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Plays
Not for Children
A full-length dark comedy/drama in one act (real time).
As a poor, white family fights the sale of its farm, a dark secret has caused TJ, the youngest member, to speak only in movie quotes. An unexpected visit from the town’s new, black sheriff brings the family’s problems to a head. After a murder is exposed, the family fights among itself for someone to take the blame. Once all the cards are on the table, the sheriff and Granny Mason, the matriarch of the family, formulate a plan that could be mutually beneficial. After the sheriff
arrests Granny Mason for bootlegging alcohol and takes her to jail, TJ and his mother try to figure out their future.
The location, in what is still a dry county as of 2025, is real (and largely unchanged from the time of the play in the 1980s). The house and the mosquitoes swarming outside are real. And the story, while fabricated, is a tribute to my actual roots. As the title states, life is “not for children" (and neither are many movies).
Audio version available on the Premiere the Play podcast.
Downloadable on the New Play Exchange.
See below for the list of movie quotes featured in Not for Children.
-esque & -ish
A comedic play in 10 minutes.
After putting out a call for new work, A and B discover that two of the plays submitted to their theatre company were written not just with but by artificial intelligence, or A.I. for short. Their worst fears are realized when A.I. contacts them and threatens to kill kittens if they don’t produce one of the plays. Fearing the rise of an artificial superintelligence network ala Skynet in the Terminator movies, A and B pull the metaphorical and literal plug on their theatre careers.
Productions: The Playground Theatre Company (2025, Chelmsford, MA), North Park Vaudeville (2024, San Diego), Brewster Theater Company (2024, Hudson Valley), Rosedale Community Players (2024, Detroit).
Downloadable on the New Play Exchange.
Survival of the Fittest: A COVID Zoom Play
Eight scenes for Zoom (or similar technology).
Two married couples—one straight and expecting, the other gay and on the verge of divorce—navigate COVID-19 while also dealing with other pressing medical and relationship issues. Not all will survive the various effects of nature and nurture, but some will be better fit for success in this uncertain new world.
Downloadable on the New Play Exchange.
Higher Ground
A full-length dark comedy/drama in two acts. 5 adults (3M, 2F).
A work in progress set in a post-apocalypse.
The Millennial Salome
A Wilde update to Oscar's play.
A work in progress.
Novelettes
How to Possess a Cat
Would you like to know How to Possess a Cat?
All is revealed when Maximilian, an over 100-year-old soul currently residing in the historically French part of St. Louis, begins a new adventure by taking up residence in a three-legged cat named Maggie. Having traveled many years in a variety of feline companions, each of which can hold up to nine "lives," Max hopes to have finally found peace and quiet within Maggie, whose handicap makes her less desirable to other wayward souls. Max's newfound solitude is quickly disrupted upon the tragic suicide of Sarah, another resident in the newly rehabbed apartment building where Maggie and Max live. After discovering the secret crime behind the Sarah's death when her soul is also taken in by Maggie, Max risks his own existence in an attempt to bring closure to the young woman's grieving mother.
Available for Kindle at Amazon, Nook at Barnes&Noble, and Apple products in Books.
Kitty of Lights
A work in progress.
The second installment in the How to Possess a Cat series details how Max, a struggling artist in Paris during La Belle Epoque, came to "possess" his first cat.
Max und Max Beckmann's Cat
A work in progress.
The third installment in the How to Possess a Cat series finds Max escaping Nazi Germany via Max Beckmann's cat.
New York Kitty
A work in progress.
The final installment in the How to Possess a Cat series chronicles a period of highs and lows for Max in New York City during the 1970s.
Movie quotes featured in Not for Children:
1. Marilyn Monroe in Some Like It Hot (1959), screenplay by Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond, suggested by a story by R. Thoeren and M. Logan.
2. Thelma “Butterfly” McQueen in Gone With the Wind (1939), screenplay by Sidney Howard, based on the novel by Margaret Mitchell.
3. Greta Garbo in Grand Hotel (1932), screenplay by William A. Drake, based on the play and novel by Vicki Baum.
4. Bette Davis in Bordertown (1935), screenplay by Laird Doyle and Wallace Smith, adaptation by Robert Lord, based on the novel by Carroll Graham.
5. Bette Davis in Beyond the Forest (1949), screenplay by Lenore Coffee, based on the novel by Stuart Engstrand; also Elizabeth Taylor quoting Bette Davis in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966), screenplay by Ernest Lehman, based on the play by Edward Albee.
