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Ned Cox

NED COX

  (1953 - )
Nationality:    USA
email:    Click here to contact     Website:    n/a

Literary Agent:    n/a

Ned Cox, born 29 Jul 1953, originally from New Jersey, Ned earned a degree in Film Studies at the University of Rochester NY, before heading for Los Angeles, London England, Brisbane Australia, and back to London for about 20 years. He now lives in Montreal full-time with his wife and son. In London: Ned's first play, "I Die for None of Them" won the Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 1980, and the Time Out Acting Award for Solo Performance in its 1993 London revival. His controversial sophomore play "Pontifications" was also nominated for the Fringe First in Edinburgh. He was Literary Manager for The Red Room for 3 years, was a founder member of the Literary Managers' Action Group, and was appointed to the Advisory Panel for the Man in the Moon Theatre, Chelsea. In Montreal: Ned developed several plays as part of the first Writers Unit at Playwrights Workshop Montreal, where he is currently a member of the Board Of Directors.

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below is a list of Ned Cox's plays - click on a Play Title for more information

         Bastards         Bloomers: Me And Nellie McClung         Fugitive Green         I Die For None Of Them         Jazz And the Blue Kitten         Jazz Is Dead         Liar Liar         Marta         Mimi On The Beach         Play-Thing         Pontifications         Purgatory Rise         Walking The Cyclone

Bastards

Synopsis:
What might a Jewish American princess, a Wall Street yuppie and a Montreal teacher have in common? the answer is a white trash Charles Manson-type killer for a father. Since siring the trio in a Sixties desert cult, their dad has taken three decades' paternity leave in the state penitentiary. Meanwhile, the three children have grown up in blissful ignorance with different adoptive parents. Now, with their biological Father suffering from leukaemia, the authorities are keen to do a deal and uncover the missing bosies of his victims.
Patrick Marmion, evening Standard

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Savage Kid Theatre Company

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
dark comedy

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Bloomers: Me And Nellie McClung

Synopsis:
Canada, February 1914, a local Meeting Hall. Emily Hill has just stepped onstage to take the last-minute place of her close friend and colleague, Nellie McClung, to speak on the topic of Women's Sufferage and the Right To Vote. Through the fictional story of their long-time friendship, we learn about McClung, the courageous, independent, and creative real-life sufferagette, who was arguably more responsible than anyone else for women's right to vote in Canada. Her persistence and commitment are both fascinating and inspirational, as well as enormously entertaining -- for Nellie's sense of humor saw her through to her goal. A portrait of exceptional women at a crossroads in the history of their nation.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Unproduced    2006

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Comedy drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Fugitive Green

Synopsis:
It's one in the morning, and there's an October gale blowing along Atlantic Ave, but Sack hasn't closed the bar yet, and Robert has just come in for a belt of scotch. And this just happens to be the bar where his mom and a stranger conceived him on the beach out back, thirty-five years ago. Robert's recently dead mom who never let him forget how keeping him as a single mom ruined her life. Soon enters wild and preppie Zander, unpredictable and dangerous. Zander is on the road to find his biological mother, who gave him up to follow her career as an artist. What do these two have in common with a sketch done in fugitive green?

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Unproduced    2005

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Drama

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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I Die For None Of Them

Synopsis:
Subtitled: The Death Of Thomas Chatterton. Powerful influence on the poets Keats and Shelley, and a figure who practically defined the Romantic Movement, working-class child prodigy Thomas Chatterton wrote hundreds of extraordinary poems between the ages of 14 and 17. We visit the teenaged poet and literary forger in his London attic room on his last night on earth, 24 August 1770. We walk with him through his brief life as he decides whether literally to be or not to be - whether to return to Bristol as an abject failure or to end it all with a cocktail of arsenic and opium.

Notes:
This one-man show won the Fringe First in the 1980 Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

1st Produced:
St Anne's Community Centre, Edinburgh    Aug 1980

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Drama

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Jazz And the Blue Kitten

Synopsis:
Greenwich Village, 1952. Mona's basement nightclub, The Blue Kitten, has a new denizen - a mysterious young englishwoman who refuses to identify herself except as "Pete", but who quickly finds herself welcomed into the burgeoning jazz scene. Also find Doc, whose sole purpose in life is to rival Charlie Parker, and who finds his goal further away the harder he reaches. And proto-beat Jazz, the crazy action painter in the loft upstairs, who soon finds himself dedicating all his stream-of-consciousness poetry to Pete.

Notes:
Part 1 of the projected "Jazz Quintet".

1st Produced:
Soho Poly, London    1988

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Drama

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Jazz Is Dead

Synopsis:
1961, Greenwich Village. Maloney's Bar, formerly The Blue Kitten Nightclub. Mona has a thing for Eddie, who bought The Blue Kitten from her a few years back. It's a hot summer night and she's about ready to hit the road when she notices a familiar figure face down at one of the tables, fast asleep. Seven years ago, teen-aged Pete had simply vanished after the death of her lover and the forced adoption of their child. She's been bumming around Eisenhower's America looking for solace, only able to find a little in the arms of a talented and rising jazz musician. But somewhere on a stretch of road in upstate NY, he is about to destroy any hopes for happiness Pete may have had. And the love Mona still has for the tormented Pete is thrown back in her face, as both women find they can't yet let go of their pain.

