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Ben Josephson

BEN JOSEPHSON

  (1947 - )

Nationality:    USA
email:    Click here to contact     Website:    Click here

Literary Agent:    n/a

Ben Josephson's plays including biography, theatres, agent, synopses, cast sizes, production and published dates

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

        Brevis         Coming for a Visit         Couple Of Kids From Queens, A         Horace Whirley's Woe         Never Mind The Wind         Problem Play         Short Form         Through And Through         Time's Price         What The Light Lights Up



Brevis

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
A man and a woman in their eighties, a man and a woman in their early twenties, and a man in his early sixties. NOTE: all Ben Josephson scripts are posted in full, to be read free of charge, at bjplayscri[pts.com

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:
Full-length breezy drama

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Coming for a Visit

Coming for a Visit
In summer, 1966, Mrs. McNulty brings Tim, a nineteen-year-old American hitchhiker, out of the rain and into her Galway home. Reluctantly, he welcomes the shelter and the hospitality. She welcomes the company. Her own "boys" are away, some of them gone from Ireland altogether, in pursuit of a better life. Tim, to her chagrin, broods and refuses to open up. So she takes him to task but, upon reading a letter to him from his mother, a complex truth reveals itself to her about wandering boys, and their separation from those who love them.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Attic Theatre,Los Angeles    May 1982

Organisations:
The New One-Act Theatre Ensemble

1st Published:
in One Act Plays For Acting Students, Meriwether, 1987   978-0916260477

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:
One-act drama, 10 minutes

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Couple Of Kids From Queens, A

Synopsis:
Ricky returns to Queens, New York from the Midwest in April, 2002. He seeks out Alice, who was his classmate in the local elementary school. He finds her walking along an old, abandoned, overgrown roadway. Preoccupied, she holds back from his self-reintroduction to her. But his genial and fervent volubility softens her up enough that she joins him in his reminiscences. Still, Alice keeps resisting his requests for an explanation as to why she seems to be brooding. When Ricky's mythic glorification of the New York of their childhood reaches a crescendo, Alice gives in and reveals the cause of her heartache. The hard, here-and-now New York that has afflicted her plunges Ricky into grief. But then the hope and wonder of their own childhood reappear by way of the childhoods of others. They put their sorrow in its place, and so respond with generosity and with love.

Notes:
Winner, 2003 Drury University One-Act Playwriting Competition

1st Produced:
American Theatre Of Actors, 314 West 54th Street, New York, Ny 10019    Mar 2003

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:
one-act drama, 30 minutes

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Horace Whirley's Woe

Synopsis:
Dr. Vance, having just retired, comes home to the surprise party that nurse Polly is throwing for him. His lawyer, Linda, there with Vance's as-yet-unsigned will, wrangles her metaphysically-obsessed friend, Alan, into bed. Roscoe, the lunatic grandson of Vance's gold-digging housekeeper, Mrs. Clark, vies with Polly's ignoramus nephew, Frank, for a place in the doctor's household. Vance finally gets around to addressing his will, agreeing to bequeath his fortune to Clark if she can overcome his lifelong gloominess, and make him laugh. As Alan hounds schizophrenic Roscoe for the meaning of life, and Linda demands ever more love, and Polly and Frank conspire to save the human race, Mrs. Clark concentrates on cracking Vance up. He does laugh, in the end. As for Clark collecting his money, well. . .

Notes:
Winner, 1985 Jacksonville (FL) University Playwriting Contest

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:
full-length comedy

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Never Mind The Wind

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Trinity Center, Berkeley, Ca    Jun 1982

Organisations:
The Bare Stage

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:
full-length drama

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  5            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Problem Play

Synopsis:
Lou observes that all the characters share a "single fundamental and overarching problem." Nico proclaims the need to "do something about it," and Blake takes charge of rallying the others to participate in whatever that something might be. Pat and Alex buy in, but with qualifications. Sidney does whatever s/he can to take part in the project as it unfolds; but because the others fear that his/her apparent medical condition is contagious, they marginalize him/her. Robin engages in the construction of the group's "answer" to the problem with unrestrained enthusiasm, while Dale contemptuously refuses to join in. Acting out their respective kinks and quirks, the eight go about piecing together and, finally, completing a ramshackle construction that amounts to a triumphant misstatement of their solidarity.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
-    -

Organisations:
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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:
full-length comedy

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  8

Further Reference:
-

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Short Form

Synopsis:
Observations on the craze for ten-minute plays.

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:
one-act comedy, 10 minutes

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  3

Further Reference:
-

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Through And Through

Synopsis:
-

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:
full-length funny drama

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  1            Other:  1

Further Reference:
-

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Time's Price

Synopsis:
dramatizes two women's emergence from mere adulthood into maturity. Jill, who plans to end her marriage, goes off for a solitary weekend to think things over before she burns her bridges. She checks in at Dora's rural-village bed-and-breakfast. In the presence of this other woman her own age, Jill reaches out. Dora does not respond to her as she hopes. Dora has her own concerns: the teenage niece and nephew who recently moved in with her. She worries about Paul because he seems not to understand the realities of his new living situation. Heather, on the other hand, irritates Dora, yet promptly captures Jill's imagination. When Heather repudiates her brother unspeakably, she snaps Dora's patience and blows Jill's tenuous equanimity apart. The girl runs away. Jill, purporting to have attained new insight, goes home. Paul, who has attained new, if imperfect, insight, challenges the durable and growing insight Dora purports to possess.

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:
full-length drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  3            Other:  1

Further Reference:
-

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What The Light Lights Up

Synopsis:
-

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:
full-length fanciful drama

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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