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Adam Rapp

ADAM RAPP

  (1968 - )
Nationality:    USA
email:    n/a     Website:    n/a

Literary Agent:    United Talent Agency  represented by Mark Subias

Adam Rapp is a novelist, filmmaker, playwright and director. In 2006, he was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for his play Red Light Winter. His other plays include Bingo with the Indians, Kindness, American Sligo, Nocturne, Blackbird, Stone Cold Dead Serious, Finer Noble Gases, Essential Self Defense, Trueblinka, and Faster. As a director, his production of Blackbird received two Drama Desk nominations. Red Light Winter won the Joseph Jefferson Award in Chicago and a Lucille Lortel Nomination for Best New Play and two Obie Awards in NYC. Finer Noble Gases at the 2006 Edinburgh Festival received a Fringe First Award. His films include Winter Passing and Blackbird. His newest play, the Metal Children, opens at the Vineyard in February 2010.

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

         American Sligo         Animals And Plants         Bingo With the Indians         Blackbird         Classic Kitchen Timer         CouchWorks         Dreams of Flying Dreams of Falling         Edge Of Our Bodies, The         Essential Self-Defense         Faster         Finer Noble Gases         Ghosts in the Cottonwoods         Gompers         Jack on Film         Kindness         Members Only         Metal Children, The         Nocturne         Nursing         Paraffin         Red Light Winter         Rose         Stone Cold Dead Serious         Through the Yellow Hour         Train Story         Trueblinka

American Sligo

Synopsis:
Art 'Crazy Train' Sligo (Slee-go), all-star wrestling legend, is about to retire. His two sons, his sister-in-law, his greatest fan, and a few unexpected guests gather on the eve of his final match for his last supper, but things just can't seem to stop going wrong in the Sligo home
- press release

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Rattlestick Playwrights Theater

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Animals And Plants

Synopsis:
. . .a lurid comic phantasmagoria of life on the underside of Middle America. - Markland Taylor, Variety

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
American Repertory Theater    

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Broadway Play Publishing Inc, NY,    -

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Bingo With the Indians

Synopsis:
In the play, a disgruntled East Village theatre company with more on their minds then playing Bingo descends upon a small New England town

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Blackbird

Blackbird
a grimly compelling and ultimately doomed romance, shot through with moments of pure joy and tenderness that transcends the toxic lifestyles of two young lovers.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Broadway Play Publishing Inc, NY,    978-0881452495

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Classic Kitchen Timer

Synopsis:
In this contemporary Grand Guignol tale, a recently laid off meat-cutter is offered a most unusual new job.

Notes:
the Flea theater has commissioned six playwrights to create ten-minute plays that explore the impact of the current economic crisis on the younger generation. Presented under the title the GREAT RECESSION, the evening features new work by Thomas Bradshaw, Sheila Callaghan, Erin Courtney, Will Eno, Itamar Moses And Adam Rapp - All writers recently nurtured by the Flea. the plays will be performed by the Bats, the resident Acting company of the Flea

1st Produced:
Flea Theater, NY, USA >>>     20 Nov 2009

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:
Ten Min

Parts:
Male:  6            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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CouchWorks

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
written by Rachel Axler, Evan Cabnet, Marcus Gardley, Adam Knight, Adam Rapp, Theresa Rebeck, Mat Smart

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Slant Theatre Project

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:
-

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Dreams of Flying Dreams of Falling

Synopsis:
In this surreal new play by Adam Rapp, something is not right in the world. the sky is a strange color, and there are geese bombarding the Connecticut home of Sandra and Bertram Cabot. Dreams of Flying Dreams of Falling lifts the veil on the lives of two wealthy American families, and shows us how even the most polished among us can behave like animals.
- nytheatre.com

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Encore, San Francisco    

Organisations:
Atlantic Theater 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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Edge Of Our Bodies, The

Edge Of Our Bodies, The
Intimate and searingly honest, this play captures a young woman at the threshold of vulnerability and experience, achingly articulate about all she can't know or control. Bernadette is sixteen, on the train from her New England private school to New York City to give her boyfriend some big news. Achingly articulate about all she can't know or control, this play captures a young woman at the threshold of vulnerability and experience.