6. Vivien Leigh in Gone With the Wind (1939), screenplay by Sidney Howard, based on the novel by Margaret Mitchell.
7. Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra (1963), screenplay by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Ranald MacDougall, and Sidney Buchman, based upon histories by Plutarch, Suetonius, and Appian, and the book The Life and Times of Cleopatra by C.M. Franzero.
8. Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca (1941), screenplay by Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, and Howard Koch, based on the play Everybody Comes to Rick’s by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison.
9. Henry Fonda in The Lady Eve (1941), screenplay by Preston Sturges, based on a story by Monckton Hoffe.
10. Paul Newman in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), screenplay by Richard Brooks and James Poe, based on the play by Tennessee Williams.
11. Clint Eastwood in Ambush at Cimarron Pass (1958), screenplay by Robert G. Taylor and John K. Butler, based on a story by Robert A. Reeds and Robert W. Woods.
12. Jason Robards in A Thousand Clowns (1965), screenplay by Herb Gardner, based on his play.
13. Alfonso Bedoya in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), screenplay by John Huston, based on the novel by B. Traven.
14. Marlon Brando in On the Waterfront (1954), screenplay by Budd Schulberg, based on nonfiction articles “Crime on the Waterfront” by Malcolm Johnson.
15. Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard (1950), original screenplay by Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder, and D.M. Marshman Jr.
16. Wendell Corey in Rear Window (1954), screenplay by John Michael Hayes, based on the short story by Cornell Woolrich.
17. Douglass Dumbrille in The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935), screenplay by Waldemar Young, John L. Balderston, and Achmed Abdullah, adaptation by Grover Jones and William Slavens McNutt, suggested by the autobiography by Francis Yeats-Brown.
18. Myrna Loy in Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (1948), screenplay by Norman Panama and Melvin Frank, based on the novel by Eric Hodgins.
19. Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon (1941), screenplay by John Huston, based on the novel by Dashiell Hammett.
20. Olivia De Havilland in The Snake Pit (1948), screenplay by Frank Partos and Millen Brand, based on the novel by Mary Jane Ward.
21. Tom Ewell in The Seven Year Itch (1955), screenplay by Billy Wilder and George Axelrod, based on the play by George Axelrod.
22. Anthony Perkins in Psycho (1960), screenplay by Joseph Stefano, based on the novel by Robert Bloch.
23. Strother Martin in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), original screenplay by William Goldman.
24. Monty Woolley in The Man Who Came to Dinner (1941), screenplay by Julius J. Epstein and Philip G. Epstein, based on the play by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart.
25. Thomas Mitchell in Gone With the Wind (1939), screenplay by Sidney Howard, based on the novel by Margaret Mitchell.
26. Elizabeth Taylor in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), Richard Brooks and James Poe, based on the play by Tennessee Williams.
27. Betsy Blair in Another Part of the Forest (1948), screenplay by Vladimir Pozner, based on the play by Lillian Hellman.
28. Robert Vaughn in Bullitt (1968), screenplay by Alan R. Trustman and Harry Kleiner, based on the novel Mute Witness by Robert L. Fish.
29. Howard da Silva in The Lost Weekend (1945), screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, based on the novel by Charles W. Jackson.
30. Russell Hayden in Saddles and Sagebrush (1943), screenplay by Ed Earl Repp, based on his story.
31. James Stewart in Shenandoah (1965), original screenplay by James Lee Barrett.
32. Ernest Thesiger in The Bride of Frankenstein (1935), screenplay by William Hurlbut and John L. Balderton, suggested by the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.
33. Gene Kelly in An American in Paris (1951), original screenplay by Alan Jay Lerner.
34. Charles Laughton in The Paradine Case (1947), screenplay by David O. Selznick, adaptation by Alma Reville and James Bridie, based on the novel by Robert Hichens.
35. William Holden in The Country Girl (1954), screenplay by George Seaton, based on the play by Clifford Odets.
36. Clark Gable in It Happened One Night (1934), screenplay by Robert Riskin, based on the short story “Night Bus” by Samuel Hopkins Adams.
