Germaine Shames

*Fresh Reads 2023 First Place Winner
* Scripts in Play 2025

A lonely, overworked medical resident buys a state-of-the-art female pleasure robot, with which he begins an intimate relationship — until his mother discovers the lifelike gynoid sprawled, half-naked, on his bed.

A tender family dramedy about technology, taboos, and the lengths to which the human need for connection may drive us, The Robotics of Love and Longing ponders that AI augurs for the future of romance and procreation.

Roll over, George Bernard Shaw!

Highlight Reel: https://youtu.be/CswwzM8MF4I
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Pegasus Theatre's Artistic Director, Kurt Kleinmann, awarded the Fresh Reads 1st Place prize to The Robotics of Love and Longing for "its sense of humor and its exploration of what it means to find true connection in a high-tech society."

*Fulton Festival of New Works: Stories of Diversity, Fulton Theatre, 2023
*Honorable Mention, Jewish Plays Project , 2022

In the segregated, elitist world of 1950s amateur lawn tennis, two outsiders — one an African-American, and the other a Jewish Englishwoman — join forces to dominate centre court and revolutionize the sport.

Althea Gibson and Angela Buxton were not only unbeatable doubles partners but lifelong friends. While their winning partnership, cut short by injury, lasted only a year, their mutual affection would prolong Althea’s life and give Angela’s renewed purpose. Two barrier-breaking female champions, their example has much to teach us today about overcoming discrimination and transcending personal tragedy.

SWEET SPOT explores their climb to the peak of their sport, decline into relative obscurity, and hard-won coming-to-terms through the power of a singular friendship.

A Note From the Playwright: Were it not for Althea Gibson and Angela Buxton, there would be no Williams sisters, no Raducanu or Fernandez. By telling this story of two tennis pioneers united by their minority status, but divided by race, I do not mean to suggest an equivalency in their struggles, only to present their friendship in as honest a light as I can. In doing so, at critical junctures, I have taken the liberty of making the unspoken explicit. Not everyone will agree with my point of view. I offer it in a spirit of racial healing and the hope of a brave new tomorrow for female athletes.

THE EXPERIMENT follows the lives of two 1950s housewives and the pioneering neuroscientist who engaged them as test subjects in early LSD research. In and out of sync with changing times, these oddly-paired explorers examine and reconfigure their values, commitments and wildest dreams.

In the 1950s, LSD, a promising alternative to lobotomies, internment and daily drugging, enjoyed a therapeutic heyday. Then came the '60s. Psychedelics left the laboratory and spilled onto the streets, giving rise to a defiant counter-culture. Criminalized by the Nixon administration in 1971, LSD research came to an abrupt halt.

THE EXPERIMENT, a theatrical crazy-quilt of period icons from Marilyn Monroe to Albert Einstein chronicles the meteoric rise and fall of one forward-looking psychiatric clinic and the people whose lives were forever transformed by a single dose of a humble fungus.

A Personal Note From the Playwright:

My mother was a troubled woman who depended on a Byzantine healthcare system to ease her mental anguish and bipolarity. Shuttling from one doctor to another, popping a rainbow assortment of pills, she finally landed in a psychiatric clinic, where she willingly underwent twenty shock treatments. This brutal therapy left her docile and childlike, no less adrift than before, and certainly no more fit to navigate life’s challenges. Had Richard Nixon not declared war on Timothy Leary, might my mother have gained access to more enlightened and humane treatment? Might she have seen beyond the “pink ghetto” that imprisoned her and enjoyed a more purposeful and fulfilling life? THE EXPERIMENT ponders the human cost of politically motivated prohibitions on psychedelic-based therapies.

A Bechdel Test-compliant reimagining of the eponymous novel by William Faulkner.

When New Orleans' foremost patron of the arts invites a ragtag assortment of French Quarter artists on a yachting party along Lake Pontchartrain to entertain her impulsive teenage niece, catastrophe strikes, forcing young and old, rich and poor, to confront hunger, thirst and their own mortality.

As a mysterious series of disappearances rocks the boat, frivolity turns survival and the barriers of class and social status give way. The passengers, some for the first time in their lives, delve beneath the small talk to ponder shocking truths. Rescued by a maligned and unrewarded hero, the yachting party resumes its merrymaking — not suspecting that the greatest peril of all lurks ahead of them.

