Community
Community Theater Plays for Community Audiences
Discover a range of scripts for plays suitable for community audiences. Browse comedies, dramas, fun adaptations of Shakespeare, fairy tales, classics, spiritual and bible-based plays. There are one-acts, full-length plays and short plays that can be combined to make a longer show. Many are also great for touring theater companies. There are plays for holidays, Christmas shows, Nativity plays, plays for adults, plays for family audiences.
Showing 1–16 of 58 results
Backwards from Winter
- 60 Minutes
- 1 Soprano; 1 Electric Cello
Musical Drama, Poetic Drama, Bare Stage, Small Cast
Backwards from Winter is a modern opera, a “monodrama for soprano, electric cello, computer, and video.” Composed by Douglas Knehans with libretto by Juanita Rockwell, is the story of a young woman who loses her lover in a fatal accident. The story is told in four scenes – one representing each season.
Read More- $9.97 – $69.95
Ten After Ten: Ten 10-Minute Comedies
- 10 - 60 minutes
- 2 M/F - 20+ M/ F Doubling possible
Classroom Use, Farce, Seniors, Collection, Comedy
In Ten After Ten, Jack J. Berry uses unique settings to highlight current problems and issues. These short comedies can be performed as a single evening or used separately as part of a larger presentation to underscore a point. Ideal for classroom, church, or senior facility.
Read More - $13.95 – $125.00
River Country
- 70 minutes
- 4M/5F; Max 9/Min9; 3 musicians
Classroom Use, Poetic Drama, Bare Stage, Minimal Set, Music Lead Sheets
A lilting poem for the stage, follows the passionate meeting of a man and woman who share neither language nor culture, yet fall in love. Through the rhythmic blending of language and song, the play combines poetry and both traditional and original melodies to illuminate this romantic union that ultimately overcomes geography and tradition. Instant Printable PDF
Read More - $9.95 – $125.00
Alice! In Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass
- 100 minutes
- 3M/3F/28 M or F; Min 12 - Max 27+ doubling possible
Young Audience, Bare Stage, Community, Large Cast
This madcap full-length comedy chases Alice both down the rabbit hole and through the looking glass. Two 45-minute acts of mayhem and upside –down logic provides roles for all students. Mirror the logic and language of today’s global circus. Great opportunity for doubling.
Read More - $6.97 – $45.00
Christmas in Montana
- 15 minutes
- 1 M/2F/1 M or F Max 4/Min 4
Comedy, Simple Set, Small Cast
Students in a small one-room school try to sing Christmas carols in their classroom. Quickly, one of the students interrupts the singing with a thought about political correctness. Mayhem breaks out, with hilarious results, as they try to change the lyrics of the traditional Christmas songs to match contemporary standards.
Read More - $7.97 – $55.98
A Pastor’s Tale – The True Story of Silent Night
- 15 minutes
- 1 - 5F; 2-7M; Max 7; Min 7
Comedy, Simple Props, Teens
A one-act Christmas comedy – a play with live music for young actors, telling the story of how the Christmas song “Silent Night” came to be written. Set in Oberndorf, Austria in 1818, the play is staged with live guitar in a Readers Theatre format. Memorized historical vignettes are combined with a straight-forward Christmas reading. But it soon goes “off-book” as student readers question the truth of the text they’re reading, and they end up squabbling on stage among themselves. Just when their performance seems doomed, Josef Mohr remembers a short poem he had been writing—Silent Night.
Read More - $11.00 – $125.00
The Crying Tree
- 110 Minutes
- 4 Males/3Females/Max/Min 7
Dramedy, African American Theme, Colleges, Community, Diverse Cast, Drama
A stunning, dramatic reminder that the politics of money and the politics of slavery in America are joined at the hip. In his latest full length drama with great comic scenes, Peter Gunter reminds audiences that the roots of racial division ran as deep as kudzu and that our recently discovered “enlightenment” is planted in shallow ground.
Read More - $8.99 – $125.00
Alice in Wonderland
- 30-45 minutes
- 4 Male 5 Female Min 9/ Max 15+
Children's Theatre, Comedy, Community, Doubling Possible, Large Cast
A delightful, one-act play script adapted from the classic Lewis Carroll tale. Staying true to the original, this adaptation for the stage brings all the characters of the original Wonderland to life. Great for classrooms with a diverse student body, for children’s theater, competitions and for reader’s theater.
