About the Plays:

This is volume 3 of the best-selling Ten-Minute Plays anthology series from the prominent Actors Theatre of Louisville (ATL), which has championed the short play with its National Ten Minute Play Contest over the years; winning plays have often been included in the annual Humana Festival. Ten-Minute Plays: Volume 3 contains contemporary plays by some of the world's most important writers. All are perfect for classes and showcases where actors and directors show their stuff without expending the time or money to mount a full-length play.

Ten-Minute Plays: Volume 3 contains:

• The Appeasement by Holger Teschke, translated by Phil McKnight. This play is about two characters who are A and B. A's job is to let go a worker who is no longer needed which is B. B questions the release and the direction of which the others have made as well as B's self. A describes to B how others reacted and let B go. (2 female or male)

• Breaking the Chain by Michael Bigelow Dixon and Val Smith. Chuck and Beth try to convince their neighbour, Jessica to continue a chain letter of 22 years, but she refuses. As Chuck and Beth's luck keeps coming, Jessica's slowly dwindles. A fun three person play that tests the skeptics. (2 female, 1 male)

• Broken Hearts by Kevin R. McLeod. During an operation, Dianne enters the realm of the Unconscious – the realm just preceding heaven. There she meets a crocheting woman who's looking down on her husband and her grandmother. Together the two ladies must convince Dianne to go back to the land of the living. (3 female)

• Drive by Neal Bell. A couple, Michael and Maddie drive around lost in the back-streets of an inner-city neighborhood, and lost in their lives together. (1 female, 1 male)

• Executive Dance by Joe DiPietro. Young executives caught up in corporate "team building" activities, wind up dancing with each other. (2 male)

• Go Look by Christopher Graybill. Danny and Kath are a young couple that decide to go camping in the woods. They argue through the entire trip. While being in the woods they encounter a frightening bear. (1 female, 1 male)

• Hard-Boiled by Deborah Lynn Frokt. The tension begins to simmer when a post-work happy hour turns into a battle of the sexes after Kramer, a female lawyer, is promoted above her male colleagues. Power, sex, and the blurred lines that separate the two are scrutinized in this sizzling short play. (1 female, 2 male)

• Helen at Risk by Dana Yeaton. Helen takes her ideals to prison along with her workshop in creative mask-making. When a wise-guy inmate starts acting up, however, self-expression takes a nasty turn, and art provides the imprimatur for deadly craft. (1 female, 2 male)

• The Last Time We Saw Her by Jane Anderson. A productive, female employee comes to her boss's office to divulge that she has been married to a woman for the past eight years. While he states that he does not care, he prevents her from sharing this information with the rest of their coworkers. She must try to make him see the necessity behind honesty and openness in the office. (1 female, 1 male)

• Love Poem #98 by Regina Taylor. An abstract, relentlessly dark 1950s film noir-style play featuring three indelibly intertwined, mysterious characters. (2 female, 1 male)

• Lynette Has Beautiful Skin by Jane Anderson. Three young people deal with the frustrations of small-town living. Bobby and Lynette use the presence of their lonely, single friend Larry as a way to make them feel better as a couple. A sequel to Lynette at 3:00 AM (Published in Ten Minute Plays from the Actors Theatre of Louisville, Vol. 3). (1 female, 2 male)

• One Hundred Women by Kristina Halvorson. Kelly and Nina are college roommates and close friends. However, when Kelly starts dating her new boyfriend, Christian, Nina becomes overbearing and tries to rescue Kelly from the destruction of men. Nina strains Kelly's patience and her new relationship with Christian, until Kelly is forced to decide whether or not Nina is her best suited roommate. (2 female, 1 male)

• Outlaws by E.H. Wasserman. A comedy chronicling the short career of two desperadoes of an absurdly fractured Old West. (Variable, 5-7. Gender crossing encouraged with the addition of fake moustaches.)

• Poison by Elliott Hayes. Opening immediately after Karen's husband, Jack, discovers her with another man, Poison deals with the repercussions of such an act on a marriage and a life. (1 female, 1 male)

• Pomp and Circumstance by Jane Martin. The King interviews a genius but brown-nosing musician for the position of court composer. (2 male)

• A Private Moment by Stephen Gregg. A touching depiction of an episode in the lives of Chang and Eng, the original "Siamese Twins". (2 female, 2 male)

• Quiet Torrential Sound by Joan Ackermann. A three-character play featuring centring on two sisters – Monica and Claire – having a conversation in a café following a performance of Beethoven in a nearby park. (2 female, 1 male)

• So Tell Me About This Guy by Dolores Whiskeyman. Marla and Angie, two close friends, banter about Marla's new boyfriend without having to say much at all. A comedic take on verbal and non-verbal communication dexterity between young, urban women. (2 female)

• Stones and Bones by Marion Isaac McClinton. Deals with two couples struggling to bridge the language barrier between the vernaculars of the hip-hop culture and the accepted patterns of speech. (2 female, 2 male)

• Tape by Jose Rivera. A person is led into a dark room by an attendant. The only thing inside is a table, an old tape recorder, a glass, and a pitcher of water. In truth, the dark room is really purgatory, and this person is there to listen to tape recordings of every lie he ever told in his life. He learns that there are ten thousand boxes of tapes. Neither of the characters knows one another at the start but, within ten minutes, they begin to have mutual understanding, which makes it interesting for scene study. (1 male, 1 female or male)

• That All of Us Should be Fed by Eliza Anderson. When a village recluse unexpectedly invites her neighbour over for tea, the conversation moves quickly from the public to the private sphere. Set in Northern New England, 1920. (2 female)

• Two-Part Invention by Michael Hollinger. A meeting between a mousetrap manufacturer and his longtime lightbulb supplier forces both to acknowledge the nascent friendship beneath their quarterly business lunch. (2 male)

• What Wasn't Said, What Didn't Happen by Bob Manning. Michael leads seminars about listening to what goes unsaid in the workplace. With the help of his assistants Kevin and Kim, Michael runs a very successful practice; however, he doesn't always pick up on Kim's unspoken feelings for her boss. (1 female, 2 male)

• What We Do With It by Bruce MacDonald. A father and daughter who have not spoken for several years are finally coming out to discuss some long buried secrets. John claims that Cheryl is mentally ill, but Cheryl is only beginning to remember what life was like with her father. (1 woman, 1 man)

• Your Obituary is a Dance by Bernard Cummings. A young man dying of AIDS returns to his Texas hometown and is reunited with a childhood friend. (1 female, 1 male)