At once a coming-of-age and coming-to-terms-with-age story, Mosquitoes showcases Faulkner's keen understanding of class differences and respect for the underdog.

Video trailer: https://youtu.be/mi-reZhypWc

An elderly wildlife carer returns home from the Australian Outback to the American Midwest to set her affairs in order—only to become embroiled in a family tragedy that could cost her the remainder of her life.

The Nashes, upwardly mobile conservatives from Ohio, doggedly pursue the American dream. As moral standards blur around them and acts of betrayal and brutality shake their lives, the certainties that have been the bedrock of their collective identity give way. When an enigmatic great-aunt comes to visit, long buried resentments surface, and with them questions. Does true altruism exist? Are humans, at once, the most altruistic and most cruel species?

Altruism, a story of quiet heroism and struggle amid privilege told through the eyes of Imani Nash, a clear-sighted teen of biracial heritage, reminds us that it is the small acts that confer immortality.

View a video teaser: https://youtu.be/DjA2o-H5ZzM
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A Note From the Playwright: Years ago, I sojourned in Australia as a correspondent to write a series of articles on Aboriginal life. While visiting a nature reserve, a mother kangaroo hopped up to me, gently nestled her head against my stomach, and clung to me with her sinewy arms. The joey leapt from her pouch and capered in circles at my feet. Of all my memories of Australia, this is the most compelling. What was that innocent, trusting creature trying to tell me? Altruism, the play, is my best guess.

When an underpaid Jewish World Lit' professor in the throes of a midlife crisis lands a gig ghostwriting lyrics for a young Black hip-hop producer, racial and sexual tensions collide.

In the gritty, vibrant culture of American hip-hop, an unlikely pair of strivers brave the minefield of Black-white confrontation to capitalize on the one bankable commodity they've got: words. Will their collaboration meet with success or end up one more casualty of a system that values hype over truth? Can music bridge the social barriers of race and class? Can friendship?

With rhymed invective and thwarted love, BARS exploresthe personal cost of racism to those, Black and white, caught in its web.

View a video teaser: https://youtu.be/5h_2rFhO6ls

*The playwright acknowledges the support of the Playwrights Realm, Play Incubation Collective, and Frank Silvera Writers' Workshop in developing this play.

Four thespians, longtime friends, test the bounds of artistic expression under the watchful eye of an autocratic regime. When they stage a controversial play, the consequences exceed their worst nightmare and they are branded "terrorists." With only creativity as their arsenal, they scheme, lie and conjure their way back to (relative) freedom. A darkly comedic fable about the fragility of creative freedom and what one seemingly powerless band of misfits willingly risks in its service.

INSPIRATION/MOTIVATION

The battle for freedom of creative expression is never entirely won. As Oskar Eustis once said, "Truth comes from the collision of different ideas, and theatre plays an essential role in showing us that truth." I wrote The Joy of Theatre because democracy needs theatre as much as theatre needs democracy.

When I learned that two female Russian feminists, a playwright and director, had been incarcerated for "justifying terrorism," I read the offending play and quickly realized that the charges brought against these two free thinkers were a total sham. The injustice of their incarceration and subsequent conviction not only incensed me, but filled me with horror. Imagine being an artist under a regime that may, arbitrarily, at any moment, persecute you for a poem, an image, or a scene acted upon a stage! This play is the waking nightmare induced by a dictator's latest twisted act of vengeance.

Whole generations have read the global bestseller, The Prophet, but how much do they know about its enigmatic author, Kahlil Gibran? Less known still is the woman responsible for his fame, Mary Haskell, a Southern social reformer decades ahead of her time.

Two impressionable actors, Salim and Lucy, land the roles of a lifetime: Khalil Gibran and Mary Haskell. As rehearsals progress, the actors grapple with their unpredictable characters, the meaning of love, and the stage kiss to end all. Offstage, a tragedy strikes the play’s director, casting into doubt Gibran’s and Haskell’s lofty, if unrealized, ideals. From infatuation to heartache to conviction, each character is tested in his/her quest to seize the higher love.