Read More - $9.95 – $125.00
Tom and Huck–Breakin’ The Law
- 110 Minutes
- M 5-6/ F 2-3/Max 9/Min 7
Colleges, Comedy, Competitions, Doubling Possible, Edgy Play, Friendship, High School, Teens
An award-winning romantic comedy that imagines Tom and Huck as gay sixteen-year-olds, trapped in the 1850’s in St. Petersburg, Missouri. The adventures will be familiar, yet comically twisted, full of teenage angst, and discovery of one’s sexuality and uniqueness. The beloved characters in this send-up remain innocent, and true to the loving spirit of Twain’s original novels.
Read More - $9.95 – $125.00
Alice Through the Looking Glass
- 50 - 60 minutes
- 4M. 6F. 11 M or F; Variable cast from 12 to 31
Children's Theatre, Colleges, Comedy, Community, Doubling Possible, Fantasy, Flexible Casting, Theatrical Staging Possible
Alice takes the plunge yet again in this madcap one-act comedy. A glorious romp for the stage, the world behind the mirror leads her to a realm where everything is backward. Sense is nonsense. Backwards is forwards. The faster you run, the further behind you get.
Easily performed either in the classroom or on stage. A delight for school drama groups with diverse casting challenges. Downloadable PDF’s for purchase available.
Read More - $6.97 – $48.00
The Trunk
- 15 minutes
- 2 Male, 1 Female, Min/Max 2
Competitions, Fantasy, Simple Set, Small Cast
A man is about to board a mysterious train when he is stopped because of the size of his luggage. What is in his trunk that he is so reluctant to part with? And where is the train going? In this 15-minute play, L. Elizabeth Powers bears witness to the fact that it’s never too late to take a different path.
Read More - $7.95 – $40.00
Short Plays for Long Lives
- 10 - 60 minutes
Collection, Doubling Possible, Flexible Casting
A collection of six 10-minute plays for seniors and senior theater groups. With mostly senior cast members, these short comedies plays about old people play well for senior groups and senior actors. They may be produced as Readers Theater, or on stage individually or as a group. These are good plays for amdram groups and community theater.
Read More - $7.99 – $110.00
Angel Band
- 110 Minutes
- 14 Males, 5 Females, Max. 19+/Min 15
Drama, Edgy Play, Large Cast, Lust, Prejudice, Tolerance
Leaders of the snake-handling Signs Following Church in the hills of Appalachia are threatened by the snakes they handle to prove their Godliness and by the law enforcement and child welfare agencies of the surrounding community. They live side-by-side with the Blue People, a society of outcasts whose skin is marked by a blue skin tone. Into the mix comes Jay, a shy, possibly autistic, journalist intent on uncovering the secret world of these hidden cultures.
Read More - $11.00 – $125.00
N
- 100 minutes
- 2 Males, 1 Female
Colleges, Community, Diverse Cast, Drama
Adrienne Earle Pender’s “N” dramatizes the struggle between playwright Eugene O’Neill and actor Charles Sidney Gilpin over the inclusion of the “N” word in the script for O’Neill’s first box office hit, The Emperor Jones. in 1920. They fight from rehearsal to Broadway run and, eventually, to the London tour. To Eugene O’Neill, a word is just a word. For Charles Gilpin, those six letters have the power to unravel everything that he has ever worked for. At stake for O’Neill? His artistic vision. For Gilpin? His entire career and family.
Read More - $9.00 – $60.00
Refraction of Light
- 100 minutes
- 2 Males, 2 Females, Min/Max 4
Drama, Professional, Simple Set
On the day World War II ends, another war begins. Joe Taylor, an African-American veteran decides he wants to marry Nettie French, a childhood sweetheart, and buy the house belonging to Rose Beauchamp. Rose is a white teacher who has befriended both Nettie and Joe and encouraged their friendship and academic aspirations. Rose’s prejudice rears its head and her reluctance to sell her house to Joe sets in motion a chain of events that threatens to destroy all their futures. Harry Rosen, a Jewish immigrant from Nazi Germany, enters their lives and helps them find their way home.
Read More - $9.95 – $50.00
A Touch of Frost
- 20 - 60 minutes
- 2 Males, 1 Female Max/Min 3
School Touring, Simple Set, Touring
Three 20-minute comedies in one act. Wilford, from New York, has just bought and moved to a new homestead in Vermont, but he realizes that his new neighbors may not be from this planet! Mila, her son Klig, and husband Kulerie Klee, live on a farm next to Wilford’s and their adjoining farms are separated only by a stone wall which is beginning to fall apart. What to do? Knock it down? Build it back? – and what are they walling in and walling out? Can be performed by high school, college, university students or groups.
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