10 Minute Plays

A Bowl of Soup:

This was my favorite of the four plays we had to read, and upon reading the first page I did not expect it to be. I liked this play because I could not see where it was going or what its significance was until the very end. It was interesting to ponder why Rob was silent in the beginning, as Eddie seemed to be slightly patronizing to him, and obligated to look after him. The relationship Eddie created thorough the monologue in which he was trying to make conversation with Rob, proved to be a powerful one. They were brothers, spent a childhood together, and this seems infinitely important to Eddie. One question I would have from a directorial standpoint would be how to portray Rob with equal importance to Eddie, even though Rob is silent for the majority of the play. I guess if Eddie is directing everything toward Rob and giving him the majority of focus (with some exceptions of tending to the soup) this would work out beautifully. Everything finally makes sense in the end when Eddie brings up David; and when Rob finally speaks, his words resonate far more than Eddies, as they get to the point instead of trying to work around it or work into it.


That Midnight Rodeo:


This play, like the first, opens with a topic that avoids the underlying issue. Through this, however, one can see where the couple's interest, time, money, and effort goes: into Sonny and the Rodeo. However, unlike the previous play, a conflict between the two characters is introduced: Bo wants Cindy to keep the child, and Cindy wants to get the abortion. Cindy is in a catch 22, as she is afraid she will kill the child, and that she will not love it, but she is not giving herself a chance. It is interesting, as there is no right or wrong answer to her dilemma. The concept of a turning point in conversation seems especially pertinent in short plays as there is so little time in which things happen. I also liked how in this play nothing was concluded: how the audience will never know what Cindy chose to do.


The Man Who Couldn't Dance


This play differs from the first two as the serious situation is already set up when the play stars, it is not unraveled later (though it is elaborated upon.) This play is really theme heavy. It begins with Eric's bitter cynicisms about the situation (which are actually quite honest and amusing: observations of a "desired" adult life) and fades into a deep conversation between him and Gail. I would say the theme to this play is the concept of choices: is making a choice okay if it might be the wrong choice or is it better to make no choices at all? We see two characters who have taken these two different options, the metaphor for this being the ability to dance. Eric finds it better to not make any choices, to not dance at all as he is afraid he cannot. Another theme in this is asking what it means to be human. Like the previous play, what happens to resolve the plot is left up to the audience's imagination.


The Road That Leads Us Here


I did not like this play. It was really weird, and I just didn't like it. I think this is the first play for this class in which I could barely find anything I liked. For some reason these three brothers who travel across America every year refer to their father as the Eminent, as if they were part of a cult. It is really impossible to tell what is going on in the first page, other than that these three characters have been traveling. I guess describing beautiful places can be interesting, but is this really a good enough story to make a play out of? I guess this shows the diversity to the world, but it is really unclear what sort of themes this brings up. My only stab would be the playwright is trying to say that the beauty of the world is no good unless people lead lives in it. But it took me forever to think of that, and it should not have been that hard. Yeah, I was not a fan of this one.