These parallel love stories, separated by a century, underscore the timelessness of humankind's search for transcendence through connection—and the barriers of race and religion that make its attainment so rare.

Winner of four workshop competitions and a finalist for the Trustus Award, The Higher Love has been called “an impressive literary sleight of hand and heart” by novelist Isabella Ides. “The double dramatization/intersection of the actors and their characters was a sublime and deep metaphor mirroring the way lovers mythologize themselves.” Tania Sammons, former curator of the Gibran Collection, writes, “Germaine Shames captures the essence of Mary and Kahlil and brings depth to their story in her wonderful new play.”

*ThinkTank TYA New Play Festival, 2021

Who will ever forget 2020? For many, it was a year of terror and heartache. But for Sam Baron, a precocious preadolescent with her eyes on the stars, 2020 brought wonder and hope, beginning with the sudden appearance of an older brother she never knew she had.

Amateur astronomer, Sam, turns 13 on a year of 13 moons. As each successive moon waxes and wanes, she confronts a new revelation and learns that life on planet Earth may be every bit as awesome and mysterious as a night in outer space. An interracial cosmic coming-of-age story about secrets, forgiveness, and the power of even the most mismatched family to re-invent itself.

"Wry, warm, and full of wonder, Year of Thirteen Moons is perfect for student actors ready to explore complex characters, big emotions, and the quiet power of connection." Gitelman and Good Publishers

In the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge, three extraordinary individuals, living and dead, probe the sprawling steel colossus in search of the American soul.

In the 1870s, Emily Warren Roebling, wife of the bridge’s paralyzed chief engineer, moved to 110 Columbia Heights to take over the day-to-day supervision and diplomacy needed to complete the project. A half century later, Jazz Age poet, Hart Crane, occupied this same apartment as he labored on his seminal poem, The Bridge. Peggy Baird Cowley, a free-spirited painter and Hart’s one heterosexual lover, often visited the poet there. In 110 COLUMBIA HEIGHTS, a comi-tragic marriage of fact and fantasy, their lives intersect as they grapple for a toehold in an age of frayed morals and accelerating flux.

Part love letter, part indictment, 110 COLUMBIA HEIGHTS plumbs the dark recesses and soaring heights of a country still struggling to live up to its own rhetoric, and whose future, now as then, hangs in the balance.

View a video teaser: https://youtu.be/oI1GhbZLGSU

A shy young poet, Denis Stone, goes to a house party at Crome hellbent on wooing his hosts' niece, only to find that a dashing, if jaded, painter has arrived first. Spurned by the woman he ardently pursues, Denis grapples with the fickleness of desire and discovers that one’s true soulmate may be hiding in clear view. Huxley, writing in the aftermath of the Great War and Spanish Flu, depicts a generation rent by loss and primed to break free of social constraints. Amid a crossfire of wayward pheromones and barbed repartee, a young deaf woman emerges as the mute voice of wisdom and Denis’ redeeming love.

For demo's, creator bios and more: https://germainewrites.wixsite.com/virginity
For introduction and a sampler of songs: https://youtu.be/46NFZRLPsoI?si=Rw84E_wpFbtPDB_T

*Score available upon request

Based on the Edith Wharton short stories, "The Muse’s Tragedy" and "The Touchstone"

The young biographer of a renowned poet chances upon the poet’s much talked-about Muse during a sojourn in Venice. They spend a week together — ostensibly, to collaborate on a volume of verse. Instead, romance blossoms. Ten years later, the biographer returns to Venice with his young socialite wife, having sold his Muse’s love letters to pay for the honeymoon.

Can a Muse inspire the most sublime sonnets in the history of poetry and yet not be loved?

Highlights: https://youtu.be/s7BAi5Mz2YU
Video trailer: https://youtu.be/015BuN_A7Pw
OperaWire Announcement: https://operawire.com/jessica-fishenfeld-teresa-buchholz-amber-evans-to…
music: Paul Scherer libretto: Germaine Shames

🏆 American Prize winner 🏆Marian Anderson Prize in Social Justice 🏆 New Score Showcase winner
Composer: Jane Kozhevnikova

In 1950, Milada Horakova, champion of women's rights and democracy, became one of the first victims of the Czech Communists' scripted show trials. She refused to follow the script.