Notes:
One-act play. Part 2 of the projected "Jazz Quintet".

1st Produced:
Unproduced    1998

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Liar Liar

Synopsis:
True story. Over two hours in real time, we try and find the answer to the question of why Timothy Evans confessed to the murder of his wife, their unborn child, and their infant daughter. In 1950, Evans was hanged for these dreadful crimes. As was Reg Christie in 1953, the man who actually committed them in the first place. The play follows Christie's attempts to play mind games with someone whose mind is too simple to dupe with mere logic. Both men are liars, but only one of them was a murderer with eight dead women to his credit in the end. Frightening and fascinating, and, at times, surprisingly funny.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Drama

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Marta

Synopsis:
Ex-High School Beauty Queen Marta developed intellectual ambitions 15 years earlier when thrown together with a group of academic women in Europe. Now supposedly studying medicine in a remote part of the world, she is visited by one of her distant "friends", who is trying to determine whether Marta - fascinating but toxic - is in fact on the road to a meaningful life, or whether she is just in hiding, pursuing a lifestyle of self-destructive excess. And she must remember: Marta has always been an expert in the art of the almost-believable half-truth.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Etcetera Theatre, London (readings only)    1991

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Mimi On The Beach

Synopsis:
Charles and Fiona have been dating for years now, and are settled like an old married couple& at the age of 35. Charles has trouble committing, you see, because his heart went out at the age of 16 to the French teen-aged waif, Mimi. And he can't seem to forget her. Now, here they are, two Brits on the beach in Deauville on an August Bank Holiday weekend. The same beach upon which Charles lost his heart, all those years ago. And here's the gorgeous Michelle, who is in fact Mimi, all grown up now. Better still, here's bikini-clad Mimi herself, real as can be, bouncing to a yeah-yeah beat, flirtateous as ever. Who will Charles end up with: Fiona? Michelle? Mimi? Or will he bumble his way into a life with none of the above?

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Bain Saint-Michel, Montreal Fringe Festival    2003

Organisations:
Savage Kid Theatre Company

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Comedy one act

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Play-Thing

Synopsis:
An evening of two linked one-hour plays. 1. "Re: Play", a parody of Private Lives as if written by Coward parodying Stoppard parodying meta-theatre parodying agit-prop parodying Brecht parodying Pinter parodying Coward all over again. Confused? You'd better be. 2. The same actors perform "Mystery Play" in which the entire cast from The Maltese Falcon re-enact the Passion Of Christ. In the original rhyme-schemes of the traditional English Mystery Plays, of course. " They call me Plato. Pretty tough. Hard as rock and twice as rude. Common as dirt and twice as rough. Slick as oil and twice as crude. A private eye. My tools are bluff, discretion, and bad attitude. 'Best of times, I'm sharp enough -- some folks even say I'm shrewd. But this job kind of sours, and shrewdness ain't worth nuts when you count your hours in yawns and cigarette butts."

Notes:
Written as two plays in 1982, workshopped in 1991, and combined and re-worked in 2005. Unproduced as yet.

1st Produced:
Unproduced    2005

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Comedy Drama

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Pontifications

Synopsis:
An absurd extravaganza on religious themes. The Holy Roman Empire, 1415: Several events are about to collide with each other. (1) The Papal Schism is in full swing, with three, count 'em, three factions claiming their man is the true Pope; (2) meanwhile, in Prague, preacher Jan Huss is gaining a following amongst those who would have a simpler, more "Christian" church (in other words, he's an unholy heretic!); (3) It's time to bring out the smoke and mirrors - the Council Of Constance would be a great way to dispose of the opposition in a flurry of auto-da-fe's. Sometimes it's hard to know whether to laugh or cry -- in Pontifications, you can do both at the same time.

Notes:
Nominated for the Edinburgh Fringe First Award.

1st Produced:
YWCA, Edinburgh    Aug 1981

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Comedy Drama

Parts:
Male:  7            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Purgatory Rise

Synopsis:
A twisted parody that takes Thornton Wilder's "Our Town" and adds Y2K (or more accurately, Y19C) plus a real-life 1899 epidemic of catarrh in small town Connecticut, treated by the local druggist with healthy, and highly addictive, doses of cocaine. Wilder's beloved characters follow their confused Messianic leader, George Gibbs, up Purgatory Rise to the apocalypse. You know, the kind of thing that happens all the time. Purgatory Rise -- farce, or documentary?

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Savage Kid Theatre Company

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Comedy

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Walking The Cyclone

Synopsis:
Coney Island. Harry is a drunk. Rumor has it he killed somebody once. He has anger issues. He is not nice to Michelle, who worships him despite his violent ways. Her gypsy friend Willow knows Harry will take everybody down with him as he self-destructs, and Willow will do almost anything to break up the relationship. Meanwhile, drinking buddy Cage is trying to get Harry to Boss Esposito's office for a showdown. And it ain't about money. Harry is getting tired of walking The Cyclone for Esposito at dawn every day, tapping and banging and looking for loose bolts and cross-ties. One of these days it's all bound to fall apart.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Savage Kid Theatre Company

1st Published:
-   -

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Drama

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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