of announcing that I'd decided to produce the world premiere of my play Kill the Critic! At the time, I questioned my sanity due to the sheer amount of work required to produce a full-length play. And the simple fact that I had never produced one before.

Well, if I was borderline crazy at the time, I must be completely certifiable now because I've just signed up to not only produce but direct my new play, The Last Radio Show.

Why am I doing it? Well, I guess it's because I haven't produced a play since that time and I really want to get back into it. Not only was producing a blast, but sitting in on rehearsals and hearing the audience response taught me more about playwriting than anything I've ever done.

And if producing taught me that much, then directing should teach me a whole lot more.

Plus, I really, really want to do this one. It's a classic farce, my favorite type of play, and yet it should be easy to produce. There's no set. Light and sound cues are minimal. And much of the play will be read from scripts.

Of course, that's not to say that the play doesn't pose its own challenges. There will be plenty of sound effects, after all. It's just that they'll be generated onstage, just like they were in the Golden Age of Radio. There's also a ton of physical comedy, and making sure that part works is always the toughest part of developing a new play.

The process is already well underway. I've booked the theater. I've reserved a rehearsal space. I've set up the ticketing site. A couple of friends have even signed as stage manager and light/sound tech. Now I need to get the actors.

What's the play about, you say? Well, here's the blurb:

It's 1946, and KUKU Radio is in trouble. Their broadcast tower keeps falling over. The electric company is about to cut off their power. And now the station owner is threatening to fire the whole crew. Can this ragtag group of radio actors out together one perfect show? Or will they be shut down for good?

The show runs Jan 14-16 at Black Box Theatre, 1367 Pecan St., Colorado Springs. Tickets are just $15, To get yours (you know this won't be the last you hear about it!), go to thelastradioshow.brownpapertickets.com.

Million Dollar Meatballs is here!

My fifth play has just been published by Pioneer Drama Service. Million Dollar Meatballs is a full-length farce that I first developed at a local high school last year. It has 12 roles (4M/4F/4 either) and runs about 70 minutes.

Here's the blurb:

Get ready for a comedy of epicurean proportions! Two bumbling jewel thieves are on the run from the cops when they duck into Chez Monyeu, a restaurant so bad the mice are their only repeat customers. And that's just the start of their problems. Not only has Chez Monyeu's chef just quit, but the city's most powerful restaurant critic is about to arrive. In desperation, the restaurant's owner, mistaking the thieves for famous French chefs, insist that they make their renowned Million Dollar Meatballs for the tough-minded critic. Insanity ensues as the pair try to keep up the ruse while hunting for the seven priceless diamonds they lost. Will the thieves get away with their crime? Where could the diamonds have gone? And why are the meatballs so crunchy? Find out in this deliciously funny farce!

I love all my plays equally, but this one holds a special place in my heart as it's my first classic farce. I just adore comedies that feature mistaken identity, outrageous accents and some poor sap getting water dumped in his lap. This play has all that and more.

To learn more, check out the play's web page here.

Kill the Critic! returns

After two years and over a hundred submissions to contests and theatre companies, both large and small, Kill the Critic! is finally getting its second production. Stage Presence Players in Austin, TX has just announced that they'll be performing the play in September.

I couldn't be more excited. My published plays have been getting a ton of productions, and I'm thrilled for every one of them. But this production is especially meaningful to me because this is probably my favorite play I've written. And its the first full-length production I've arranged myself.

Why did I take this route instead of submitting it directly to my publisher? Well, Kill the Critic! is my first "mature" play, a bawdy farce in the spirit of Noises Off or Boeing Boeing. I produced it that way for its world premiere, and audiences responded enthusiastically. I thought that professional theatres would gobble it up.

Well, they didn't. I got a few nibbles, with theatres in both NYC and LA asking to read the whole script. But no bites.

I thought the play was dead.

And then a funny thing happened. I heard from two different groups who had performed The Butler Did It!, wondering whether I had anything similar. I sent them Kill the Critic!, warning them that it was considerably more risque than my murder mystery.

They both loved it. And a great new theatre company in Austin, Texas, the Stage Presence Players, decided to produce it. (The other group, a church in Canada, would have done it but worried that some members of their congregation might complain.)

That's when I realized something. I'd been targeting the wrong markets. Despite the "maturity" of Kill the Critic!, no professional theatre company is ever going to produce it. They simply don't do farces, at least not new ones. No, they'd rather do yet another grim social drama. (Seriously, have you seen the schedules of most professional theatres?)

But community theatres love farces. And if I clean this one up a bit, I may be able to get high schools and churches interested.

So that's what I'm working on now. It's not easy, turning a naughty comedy into something that your grandma will enjoy. But, as I'm discovering, it can be a lot of fun.

If you're in the Austin area, I urge to see Stage Presence Players' production of Kill the Critic! It runs September 24-26.

For more info, visit the theatre company's Facebook page.