Dale Perreault

Dale Perreault

Dale Perreault is a dramatist living in New York City and has written over 50 plays. His works have been presented at the Samuel Beckett and Harold Clurman Theaters, Dixon Place, Ensemble Studio Theatre, the Atlantic Theater, Naked Angels, the Dramatists Guild and the Flea. Other credits include works in Chicago, Los Angeles, Denver and Prague. He is featured in the ContentMint podcast series Five Minutes or...
Dale Perreault is a dramatist living in New York City and has written over 50 plays. His works have been presented at the Samuel Beckett and Harold Clurman Theaters, Dixon Place, Ensemble Studio Theatre, the Atlantic Theater, Naked Angels, the Dramatists Guild and the Flea. Other credits include works in Chicago, Los Angeles, Denver and Prague. He is featured in the ContentMint podcast series Five Minutes or Less in Episodes 1, 4, and the June 2022 Relaunch. He brought his play Euterpe to Professor Mary Stieber's Greek Mythology class at Cooper Union for a reading and discussion. His play Interbetween was staged in a vintage subway car at the New York Transit Museum by the Modern-Day Griot Theatre Company. His radio play Sculpitekt aired on over 100 stations nationally via the Shoestring Radio Theatre network. This play was also staged on a bill with work by Mac Wellman and Lumberob in a benefit for Staging Ground magazine. He participated in Paula Vogel's Ubu Bake-Off on Presidents' Day 2018. His script Ubu Rot is archived in Yale's Beinecke Library American Literature Collection. He is a five time Semi-Finalist for the Eugene O'Neill National Playwrights Conference. He was a 2015 PlayPenn Semi-Finalist and a Finalist for the 2009 Princess Grace Playwriting Award. He audited 85 theater productions for the New York State Council on the Arts and is proud to have been part of the process bringing public funds to small theater companies with vision. He has worked at two radio stations and three libraries. He wrote the text for a Samuel Beckett centenary commemoration at Cooper Union Library, curated a Great Hall Speakers exhibit and one-day Dada pop-up there, and is the Project Liaison for the Voices from the Great Hall digital archive of recordings of a vast array of noteworthy Cooper Union speechmaking through the decades. He's a long-standing member of the Dramatists Guild. His playwriting debut was at Holy Trinity Elementary School in his hometown of Somersworth, NH.

Plays

  • New Milieu
    With the polar caps melting and the seas about to turn to lemonade, Cordial enlists Mr. and Mrs. Moot to remake Moot Farm into a Fourier Society abounding in work pleasure, Opera Cabal, the butterfly passion, various corteges, plumes, and the 4 significant apples of history - on the way to Harmony. Another Utopia of plenty, the supermarket Eden Fair, is within walking distance and has air conditioning.
  • Harpsody
    Miser Harpagon returns to bedevil the dying Madame de La Touche into signing over her assets to him rather than her faithless godson.
  • Euterpe
    Hesiod has written his Theogony without invoking the Muses, who demand acknowledgment. Muse of Music Euterpe intervenes on behalf of her sisters. Their mother Mnemosyne (Memory) attempts to appease their fury.
  • Aigu
    In the French spa town of Aigu, Réjuve and le Docteur take the waters and discourse on ailments, maladies, and thermal hydrology. Their discreet tryst is interrupted by a macabre Bluebeard-themed tour stopping at the wellspring. The notorious Duke has become apocryphally associated with the town, and his ubiquity threatens to overrun the idyllic charm of scenic and psychic landscapes.
  • Jot Respeck
    The annual town meeting in Grover's Corners, New Hampshire. Tonight, the Stage Manager must take a seat, as the Moderator and his gavel are in charge of the proceedings. A chorus of townfolk vote on bridge repair, dump hours on Satiddy mornings and who might possibly be the best candidate to administer the new Grover's Corners Historical Society. A special appearance by Mrs. Stage Manager.
  • Woefulest
    A skeletal benefactor presides over an annual banquet he had bequeathed funding for, a spread populated by a beset table of malcontents vying for the garland wreath of most wretched. Loosely adapted from Nathaniel Hawthorne's story "The Christmas Banquet."
  • Your Frequency Modulation
    In 1993 New York City, radio station Allegro FM plays bouncy classical music and consistently bests rival Andante FM within key dayparts in many recent quarterly ratings books, but radio has been known to be a volatile medium.
