Update: TRIAL BY FIRE opens Feb. 7, 2025, for three performances at Kent State University.

This play premiered in January 2024, with six consecutive sell-outs with Akron School of the Arts at Firestone High School. Multiple media outlets covered the play's development (see attached links.). This play is now available for other schools, specifically strong high school and college programs.

LOGLINE: When word leaks that new Women’s Studies teacher Georgia Grimm has been allowing her high school students access to books on the state’s new “banned” list, five teen girls rise up with a plan to save her job and reputation. As the pressure mounts for Georgia to resign or be fired, her students try to stop town leaders from burning books leading to one student being injured in the flames. With a 5 p.m. deadline looming before Ohio’s conservative governor looks to make a national example out of this young woman of color, Dan Shaw, an 11th-hour mediator, is called in to end the growing PR nightmare but only if he can unravel what's really at stake.

SYNOPSIS: Young teacher Georgia Grimm must fight for her job after news and social media reports indicate she's been using banned books to teach Women's Studies at Knights Academy. This prestigious all-boys academy only recently allowed girls to attend.

With protestors outside the school and the fall election only days away, Ohio's Governor plans to make an example out of Georgia as to what's wrong with the American education system.

Facing a 5 p.m. deadline to resign or be fired and with the governor in route to make a speech at the school, Georgia and her students face an interrogation from Dan Shaw, a career detective brought in as an 11th-hour mediator who specializes in persuading others to give up and admit they were wrong.

Can Georgia withstand the pressure to resign to save her career? Or will Dan learn what's really behind her fight for her students to have access to the classics?

Note: FIrst 25 pages of this full-length play are available for download. Those interested in reviewing the entire play should contact the playwright. eric@ericmansfieldwrites.com.