The Old Fart Plays
By Deborah Ann Percy and Arnold Johnston.
Product Code: OC1000
Collection
Comedy | Drama
Livestream and Record & Stream Rights Available
Rights and availability
Please note: The titles in this collection must be licensed through the collection book itself. None of the titles within have a separate playbook.
This title can be licensed and sold throughout the World.
* Please note the royalty rate listed is the minimum royalty rate per performance. The actual royalty rate will be determined upon completion of a royalty application.
Synopsis
The Old Fart Plays is a collection of one-act plays that focus on characters of “a certain age” or beyond. Rather than a lugubrious concentration on theme, the plays deal—in one way or another—with the various challenges of aging but are mindful of plot, character and humor. If there is an overarching theme, it may be found in the words of E. E. Cummings: “love is the every only god.” Together, the pieces could make a fine evening’s showcase for a theatre company’s mature performers.
Notes
Livestream and Record & Stream Rights Available
Details
- Status In stock
- Type of Show Collection
- Product Code OC1000
- Min. Royalty Rate $15.00/perf
Categories
- Target Audience Senior Adults
- Performing Group Senior Theatre
- Genre Comedy | Drama
- ISBN(13) 9781619593220
Included Titles
Continuum of Care By Deborah Ann Percy and Arnold Johnston.
Retirees Louise, a former middle-school principal, and Albert, a former university professor, cope with the growing challenges of aging and the well-meaning efforts of their daughter Eleanor, an attorney, to have them move out of their home and opt for residence in an assisted living community.
- Product Code: CT8000
- Genre: Comedy,Drama
- Cast Size: 2m., 2w.
- Approx. Run Time: 30 min.
Livestream and Record & Stream Rights Available
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Through Collection
Stuck in the Middle With You By Deborah Ann Percy and Arnold Johnston.
Sheltering in place at their home in a small city, John and Allie contend with the difficulties—serious and comic—of isolation caused by a dangerous virus, as well as facing intimations of their own mortality and middle-class privilege.
- Product Code: S4V000
- Genre: Comedy,Drama
- Cast Size: 1m., 1w.
- Approx. Run Time: 20 min.
Livestream and Record & Stream Rights Available
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Steering Into the Skid By Deborah Ann Percy and Arnold Johnston.
In 12 short scenes from New Year’s Day to New Year’s Eve, Amanda and Tim, both in their 60s, face the changes wrought by advancing age and the gradual realization of Tim’s advancing dementia, forcing each character to adjust to new demands on their imperfect but loving marriage.
- Product Code: S4W000
- Genre: Comedy,Drama
- Cast Size: 1m., 1w.
- Approx. Run Time: 25 min.
Livestream and Record & Stream Rights Available
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Through Collection
Recalculating By Deborah Ann Percy and Arnold Johnston.
Financially strained art dealers Libby and Beth take an automobile ride across a big city to a rendezvous during which they appear engaged in the illegal sale of stolen fossils. Their trip is comically punctuated by the unctuous female voice of the GPS unit on the dashboard, which begins to make cryptic remarks that seem less concerned with geography and more with the course of Libby and Beth's lives, ultimately leading them to make a significant decision.
- Product Code: RF2000
- Genre: Comedy,Drama
- Cast Size: 1 to 2m., 3 to 5w.
- Approx. Run Time: 35 min.
Livestream and Record & Stream Rights Available
License Available:
Through Collection
Hogmanay By Deborah Ann Percy and Arnold Johnston.
As Ben and Molly prepare to celebrate Scottish New Year alone in their Oak Park home, an ice storm causes an automobile accident outside, and Molly and Ben end up as impromptu hosts to the accident victim Wallace, their next-door neighbor Sharon, their daughter Lizzy, and Wallace’s daughter Amy. Both the older and younger characters are forced to face the issues brought on by aging, which they muddle through with humor. Despite their regrets from the past and fears for the future, love endures.
- Product Code: HJ2000
- Genre: Comedy,Drama
- Cast Size: 2m., 4w.
- Approx. Run Time: 40 min.
Livestream and Record & Stream Rights Available
License Available:
Through Collection
Come Rain or Come Shine By Deborah Ann Percy and Arnold Johnston.
Frank and Dorothy trace their joys, sorrows and perpetual misconnection through 50 years of selected notes and letters. From their college graduation in 1950 until their 50th class reunion in 2000, they maintained a friendship despite everything and finally found themselves face to face and free to be together at last.
- Product Code: CT9000
- Genre: Comedy,Drama
- Cast Size: 1m., 1w.
- Approx. Run Time: 35 min.
Livestream and Record & Stream Rights Available
License Available:
Through Collection
Customer Reviews
Talented, smart writers who’ve walked the earth a few years more than others often have an element to their writing that most other writers don’t and can’t have: wisdom born out of life’s tosses and turns. And that kind of wisdom, along with good storytelling, is the hallmark of a good play, no matter its length. You get all of that and so much more in Debby and Arnie’s The Old Fart Plays. Yes, of course, you get beautifully crafted characters, such as Albert and Louise in the poignantly drafted Continuum of Care. But you also get the gorgeous wisdom and experience (and sometimes sheer comedy) of people struggling with the frustration and horrors of aging. Want an even fuller illustration of all that wisdom? Look no further than the life cycle of a year between characters in Steering Into the Skid or the complications of age, culture and class in Hogmanay. You’re in for such a treat, so sit back and enjoy the ride.
Arnie and Debby have done it again. The Old Fart Plays is a (yummy) collection worth reading—and performing. Like reading a collection of short stories on a theme—aging gracefully (or otherwise). You could read these wee gems in one sitting, but I recommend you spread them out to savor and appreciate the clever, skillful, thoughtful and emotional clues and unerring insights on display in each short play. And—enjoy the Easter eggs, such as daffodils, Alice in Wonderland and—personal to me—my name!
—Lisa Dillman (Playwright)