By the time the terror subsided, Czechoslovakia had tried, condemned and executed over 200 dissenters.
Of this number, only one was female – Milada Horakova.

Eighteen years later, Horakova's daughter escaped the Iron Curtain to join her father in the United States. More than half a century would pass before Czech State Security released her condemned mother's last letters.

Highlight Reel: https://youtu.be/Jy9y3pJnYYE?si=sfRdIgc_AZYpEZ9T

*Musicals NOW, Piper Productions, 2022
*Florida Festival of New Musicals, Winter Park Playhouse, 2022
*Colorado New Musicals Festival, 2021

When a second-tier American art museum unexpectedly receives Manet's Le Déjeuner Sur L'Herbe on loan for a landmark exhibition, the curator's wife learns a lesson in art history, l'amour, and the necessity of following one's dreams.

A troubled marriage. A burned-out artist finding her way back to wonder. Long-dead artist models stepping out from their paintings into a world changed beyond recognition. Magic and mischief conspire to make the opening of a landmark exhibition a life-changing renaissance.

Naked brings nineteenth-century Paris to the doorstep of a Midwestern museum and lays bare the hypocrisy of a patriarchal art world that disadvantages female artists while using female bodies for their own ends. With music, humor and love, Naked reminds us that no woman should have to be naked to be notable.

Visit Naked's Website: https://germainewrites.wixsite.com/naked
—Full script and score available upon request

Arlene Abelman — wife, mother, and theatre director — braces for her 60th birthday amid a gathering apocalypse. An intimate slice-of-life portrait of a woman grappling for a toehold in an era of accelerating flux and burgeoning ambiguity.

First Place, LTA 47th annual Playwriting Competition
Finalist, Voices of Women Festival 2023
Finalist, Trinity New Works 2024

When a deadly explosion rocks a quiet working-class neighborhood, a survivor, a ghost, and a family pariah rediscover what makes life worth living, and love worth dying for. Three generations of women stake their all on the fast-receding hope that the youngest among them, rendered a paraplegic by the blast, might one day rise from her wheelchair and dance.

With humor, compassion and unblunted honesty, BLINDINGLY BRIGHT, SHATTERINGLY LOUD ponders the human capacity for self-deception, the dangers of cyberspace, and one flawed and reviled woman's willingness to make the ultimate sacrifice.

*Dramaturgical notes from the Athena Project: "A story of strength and survival that took us on a wild ride, to say the least, featuring a fast-paced, high-stakes plot, biting humor, and infinite hope. Overall, we felt that Blindingly Bright, Shatteringly Loud is a wonderful exploration of womanhood, family, solidarity and true grit. We applaud you for your daring work."

— Please consider the attached script an intermediate-to-advanced draft in search of a final developmental process and premiere.

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s classic novel radically re-imagined.

When Hester Prynne is seen kissing a mysterious woman after Bible study, the congregation sends her to “The Program,” a remote ministry dedicated to sexual conversion therapy—only to discover more skeletons than homosexuals in their church’s closet.

A timeless story of forbidden love set in the Deep South of the embattled mid-1960s, THE SCARLET LETTER (Bible Belt, 1965) brings back the unforgettable heroine, Hester Prynne. Caught between her mother’s new-found evangelism and the Age of Aquarius, and determined to hide the identity of her clandestine lover, Hester stands her ground against Pastor Dimmesdale, whose fire and brimstone mask libidinous ulterior motives. Will she wear her scarlet letter with her namesake’s dignity and forbearance or fall prey to The Program’s relentless indoctrination? Will love triumph over dogma?

Even in the 21st century, countless Hester Prynnes wear their own invisible scarlet letter. Therapies aimed at
changing sexual identity are still advocated by many religious institutions. Sending minors to such programs is
still legal in most U.S. states. The playwright hopes, in some small way, that this play will alleviate their
suffering.