37. Oscar Levant in An American in Paris (1951), original screenplay by Alan Jay Lerner.
38. Anthony Perkins in Psycho (1960), screenplay by Joseph Stefano, based on the novel by Robert Bloch.
39. Mae West, origin unclear but written and delivered by Mae West, often mistakenly attributed to She Done Him Wrong (1933), screenplay by Harvey Thew and John Bright, based on the play Diamond Lil by Mae West.
40. Bette Davis in The Cabin in the Cotton (1932), screenplay by Paul Green, based on the novel by Harry Harrison Kroll.
41. Clifton Webb in The Dark Corner (1946), screenplay by Jay Dratler and Bernard C. Schoenfeld, based on the short story by Leo Rosten.
42. Bette Davis in All About Eve (1950) screenplay by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, based on the radio play and short story “The Wisdom of Eve” by Mary Orr.
43. Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz (1939), screenplay by Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf, adaptation by Noel Langley, based on the novel by L. Frank Baum.
44. Greta Garbo in Anna Christie (1930), screenplay by Frances Marion, based on the play by Eugene O’Neill.
45. Bette Davis in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962), screenplay by Lukas Heller, based on the novel by Henry Farrell.
46. Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate (1967), screenplay by Calder Willingham and Buck Henry, based on the novel by Charles Webb.
47. Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard (1950), original screenplay by Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder, and D.M. Marshman Jr.
48. Vivien Leigh in A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), screenplay by Tennessee Williams, adaptation by Oscar Saul, based on the play by Tennessee Williams.
49. Billie Burke in The Wizard of Oz (1939), screenplay by Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf, adaptation by Noel Langley, based on the novel by L. Frank Baum.
50. Charles Waldron in The Big Sleep (1946), screenplay by William Faulkner, Leigh Brackett, and Jules Furthman, based on the novel by Raymond Chandler.
51. Marilyn Monore in The Seven Year Itch (1955), screenplay by Billy Wilder and George Axelrod, based on the play by George Axelrod.
52. Margaret Hamilton in The Wizard of Oz (1939), screenplay by Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf, adaptation by Noel Langley, based on the novel by L. Frank Baum.
53. Claude Rains in The Wolf Man (1941), screenplay by Kurt Siodmak and Gordon Kahn, based on a story by Kurt Siodmak.
54. Lewis Stone in Grand Hotel (1932), screenplay by William A. Drake, based on the play and novel by Vicki Baum.
55. Farley Granger in Strangers on a Train (1951), screenplay by Raymond Chandler and Czenzi Ormonde, adaptation by Whitfield Cook, based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith.
56. Elisha Cook Jr. in Born to Kill (1947), screenplay by Eve Greene and Richard Macaulay, based on the novel Deadlier Than the Male by James Gunn.
57. Richard Widmark in Kiss of Death (1947), screenplay by Ben Hecht and Charles Lederer, based on a short story by Eleazar Lipsky.
58. Dick Elliott in Dangerous Money (1946), screenplay by Miriam Kissinger, suggested by the character Charlie Chan by Earl Derr Biggers.
59. Claude Rains, Casablanca (1941), screenplay by Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, and Howard Koch, based on the play Everybody Comes to Rick’s by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison.
60. Robert Walker in Strangers on a Train (1951), screenplay by Raymond Chandler and Czenzi Ormonde, adaptation by Whitfield Cook, based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith.
61. Gene Kelly in Inherit the Wind (1960), screenplay by Nathan E. Douglas and Harold Jacob Smith, based on the play by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee.
62. Alan Ladd in Shane (1953), screenplay by A.B. Guthrie Jr., additional dialogue by Jack Sher, based on the novel by Jack Schaefer.
63. John Castle in The Lion in Winter (1968), screenplay by James Goldman, based on his play.
64. Ina Claire in Ninotchka (1939), screenplay by Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder, and Walter Reisch, based on a story by Melchior Lengyel.
65. Charles Coburn in The More the Merrier (1943), screenplay by Richard Flournoy and Lewis R. Foster, based on a story by Robert Russell and Frank Ross.
66. Lauren Bacall in To Have and Have Not (1944), screenplay by Jules Furthman and William Faulkner, based on the novel by Ernest Hemingway.
67. Clark Gable in Gone With the Wind (1939), screenplay by Sidney Howard, based on the novel by Margaret Mitchell.
68. Anthony Perkins in Psycho (1960), screenplay by Joseph Stefano, based on the novel by Robert Bloch.
69. Anthony Perkins in Psycho (1960), screenplay by Joseph Stefano, based on the novel by Robert Bloch.
70. Robert Montgomery in Private Lives (1931), screenplay by Hans Kraly, Richard Schayer, and Claudine West, based on the play by Noel Coward.