Notes:
part of the 2011 Humana Festival.

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:
70 min Drama

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Essential Self-Defense

Essential Self-Defense
a grim fairy tale with generous helpings of rock & roll karaoke." the following description is from the show's press release: "When a disgruntled misfit takes a job as an attack dummy in a women's self-defense class, he finds himself mysteriously drawn to the repressed bookworm who's beating on him. But all's not well on the mean Midwestern streets of Bloggs: with local children vanishing at an alarming rate, our hero, his lady friend, and a motley assortment of poets, butchers, and punk librarians prepare to battle the darkness on the edge of town.
NYtheATRE.COM

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Playwrights Horizons Peter J Sharp, NY     2007

Organisations:
Playwrights Horizons & Edge Theater

1st Published:
North Point Press 2007   978-0865479685

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, 1 Act Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  6            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Faster

Synopsis:
Two young men try to strike a deal with the Devil

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Contained in: "Stone Cold Dead Serious and Other Plays" published by Faber and Faber, London 2004   978-0571211395

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:
-

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Finer Noble Gases

Synopsis:
In this freakishly funny and vividly-imagined absurdist nightmare for our time, the inert occupants of an East Village apartment-members of a band once called "Lester's Surprise," now remembered simply as "Less"-are going numb. Pill-popping Chase and Staples, who look like they've been living on their sofa since the previous spring, sit mesmerized in front of the television. . .until its untimely demise. Desperately in need of technological stimulus, they decide to call up their weird neighbor, luring him upstairs and under Chase's narrative spell so that Staples can steal his Magnavox via the fire escape. the strange arrivals and events that follow move from the hilarious to the disturbingly existential, as Rapp's electronic-age creatures long to feel something, to be part of something, or to be of use.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Humana Festival 2002: the Complete Plays, ed Tanya Palmer & Amy Wegener, Smith & Kraus, 2002   -

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, 1 Act Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Ghosts in the Cottonwoods

Synopsis:
On the night of a terrible storm, a single mother and her younger son await the arrival of the older son, who has broken out of prison. Two others arrive before him: a stranger with a wounded leg and a girl with a suitcase. Nothing will ever be the same.
- nytheatre.com

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Gompers

Synopsis:
Rapp offers us an Under Milk Wood-like tour of Gompers, a town where the steel mill has closed and everyone is pinning their hopes on the arrival of a new gambling boat. the focus, however, is one particular courtyard and its deadbeat denizens. the block's superintendent, Dent, is into all kind of illegal scams and has impregnated one of the tenants. An HIV-positive resident begs his kindly black ward to kill him off. A middle-aged woman battles with alcohol addiction. - Michael Billinngton, Guardian

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Broadway Play Publishing Inc, NY,    -

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  8            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Jack on Film

Jack on Film
Three men are offered a generous sum of money to be taken to a mysterious location and interviewed for a movie. they don't know each other and have almost nothing in common, except that they all look alike and two of them are named Jack. But with the promise of cash, these men are willing to do whatever they are asked, which, for one of them, includes murder.

Notes:
In 1995, A group of writers, directors And Actors gathered on Manhattan's Lower East Side for what was supposed to be A one-time-only event: write, direct, produce And perform new plays with the span of 24 hours. More than A decade And just over 300 plays later, the 24 Hour Plays have been produced on Broadway, in London, Los Angeles, Chicago And Across the globe.

1st Produced:
American Airlines Theatre     2006

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Playscripts, Inc - New York   978-0970904690

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:
Ten Min

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Kindness

Kindness
In Kindness, an ailing mother and her teenaged son flee Illinois and a crumbling marriage for the relative calm and safety of a midtown Manhattan hotel. Mom holds tickets to a popular musical about love among bohemians. Her son isn't interested. So Mom takes the kindly cabdriver instead, while the boy entertains an enigmatic, potentially dangerous young woman from down the hall.
- nytheatre.com

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Peter Jay Sharp Theatre, 416 West 42nd Street, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10036     13 Oct 2008

Organisations:
Playwrights Horizons

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Members Only

Synopsis:
A teenage boy just wants to stay at home and masturbate. His mother wants them to go and see "Rent" but he does not as it is full of gay people.