Video trailer: https://youtu.be/hK0H6tR-kLQ

*Read by invitation at the Festival of New American Theatre, 2018

In the wake of war, Yvette Saywell returns home from finishing school. Trapped in a claustrophobic household, oppressed by her deaf, toad-like grandmother and cowardly, conventional clergyman father, Yvette seems doomed to suppression. But meeting a traveler awakens unfamiliar emotions in her, making her challenge the family’s fiercely held morality. As she wavers between conformity and rebellion, a flash flood threatens her home, her world, and her life.

Adapted from the eponymous novel by D. H. Lawrence. A coming-of-age classic by turns satirical and heart-wrenching, this Bechdel-compliant reimagining showcases all the major themes of sexuality and identity that made Lawrence one of the most original and influential writers of the 20th century. Added to this already potent mix is a powerful indictment of social divisions and ethnic discrimination.

A disillusioned expat Dadaist artist returns Stateside in the wake of World War I, and needing to earn a livelihood, sets out to impersonate a spirit medium—only to discover that she is the real deal.

The crème of New York society—a shell-shocked war hero, a charity matron mourning her daughter, and a young war widow—flock to the reluctant medium and are spontaneously healed. A wealthy male client falls in love with her. When her former life comes courting in the form of a directionless Dada poet, she must choose, not only between two men, but two radically different outlooks on reality.

If The Spirit Moves is a tender tale of recovery and healing in which rich and poor, living and dead, transcend their differences through laughter, tears, and hope in a brighter tomorrow.

Book and Lyrics by Germaine Shames
Music by Erin Murray Quinlan

°A finalist in the University of California's Ground and Field Festival, the show premiered at Theatre Elision, MN, September 2019.

Highlight Reel: https://youtu.be/7JbZsK4mmZg

Note from the librettist-lyricist:
"At this shaky juncture in our country's social and political life, If the Spirit Moves reminds us that, together, we can weather the hard times without losing faith in what America stands for. In Minneapolis, I watched audience after audience enter the theatre careworn and leave glowing. Reviews were positive, but patron response said it all."

—Demo recordings available upon request.

Finalist, Festival of New American Theatre

Vampiresa, an enigmatic outsider bears a terrible secret. Newly arrived in New York, she attracts the attention of a lonely young painter. Vampire and human fall in love. Vampiresa, desperate to overcome her innate bloodlust, seeks a cure—to no avail.

To what extent are we the masters of our desires, acts and lives? Can love and lust, light and darkness, co-exist? Is love all-powerful?

VAMPIRESA website: https://germainewrites.wixsite.com/vampiresa

*The creators encourage Drag and seek a Halloween, 2026 premiere.

A widowed French artist emotionally scarred by WWII follows the epicenter of the art world from Paris to New York City, remarries, and brings over his seven-year old daughter. Foreseeing trouble, the ghost of his first wife comes along.

The Abstract Life chronicles a decade of repressed, if radical, social change through the life of one new immigrant whose love-hate relationship with his adopted country threatens to stymie his dreams and shows how Americans weather the bad times without losing faith in what America stands for.
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Praise: “Placing an already fractured family under the stresses of an ambitious and haunted artist is fuel for an engaging story. Its commentary on cultural assimilation and individualism makes this work both topical and thought provoking.” Literary Team, Florida Studio Theatre

A Note From the Playwright

As an art school dropout, I often find inspiration in the lives of visual artists and the fast and fickle milieu in which they labor to leave their mark.

The end of World War II was a pivotal moment in world history and by extension the history of art. Bolstered by world-class museums and the wealthy patrons affiliated with them, New York City emerged as the most important art center in the West. But these were also the McCarthy years, and many artists found themselves the target of conservative America's anti-communist zeal. Amid this maelstrom of clashing cultural currents, Abstract Expressionism, the first truly American Modernist movement, had a histrionic decade-long rise and fall.

THE ABSTRACT LIFE chronicles the peaks and troughs of a mismatched family of artists and their motley assortment of Bohemian friends as they pursue their dreams in a world that is rapidly becoming as abstract as the canvasses they paint. Their story places such issues as immigration, women's rights, sexual identity and autocracy in historical perspective and illustrates how people weather the hard times without losing faith in what America stands for.