  • Telos
    In the Athenian agora, Tragus hopes to revive the tradition of Socratic/Platonic dialogue with Turgides, whose tragedy didn't fare well at the recent City Dionysia festival. The Muses of Tragedy and Comedy, Melpomene and Thalia offer trenchant dramaturgical input. A Chorus of Agora Echoes chimes in. Prize winner Telos grandly enters to humiliate Turgides further.
  • A Death Bust of a Sigh
    At the End of the Iron Age, a married couple bickers over finances and a Penny Man pauses to take a chin rest while shoveling their accumulated pennies.
  • Tearoom Dada
    In 1922 Prague, 337 year old E.M. and a 1 year old R.U.R. meet at the Obecní dům café for an afternoon Tarot reading of three cards from the Greater and Lesser Arcana.
  • Commodore Nutt Toy Theater
    Amid the Cosmorama of mid-19th century New York, Publicity and Hyperbole scatter the Penny Press with wartime amusement in boldface and exclamation points. And relate the tall travels and expansive life in miniature of George Washington Morrison Nutt, the newer Tom Thumb and latest sensation of the American Museum, who has inspired his own polka and variety of lettuce. For toy theater, with 23 characters in...
    Amid the Cosmorama of mid-19th century New York, Publicity and Hyperbole scatter the Penny Press with wartime amusement in boldface and exclamation points. And relate the tall travels and expansive life in miniature of George Washington Morrison Nutt, the newer Tom Thumb and latest sensation of the American Museum, who has inspired his own polka and variety of lettuce. For toy theater, with 23 characters in 23 short scenes and many changes of backdrop. Plus a fire, Lincoln and laughing gas.
  • Colour Dictionary
    A retrospective of the works of painter Basil Hallward is due to open at the Lippincott Gallery. Dame Sibyl Vane, her brother, Alan Campbell, and others have RSVP'd yes to attend the opening reception. Dorian Gray is a maybe. In short, all the dead people from Oscar Wilde's novel are alive. But the art restorer Stoddart is still having some issues with Basil's turbulent portrait of Mr. Gray...
    A retrospective of the works of painter Basil Hallward is due to open at the Lippincott Gallery. Dame Sibyl Vane, her brother, Alan Campbell, and others have RSVP'd yes to attend the opening reception. Dorian Gray is a maybe. In short, all the dead people from Oscar Wilde's novel are alive. But the art restorer Stoddart is still having some issues with Basil's turbulent portrait of Mr. Gray. Lippincott's consternation is echoed by gallery employees Ward and Lock. Basil visits the gallery and muses on his work and that time many years prior.
  • Theater Unknown
    A theater conference held in simultaneous conference rooms. Audience members choose the order of rooms they'll visit, among formats of panel discussion, interview, paper presentation, essay, proposal, workshop, synopsis, ritual, excursion, manifesto. A late attendee misses key happenings arriving too late or leaving too soon. Conference speakers wear tags with names of obscure playwrights. 21...
    A theater conference held in simultaneous conference rooms. Audience members choose the order of rooms they'll visit, among formats of panel discussion, interview, paper presentation, essay, proposal, workshop, synopsis, ritual, excursion, manifesto. A late attendee misses key happenings arriving too late or leaving too soon. Conference speakers wear tags with names of obscure playwrights. 21 characters, at least. 11 rooms, at minimum.
  • Beatitude I
    A play on ice, with all the characters on skates in counterclockwise motion. Two diplomats attempt to redraw desert borders and craft a potential Ice Treaty. Lumpenpress chase Beatitude I on her daily skate to see if she'll fall, as she eludes them with her Minister of the Interior and receives musical gifts from three of her court composers, the Masters of the Queen's Musick. A terminally excluded...
    A play on ice, with all the characters on skates in counterclockwise motion. Two diplomats attempt to redraw desert borders and craft a potential Ice Treaty. Lumpenpress chase Beatitude I on her daily skate to see if she'll fall, as she eludes them with her Minister of the Interior and receives musical gifts from three of her court composers, the Masters of the Queen's Musick. A terminally excluded Q Composer laments the state of his career and drives the ice-clearing Zamboni.
  • Sculpitekt
    At the corner of Souvenir and Expectation, Sculpitekt leads a radio announcer, Mason and Aether Decanter on a tour of his new and sustainable dream building - an apex of living unparalleled in functionality, his own stamp on Neo-Revivalism.
  • Ubu Rot
    Ubu is examined in his Office Ovum by Dr. Jarry, 'pataphysician. Ubu regards himself as The Exception. Dr. Jarry specializes in exceptionals. Ubu's trio of Grand Marshals engages in frantic enabling, but no one spews for Ubu but Ubu.
