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SYNOPSES

Full-Length Plays

Wonderful World
The down-at-the-heels neighborhood tavern is empty tonight except for CHARLEY, the bartender, and ALICE, a local independent businesswoman. Their apparently idle conversation meanders from ALICE’S son, a soldier in the middle east, to CHARLEY’S daughter, an Army helicopter pilot, to "quantums," uncertainty, national security, and God, when two strangers show up for a meeting. They seem to be terrorists—a Muslim and a Christian, forging an alliance. As the two apparent terrorists test the limits of their trust in each other, ALICE and CHARLEY learn of the violent deaths of their children. They take revenge on the terrorists at hand—or are they terrorists, after all? Among other questions, Wonderful World asks: Does quantum physics explain the larger world? Does the passion for security lead only to insupportable insecurity? Has fear and anger collapsed into fatigue and hopelessness? 3m, 1f, 90 min.

The Last Prostitute
A famous call girl, retired and farming in the midwest, is visited by two teenage boys who want to be "initiated." (Film version, starring Sonia Braga, produced by Universal Studios and shown on Lifetime TV 1991-93.) Single set. 2m, 1f. 120 min.

• Productions: Raft Theatre, New York, NY; Pilot Theatre, Hollywood, CA; The Changing Scene, Denver, CO; Spirit of the Horse Theatre, St. Paul, MN. Winner: Midwest Pkaywrights Program. Finalist: 1981 Stanley Drama Award, Wagner College, Staten Island, NY; 1981 Harold C. Crain Award, San Jose State University.

Gourmet Love
Hungry for love? Or for food? How long can Sally and Arnie keep their affair from their spouses, who are having an affair of their own? And when everyone finds out about the affairs–at supper–what will they have for breakfast? Unit set. 2m, 2f. 95 min.

• Staged reading: The Asylum, Las Vegas, NV, November 5, 1997.
  

Turtle Island Blues
500 years of American (Turtle Island) history, featuring Sitting Bull, who travels through space and time, Columbus, Isabella (who, disguised as a cabin boy, accompanies Columbus to the new world), Pocahontas, Leonard Peltier, and others. 1992-94 tour of Upper Midwest. Minimal set, 7m (4 Native American, 3 Caucasian), 3f (1 Native American, 1 Caucasian, 1 African-American), doubling. 120 min.

• Productions: Grand Valley State University, Allendale, MI, April, 2005; Listening Winds Theatre, Bemidji, MN, over 50 performances, on tour 1992-96; University of Southwestern Louisiana; University of Nebraska-Kearney.
• Staged Readings: Fourth Annual Native Playreading Festival, Juneau, AK; Phoenix Theatre Ensemble, New York City.
• Finalist: Delaware Theatre Company 1994 Connections Contest, Wilmington, DE; Remembrance Through the Performing Arts 1994 Contest, Seattle, WA; Detroit Repertory Theatre, 1993; New Dramatists Weissberger Award 1991-92.
• TURTLE ISLAND BLUES the subject of graduate papers at Purdue University, University of Illinois at Urbana, and University of Minnesota, Morris.
• TURTLE ISLAND BLUES studied at Native American Educational Services College in Minneapolis, MN
  

Meet Again
A sexy comedy about reincarnation. "Insightful and delightfully wacky," Jason Fogelson, New York Shakespeare Festival. Minimal set, 3m, 3f. 120 min.

• Staged Readings: The Playwrights’ Center Hothouse Festival, Minneapolis, MN, April 12, 1999; Golden Squirrel Theatre, New York, NY, May 6, 1996; Misfits Ensemble, Los Angeles, 1991.
• Finalist: Sonoma County Repertory SCRipts Festival; 1991-92 New Dramatists L. Arnold Weissberger Award.
• Semi-finalist: Pittsburg New Play Festival, Gemini Theatre.
  

Don't Dance Me Outside
Butch, a novelist, and Ardis, an architect, each married to someone else, begin an affair. During an afternoon and an evening, in first one hotel room and then another, they discover each other, themselves, their pasts, and their future. (Winner, 1999 Grand Valley Shakespeare Festival Plays in Process Competition.) 2 sets, 1m, 1f. 120 min.