Oblomov, a Hippie hanger-on, refuses to get out of bed — and why should he? His landlady aims to evict him; his one employee is fleecing him; and his few friends have cut their hair, morphed into Yuppies, and hightailed it to Wall Street. Is life more than one downward-spiraling existential crisis? Our protagonist is about to find out...

A radical re-imagining of the eponymous 1915 novel by Ivan Aleksandrovich Goncharov, OBLOMOV (Brooklyn; 1980) heralds the Reagan-Thatcher Era, an inflection point in Western history characterized by designer logos, rising inequality, selling out, big hair, and the assassination of John Lennon.

*Script in-progress. Actively seeking a commission and/or development opp'.

Capri, a musical of family, loss and the places only love can take us, has drawn comparisons to West Side Story and In the Heights, Italian-style.

A schoolteacher desperate to save his dying wife is drawn into a conspiracy to scam a family of recent Italian immigrants—the same family into which his only son hopes to marry.

Fraught with moral dilemmas and illumined by grace, Capri reminds us that the best time to be alive is always NOW.

Book and Lyrics by Germaine Shames
Music by Paul Scherer

🏆 Winner of a national new musicals search for the 2022 NJ Theatre Alliance Stages Festival
To hear a selection of songs, please visit Capri's website: https://germainewrites.wixsite.com/capri

It is hard to imagine a more dramatic life in science, nor one more rife with moral dilemmas, than that of Lise Meitner; a more troubling, if long-lived, scientific partnership than that of Lise Meitner and Otto Hahn; or a more tarnished chapter in the history of the Nobel Prize than the (repeated) dismissal of Lise Meitner’s groundbreaking contributions to Physics.

Lise Meitner, often called “The Mother of the Atomic Bomb,” worked in Germany for over 30 years. When she arrived in Berlin from her native Vienna in 1907, she was among the first women to seek a place in science; when she fled for her life in 1938, she was one of the last (converted) Jewish academics not yet expelled.

BEAUTIFUL FINDINGS probes Science's darkest years and reveals how one remarkable female physicist rose to exceptional prominence, only to end her career a prominent exception.

Video trailer: https://youtu.be/sHo8886aA0Q

°Both a stage and radio play version are available.

*This play is being used in India to teach young people about Science and the Holocaust. The playwright welcomes queries from educators, faith leaders, and scientists wishing to use the play outside of the conventional theatre framework.

Adapted from the eponymous novel by D.H. Lawrence, winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize.

Alvina Houghton, the headstrong daughter of a widowed Midlands draper, comes of age just as her father’s business is failing. In a desperate attempt to regain his fortune and secure his daughter’s proper place in society, James Houghton buys a theater. Among the traveling performers he employs is Ciccio, a sensual Italian who immediately captures Alvina’s attention.

When her father dies, Alvina must choose between her safe, if stifling, world and the unknown, between respectability and sexual desire.

Lawrence’s The Lost Girl is a celebration of freedom, however fleeting, and a testament to the power of the imagination to transform even the most mundane life.

Video trailer: https://youtu.be/ctP06kbknQg

🏆Starlight Theater Playwriting Prize, 1st Place

An eccentric young woman known as the Bird Lady lives a life of timeless simplicity in a well-tended garden with only her equally eccentric old gardener for human company — until a brash young man determined to build his dream home buys the adjoining lot. When the Bird Lady and her new neighbor clash over the felling of a tree planted squarely on the property line, sparks fly.

Why an opera about birds? Artists have long drawn inspiration from birds; their beauty, flight and musicality are unrivaled. Today, we are painfully aware that bird populations face global conservation challenges, with 389 North American bird species (or 2/3) facing a high risk of extinction in the near future according to a recent Audubon report. Birds perform vital ecosystem services, including pest control, sanitation, seed dispersal and pollination. A world without birds would be far less verdant and far more prone to famine and disease.

THE BIRD LADY challenges us to deepen our connection to the natural world while recognizing the fragility of all living things. At this historical juncture of collective soul-searching, we’d do well to crane our necks and ask ourselves the question at the heart of this opera: How far are we willing to go to protect what we love?

Composer: Timothy L. Miller

View a showcase performance of Act One: https://youtu.be/HLLm5qsXlZ0

Note: Both a small-ensemble chamber version and an expanded highschool/college version of the opera are available.

