FORWORD TO:
TEN-MINUTE PLAYS FROM ACTORS THEATRE OF LOUIVILLE

How is this possible when character and plot are squeezed by the vise of the form? Well, it tends to illuminate moments of profound change and realization. It doesn't usually lead to the glancing blow but the knockout punch. It has teeth and claws as a satirical delivery system. Its very limitations often lead away from strict realism and its authors seem unabashed in going for the big statement. It has a cocky, aggressive, rueful tone that charms. It has a win, lose, who cares attitude that tends to leave prudence in the dust. I like it.

As an actor's or director's teaching tool, it's plainly valuable. These pieces have, in the main, been commissioned for young actors so that they can deal with structure, character and theme while playing parts of their own age. These short works demand much of the preparation a longer role might take, but have the advantages of minimal production requirements and shorter rehearsal periods.

For the young actor, they make demands but don't overwhelm. For the young director, they create the panoply of tasks and responsibilities in miniature. For the young playwright, they show the mechanism like seeing the watchworks through a glass case. As classroom work, in my opinion, they beat scene study hollow because there is no referring to parts of a play you aren't producing. They are a whole, albeit a small whole.

You can produce eight of them and delight an audience; you can produce one of them and allow a classroom breakthrough; you can read all of them and learn more about the craft of playwriting than you ever thought possible.

Plus, they can tell a story that forty minutes or two hours would have ruined, and we've all gotten stuck with that guy at a party.

Jon Jory
Producing Director
Actors Theatre of Louiville