  • Syntagion
    Shall we start? Is everybody here? Is someone out there covering? Is there enough oxygen? Meeting culture. What was decided? We should do that. We means you. We're a focus group. Us, focus? Tomato juice. Brain scans. Tourists. Mirrors. Just keep talking fast. Let Joy continue.
  • Ubiq Equiv
    In an archive, a researcher listens to a recording of a memorial service. Since the archive is about to close, she fast forwards through fragments of eulogies. Traces of a past virus spread through the remarks of each speaker. A monodrama for radio, with a female actor taking all 12 roles.
  • Qnisphere
    In October 1946, United Nations delegate Eleanor Roosevelt and Elektro the robot from the 1939 World's Fair spar over human rights, anthropomorphic rights, the post-war landscape and presidential pet Fala during General Assembly sessions held at Flushing Meadows, Queens, prior to the opening of the UN permanent headquarters in Manhattan.
  • Library Ballet
    Something is wrong. Something is misshelved. A morn to midnight workday in the career of Laurel Dimes, Library Director, as she navigates staff, patrons, the physical plant, a Tour of Reference, a Dead Composer's Wife, salespeople, a parrot, a Narrator, and her own Head Librarian sanity. Library of Congress Subject Headings are the least of her concerns in this Librarynth. A detail oriented world, yes...
    Something is wrong. Something is misshelved. A morn to midnight workday in the career of Laurel Dimes, Library Director, as she navigates staff, patrons, the physical plant, a Tour of Reference, a Dead Composer's Wife, salespeople, a parrot, a Narrator, and her own Head Librarian sanity. Library of Congress Subject Headings are the least of her concerns in this Librarynth. A detail oriented world, yes, but not very orderly and not very quiet.
  • Metronome
    Seven ages in a life - I. Dolly Shot (age 4) - II. Dolly O'Clock (age 14) - III. Dolly Toxic (age 24) - IV. Dolly Logic (age 34) - V. Dolly Chronic (age 44) - VI. Dolly Economy (age 74) - VII. Dolly Province (age 104)
  • On the Eve
    adapted for the stage from the novel by Ivan Turgenev
  • X Circa
    Helga Scrimm is expanding her art gallery empire with a new branch at the airport. She is currently experiencing delays, as one of her commissioned artists is stalling on his install. Arrivals. Departures. Unexpected rough air. Time and place are one. JFK. LGA. ETA. TBA.
  • Delicacy
    Felled by too much syrup at a political fundraiser, the Abbot Severance is visited by several of his disciples, whose problems he addresses with glib attention. As each leaves depleted by his words, he regains strength. Amid the social bustle of a Christmas Eve fundraiser at the Crêperie, he navigates the growing political chasm between the Right to Pursue Happiness Party and the incendiary Anti-Estrangement...
    Felled by too much syrup at a political fundraiser, the Abbot Severance is visited by several of his disciples, whose problems he addresses with glib attention. As each leaves depleted by his words, he regains strength. Amid the social bustle of a Christmas Eve fundraiser at the Crêperie, he navigates the growing political chasm between the Right to Pursue Happiness Party and the incendiary Anti-Estrangement Party. An explosion there compels him to penetrate beyond the surface of his life, culminating in Act III's surreal parade of more expansive visions for himself and his society.
  • Chowder
    A family primal scene is resolved a tad too quickly for the author who enters in hope of stirring up more conflict.
  • Orbis Iota
    In the firmament, a tuning fork pings some planets and decimates others. Meanwhile, the tin-foiled Baked Potato in Space opts to divert its exploratory mission, much to the consternation of Destination Central, and encounters a cabbage planet with brussel sprout moons, the two-faced sphere Erst/eRST, a docking clone, and a series of split infinities.
  • Vunners
    Five people with the same name meet for deadpan All-You-Can-Eat. Do they have anything in common except Emmett Vunners?
  • Reincarnage
    Nursula and the Doctorly are both afraid of Hospuss the Short Hair who has a predilection for hissing, thumping his tail, clawing catheter bags, vomiting on blankets, sitting on the chests of dying patients and emitting a lethal purr.
  • Flux
    Delia and Sheila overlap in the past, future and theatrical present of Human Resources and workplace paranoia.
  • Zoether
    Three mediums gather in a reception room in a hotel by the sea during a mediums convention in the hope of communicating with their recently deceased medium friend.