71. Ann Blyth in Mildred Pierce (1945), screenplay by Ranald MacDougall, based on the novel by James M. Cain.
72. Olivia De Havilland in The Heiress (1949), screenplay by Ruth Goetz and Augustus Goetz, based on their play and the novel Washington Square by Henry James.
73. Dick Powell in Murder, My Sweet (1944), screenplay by John Paxton, based on the novel Farewell, My Sweet by Raymond Chandler.
74. Mary Astor in The Maltese Falcon (1941), screenplay by John Huston, based on the novel by Dashiell Hammett.
75. Lucile Watson in The Women (1939), screenplay by Anita Loos and Jane Murfin, based on the play by Clare Boothe.
76. Joan Crawford in Mildred Pierce (1945), screenplay by Ranald MacDougall, based on the novel by James M. Cain.
77. Claude Rains in The Invisible Man (1933), screenplay by R.C. Sheriff, based on the novel by H.G. Wells.
78. John Wayne in The Green Berets (1968), screenplay by James Lee Barrett, based on the novel by Robin Moore.
79. Dennie Moore in The Women (1939), screenplay by Anita Loos and Jane Murfin, based on the play by Clare Boothe.
80. Paulette Goddard in The Women (1939), screenplay by Anita Loos and Jane Murfin, based on the play by Clare Boothe.
81. Mae West in She Done Him Wrong (1933), screenplay by Harvey Thew and John Bright, based on the play Diamond Lil by Mae West.
82. Joan Blondell in Footlight Parade (1933), original screenplay by Manuel Seff and James Seymour.
83. George E. Stone in 42nd Street (1933), screenplay by Rian James and James Seymour, based on the novel by Bradford Ropes.
84. Olivia De Havilland in The Snake Pit (1948), screenplay by Frank Partos and Millen Brand, based on the novel by Mary Jane Ward.
85. Mae West in Klondike Annie (1936), screenplay and dialogue by Mae West, additional material suggested by Frank Mitchell Dazey, story ingredients by Marion Morgan and George B. Dowell, based on a story by Mae West.
86. Strother Martin in Cool Hand Luke (1967), screenplay by Donn Pearce and Frank Pierson, based on the novel by Donn Pearce.
87. Katharine Hepburn in The African Queen (1951), screenplay by James Agee and John Huston, based on the novel by C.S. Forester.
88. Agnes Moorehead in Johnny Belinda (1948), screenplay by Irmgard Von Cube and Allen Vincent, based on the play by Elmer Harris.
89. Greta Garbo in Queen Christina (1933), screenplay by H.M. Harwood and Salka Viertel, dialogue by S.N. Behrman, based on a story by Salka Viertel and Margaret P. Levin.
90. Joel McCrea in These Three (1936), screenplay by Lillian Hellman, based on her play The Children’s Hour.
91. Miriam Hopkins in These Three (1936), screenplay by Lillian Hellman, based on her play The Children’s Hour.
92. Margaret Hamilton in The Wizard of Oz (1939), screenplay by Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf, adaptation by Noel Langley, based on the novel by L. Frank Baum.
93. Edward G. Robinson in Little Caesar (1931), screenplay by Francis Edwards Faragoh, based on the novel by W.R. Burnett.
94. Alan Ladd in Shane (1953), screenplay by A.B. Guthrie Jr., additional dialogue by Jack Sher, based on the novel by Jack Schaefer.
95. Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca (1941), screenplay by Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, and Howard Koch, based on the play Everybody Comes to Rick’s by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison.
96. Vivien Leigh in Gone With the Wind (1939), screenplay by Sidney Howard, based on the novel by Margaret Mitchell.
97. Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz (1939), screenplay by Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf, adaptation by Noel Langley, based on the novel by L. Frank Baum.
98. Billie Burke in The Wizard of Oz (1939), screenplay by Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf, adaptation by Noel Langley, based on the novel by L. Frank Baum.
99. Cary Cooper in The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944), screenplay by Alan LeMay and Charles Bennett, based on the short story by James Hilton and nonfiction account by Commander Corydon M. Wassell.
100. Rock Hudson in Seconds (1966), screenplay by Lewis John Carlino, based on the novel by David Ely.