• Productions: Playwrights Premiere Theatre, Williamsburg, VA, February 11-20, 2005.
• Winner, 1999 Grand Valley Shakespeare Festival Plays in Process Competition, staged readings Allendale, MI, and Grand Rapids, MI, October 20, 22, 1999.
• Finalist: Sonoma County Repertory 2001 SCRipts Festival; Ukiah Players Theatre 2000 New American Comedy Festival, Ukiah, CA; 1995 New Hope Performing Arts Festival Play Competition, New Hope, PA; 1994 Charlotte Repertory Theatre Festival of New Plays, Charlotte, NC.
• Staged Readings: Ukiah Players Theatre, Ukiah, CA, June 9-10, 2000; The New Tradition Theatre Company, St. Cloud, MN, April 11-12, 1997.
  

Loon Dance
A man invites his new mistress to a family reunion on a Minnesota lake. (Winner, Humboldt State University Playwriting Competition.) Single set. 3m, 5f. 120 min.

• Productions: Humboldt State University, Arcata, CA. Staged reading: Portland Stage Company, Portland, ME.
• Finalist: 1984 Seattle Repertory Theatre, Seattle, WA; Harold C. Crain Award, San Jose State University. Semi-finalist: Beverly Hills Theatre Guild Playwright Award, Los Angeles, CA.
  

Tap Dancing Across the Universe
A college professor who wants to run away from home gets his chance when he and his wife are visited by a would-be shaman, a runaway mother, and a hippy. Single set. 3m, 2f. 120 min.

• Winner of Unicorn Theatre, Towngate Theatre, and Grand Forks Community Theatre Playwriting Competitions.
• Productions: Unicorn Theatre, Kansas City, MO; Towngate Theatre, Wheeling, WV; Corcoran Park Players, Minneapolis, MN; Greater Grand Forks Community Theatre, Grand Forks, ND. Finalist: Dayton Playhouse Competition, Dayton, OH; Sergel Drama Award, Court Theatre, Chicago, IL.

The Only Woman Awake
Richard, armed with chocolate chip cookies and wilted flowers, tries to rekindle an affair with Sienna, a high-powered deconstructionist, as his wife, Eleanor, seeks innocent comfort from the next-door DJ of classical music. A split set, with a double bed common to both. (Commissioned by Actors Theatre of Louisville.) 2m, 2f. 90 min.

• Productions: The Changing Scene, Denver, CO; University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND.
• Staged Readings: Theatre in the Works, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA; Playwrights' Center of San Francisco Dramarama; Now Art Cafe, Hollywood, FL; Acme Acting Company, Miami Beach, FL; Actors' Co-op, New York, NY.

The Consolation of Philosophy
A philosophy professor who lives in his office is confronted by a student who wants a better grade. To the surprise of both, they teach each other, eat dinner (in the office), and negotiate the eros of teaching and learning. 1m, 1f. 90 minutes.

• Readings: Denver Center Theatre Company, Denver, CO. Semi-finalist: 1988 Unicorn Theatre National Playwrights' Competition, Kansas City, MO.

Sakakawea (Musical Drama)
The legendary guide of the Lewis and Clark Expedition is confronted, as an old woman, by a sceptical reporter, who prompts her to tell her story. 2f, 4m, chorus. 120 min. Music by Thomas Peterson.

"The musical drama Sakakawea is striking and brilliant. …Tom Peterson's score and Bill Borden's libretto make for a memorable evening. … About 1600 people attended Friday's opening. They were not the usual sedate Grand Forks audience. Six of the 24 songs were applauded. The warm reaction was spontaneous, not obligatory." Grand Forks Herald. SAKAKAWEA discussed at length in Cultural Images of Sacagawea by Donna J. Kessler, University of Alabama Press, 1996.

• Productions: Bird Woman Productions, Chester Fritz Auditorium, Grand Forks, ND.
• Finalist: 1995 Midwest Playwriting Competition, Rochester, MN. Staged Reading: Opera Now!, Minneapolis, MN.
  

When The Meadowlark Sings
The 1889 North Dakota Constitutional Convention, behind the scenes deals, Sitting Bull meets an early feminist, the delegates play baseball. Named the North Dakota Centennial Drama. Toured North Dakota 1989-90. 12m, 3f, 120 minutes.