Notes:
Originally performed under the overall title "CouchWorks" with six other plays.

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Slant Theater Project

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

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Metal Children, The

Metal Children, The
In small-town America, a young adult novel about teen pregnancy is banned by the local school board, igniting a fierce and violent debate over abortion, religious beliefs, and modern feminism. Its directionless New York City author arrives in town to defend the book and finds that it has inspired a group of local teens to rebel in strange and unexpected ways. A timely and unforgettable Drama about the failure of urban and heartland America to understand each other, the Metal Children explores what happens when fiction becomes a matter of life and death.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber; (April 13, 2010)   978-0865479241

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  5            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Nocturne

Synopsis:
A son is pushed beyond his limits by his Father who wants him to be a great pianist. then there is an accident in which his sister is killed. He leaves for New York where he becomes a novelist. Fifteen years later he returns home.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
New Theater Workshop     2001

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Farrar StrAus and Giroux   978-0571211326

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:
100 min Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Nursing

Synopsis:
set in 2053 in a disease-free New York when the tenement has been transformed into a museum where young men and women in need of cash are injected with old-fashioned diseases for the amusement of the public
- nytheatre.com

Notes:
part of the Hallway Trilogy - Rose; Paraffin And Nursing

1st Produced:
Rattlestick theatre
224 Waverly Place, New York, NY 10014     20 Feb 2011

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:
90 min Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Paraffin

Synopsis:
set on the first evening of the 2003 New York City blackout
- nytheatre.com

Notes:
part of the Hallway Trilogy - Rose; Paraffin And Nursing

1st Produced:
Rattlestick theatre
224 Waverly Place, New York, NY 10014     20 Feb 2011

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:
90 min Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Red Light Winter

Red Light Winter
about two college friends who spend a wild, unforgettable evening in Amsterdam's Red Light District with a beautiful young prostitute. they find that their lives have changed forever when their bizarre love triangle plays out in unexpected way a year later in the East Village. the producers warn that the play contains nudity and sexual situations.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Steppenwolf, Chicago     2005

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London   978-0865479548

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Rose

Synopsis:
takes place on the evening of November 28th, 1953, the day following the death of Eugene O'Neill
- nytheatre.com

Notes:
part of the Hallway Trilogy - Rose; Paraffin And Nursing

1st Produced:
Rattlestick theatre
224 Waverly Place, New York, NY 10014     20 Feb 2011

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:
90 min Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Stone Cold Dead Serious

Stone Cold Dead Serious
about a family on the outskirts of Chicago severely down on their luck. Dad stays at home after being injured on the job, addicted to pain killers and the Home Shopping Network; Mom works a dead-end waitress job; their teenage daughter is drug-addicted, living on the streets. there may be hope, however, in the form of their video game-obsessed teenage son, Wynne. But he may have to make the ultimate sacrifice-participating in a real-life fight-to-the-death video game competition.
nytheatre.com

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
-    

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Contained in: "Stone Cold Dead Serious and Other Plays" published by Faber and Faber, London 2004   978-0571211395

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  6            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Through the Yellow Hour

Synopsis:
In Through the Yellow Hour, the United States has been attacked. Men are being castrated, women enumerated. Ellen has been in hiding for 52 days, subsisting on very little, hoping against hope for her husband to return. As the world around her falls further into senseless chaos, she takes an unlikely action, one that just might signal a new beginning.
- nytheatre.com

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Rattlestick theatre
224 Waverly Place, New York, NY 10014     13 Sep 2012

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:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Train Story

Train Story
-

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
-    

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Contained in: "Best American Short Plays 2000 - 2001" published by Applause 2002   978-1557834805

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:
Short play

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Trueblinka

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:
-

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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