About
the Play:
Specter has long been a favourite of acting
teachers for it's 'two-hander' structure and its brisk, demanding
dialogue.
The Green Man and Other Plays
is a collection of one-act plays by Don Nigro.
The Green Man is a haunting Gothic play of desire, past
betrayal, and murder that is an intriguing addition to the author's
Pendragon series and is ideal for presentation with Deflores.
The four additional dark comedies include his popular scene study
staple Specter, a two-hander about a man who crashes
his car in an attempt to avoid hitting a woman. Their subsequent
conversation veers from love to hatred as they play out a riveting
series of malicious mind and power games.
The Green Man is set in the winter during the U.S. Civil
War. A young Union soldier goes after a horse thief only to be shot
in a mysterious church in the Maryland woods. He wakes to an eerie
delirium involving an innocent young girl, her seductive and
dangerous mother, a cackling, half mad crone, and a bloody hunter
sharpening an axe. (Cast: 3 female, 2 male)
Specter illustrates the things that can happen when a usually mild mannered man does his good deed and picks up an alluring, unpredictable hitchhiker. The situation is a commuter's nightmare: On a
rainy night a college English teacher drives through the woods and
spots a young woman in a white dress running across the twisted road.
He swerves to avoid hitting her, landing both in a muddy ditch. She claims she had a fight with her boyfriend, who left her there, but the story seems improbable to the logical professor. They must wait for the
storm to pass before seeking rescue. He finds himself stuck in his
car with an outrageous and possibly demented young lady who might
want to murder or make love to him, or both. This tour-de-force for
two actors has become a favourite scene study vehicle in acting classes,
workshops, and fringe festivals. (Cast: 1 female, 1
male)
The collection The Green Man and Other Plays also includes
three dark comedies by Don Nigro. The plays include:
The Daughters of Edward D. Boit: Four young sisters are
trapped for a century in a famous painting by John Singer Sargent,
arguing over which if any of them actually slept with the Italian
steward on the ocean liner that took them to Italy, and over the
relative pleasures and dangers of physical experience, fantasy, self
denial and art. Florence believes in experience, Jane in mystery,
Mary Louisa in art, and baby Julia has had to go to the bathroom
since 1882. This loving tribute to a very great painting is an
imaginary journey into the world of the four girls imprisoned in it,
and also deals with serious questions such as whether cockroaches are
edible and why nobody would sleep with Henry James. (Cast: 4 female)
Hieronymus Bosch: The great painter Hieronymus Bosch and
his wife Aleyt confront their younger selves and a filthy bagpiper in
this terminally weird play that brings to life the texture and
madness of Bosch's exceedingly bizarre paintings. Loony, grotesque,
erotic and sad, wildly bitter farce and out of tune love story, this
is Bosch in a Beckett world by way of Finnegans Wake. This play will
probably not be a favourite of your old Aunt Bessie, unless she likes
to spend time naked in the bread box. (Cast: 2 female, 3 male)
The Woodman and the Goblins is a popular choice for high
school drama festivals. A lonely woodcutter finds three eggs in the
middle of the dark forest, brings them home, and they hatch into
three beautiful young girls who first enchant, then torment and
finally destroy him. This scary, funny and haunting play is based on
an old European folktale that was a favourite of Charles Dickens.
(Cast: 3 female, 1 male)
About the Playwright:
Don Nigro is a prolific American playwright with over 400
works touching on a wide variety of themes including murder mysteries
(the Inspector
Ruffing series), American history (the Pendragon County
plays), Russian life and culture, art and artists, and more. His work
has been produced around the world and translated into ten languages.
He has twice been a finalist for the National Repertory Theatre
Foundation's National Play Award, and has won a Playwriting
Fellowship Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as
grants from the Ohio Arts Council.