About the Play:

Album has long been a favourite of acting teachers for female monologues and female/female scenes and female/male scenes.

Album is a full-length comedy by David Rimmer. Amid the cultural revolution of the 1960s, two teenaged couples face their own personal revolutions while growing up together through their high school years. The music that defined a generation amplify the hopes, fears, and desires of this band of teens in Album, a charming rock-and-rollin' comedy that will resonate with audiences across generations.

Album is about two teenage couples during the turbulent 1960s. Divided into eight scenes – each associated with a pop song of the era – which span their years at Martin Van Buren High School, the comedy chronicles the coming of age of Peggy, Trish, Billy, and Boo during the chaotic years between 1963 and 1967. The language is frank but unfailingly funny, as the four discover their identities and grapple with impending adulthood and their awakening sexuality. The action ranges from summer camp, to dormitory bedrooms, to senior prom, with the popular music of the period – Bob Dylan, The Beatles, The Beach Boys and more – ever present as a telling counterpoint to, and emotional anchor for, the lives of its young foursome. As the years spin deftly by it is also apparent that maturity will bring differing perils and problems for each of them, although all will continue to recall the special excitement – and poignancy – of these last few carefree years together.

Album premiered in 1980 at the Cherry Lane Theater off Broadway in New York. The play was a major critical and popular success, ran for a year (starring a young Kevin Bacon), and went on to be a Pulitzer Prize finalist. It was originally developed in a series of workshop productions at some of New York's most prominent theaters, including Playwrights Horizons, the WPA Theater, Phoenix Theater, Theater at St. Clement's and HB Studio, one of the original acting conservatories in New York City. The play has become a favourite scene study vehicle in acting classes and workshops and is regularly performed in high school and college theatre productions as a showcase of student talent.

Cast: 2 female, 2 male (all teenagers)

What people say:

"…when Mr. Rimmer opens up his characters' anxieties and dreams that Album really soars; the play takes on the romanticism of a rougher-hewn, latter-day Ah, Wilderness." — The New York Times

"Rimmer has drawn his kids with fidelity and understanding humor." — New York Post

"I must report that my juniors in the audience responded with joyous recognition to every flick of the action." — The New Yorker

About the Playwright:

David Rimmer (1949-2017) was an American playwright and screenwriter best known for his Pulitzer Prize finalist play, Album. In addition to playwriting, he also wrote screenplays for major studios including Disney, Universal, and Twentieth-Century Fox. He also taught in the English and Humanities departments at CUNY/LaGuardia Community College in Long Island City, helping develop original student-written plays.