Comedy

Aimee – I'm not sure I fully understand what's going on here. While reading it it came across as a really surface level political diatribe against the patriot act/ American anti-French sentiment. Which, I mean is cool and all, I'm as anti-patriot act/pro-French as the next liberal arts student, but it seems kind of trite here, maybe it wasn't in 2003. I recognize that on a deeper level this is about love, but that doesn't come out until halfway through the play. I don't know how easy it is for an audience to forgive even five minutes of triteness, even if it is clever. I guess though that if you want to play with that, ten minute plays are the place to do it.

Anything for You – A fun, quick ten minute play with witty dialogue and good realistic character confessions that are heartfelt but not overly dramatic. Stepping away from the playwriter role, I do have to say that I'm kind of bothered by the fact that if this was about a straight coupling, people probably wouldn't find it funny, or the play wouldn't work. The playwright very cleverly plays with this though, starting off with the "humorous" proposition that Lynette and Gail have an affair because it's sort of non-threatening to their husbands, and then ending with the reveal that, yes, for Gail it is serious, and lesbian relations can carry the same weight of straight relations. Very clever of the playwright to anticipate why the beginning of the play is objectionable. Again, this might be something that only works in 10 minute plays, because hey, they're only ten minutes, so you can give your audience something they find objectionable for 8 minutes, and then give them resolution and they're not likely to desert you.

Duet for Bear and Dog – I rather enjoy this one, largely because I've always believed in theater as something of marvelous imagination. Ladder as tree? Check. Actors playing a bear and a dog but talking like regular humans? Love it, I'm there. Interestingly enough, like the previous two plays it ends on a more serious note, but it's even more of quick turn here. I didn't get it till rereading the play, but it seems to be about this contrast and grayed line between the domestic and the wild, as Dog's final line is of wilderness but Bear's is of a sort of wild matronly domestication. I like the contrast. Seemingly the play would be incomplete without this last soliloquy. Which, I mean is weird given that this is a comedy, and a ten minute one at that. We admit that comedies don't need a point, but sometimes they're made better by them. Weird.

The Philadelphia – This is the only one of the ten minute plays that I would argue is comedic throughout. And yes, it's very David Ives, and therefore very witty/poignant/blah blah blah, but somehow in contrast to the other three it seems a little flatter for being more of a straight comedy. (Though I mean, the last line does leave us some philosophic gristle to chew on I guess) It seems like there's a difference between "sketch" and "10-minute comedy play" that's hard to pinpoint, though seemingly crucial.