Defying patriarchy’s grip on nineteenth century literature, Sophia Tolstoy abandons her deathbed to join forces with young Mae West on a mission impossible: to save the life of Anna Karenina. Can Mae and Sophia re-plot a classic of world literature in time to save Anna? Will the fatalistic Anna allow herself to be saved?

Odd couple Mae and Sophia pit sisterhood against social convention to turn a tale of infidelity and self-destruction into a celebration of love and redemption.

Video trailer: https://youtu.be/n4J1hCF3fVs
—

Note: This is a play with vintage songs. The Mae West character would ideally be an actor-singer. Sheet music available.

A post-industrial fable about birds, self-sacrifice and the struggle to protect what one loves.

Aviana, a birdlike young woman with a mysterious past, lives a life of timeless simplicity in a well-tended garden with only her dutiful old gardener for human company — until a brash young man determined to build his dream home buys the adjoining lot. When Aviana and her new neighbor clash over the felling of a tree planted squarely on the property line, sparks fly.

Songs I don't yet understand, but hope to one day. Reflections on what Rumi's poetry has to teach us in the 21st century. A choral song cycle for women's choir.

composer: Paul Scherer
https://youtu.be/RTwEJsGHZcM?si=lGDSIc9iggHU4Hoi

A musical revolution in 15 minutes. The Communist Manifesto has been called "the most influential book after the bible." Yet, in 1848, Marx and Engels were two scrappy, unknown pamphleteers speculating about a new form of society whose character and reach could barely be fathomed. Written out of the story was Marx's wife, Jenny, a Baroness by birth, and a rebel by nature.

—Script, score, mp3 and archive video available upon request.

When her aloof astronaut son becomes stranded in the International Space Station, Sarah, back on chemo' and coming to terms with a sobering prognosis, moves heaven and Earth to heal their long-troubled relationship. Into the breach storms the son's headstrong Hindu fiancee. As Sarah's death draws inexorably nearer, the mismatched threesome learn a lesson in distance, dharma, and the power of love to transcend death.

—In-development. Please consider the attached script an intermediate draft awaiting workshopping.

"This was a treat of a play. So many moving and honest moments, heartfelt dialogue, and characters you care about the minute you meet them. " Rachel Ladutke, States of Play

The Masterpiece, Emile Zola’s semi-autobiographical novel, tells the story of artistic and political rebellion among a group of aspiring young artists and writers in 19th century Paris. Accepted leader of the Bohemian group is the brilliant painter, Juan Beltran, who is haunted by the need to create a masterpiece.

Falling in love with an innocent young woman, Christine, he takes her as his common-law wife and they begin their relationship in blissful romance. As Juan struggles to create his masterpiece, Christine fights a losing battle with Art, her rival for Juan's affections. As the initial passion between Juan and Christine cools, Juan becomes obsessed with the nude woman he grapples to paint but can never quite capture and slips into madness.

Finally realizing that he can never satisfy his own manias, Claude resolves to hang himself in front of his mutilated canvas, but called back from the brink by his wife’s passionate entreaties, hangs his painted nemesis instead.

Germaine Shames’ tender re-imagining of Zola’s story gives voice to its female characters and pits love against compulsion to turn a futile tragedy into a triumph of the human spirit.

Video trailer: https://youtu.be/b4XXEhRKUQg

*A musical version of The Masterpiece is in-progress.

When Adolf Hitler declares war on Europe’s avant-garde, a jaded Paris art dealer and a high-minded Berlin art student play a deadly game of bait-and-switch to save the life of a condemned Jewish artist.

A high-stakes drama-thriller of art looting, art forging, and the struggle of a courageous group of banned artists to remain true to their visions.

In the aftermath of The Calamities, a tiny remnant of survivors takes refuge in the ruins of an old convent. Their mission: to restore the Mother Tongue to pristine purity and perpetuate the writings of three 19th century writers: Mary Shelley, Mary Seacole, and Mary Antin — known hereafter as The Marys, a matriarchal Trinity with the wisdom to re-make a ravaged world. When a lone scrounger plants herself on the convent's doorstep, the survivors' rigid beliefs and way of life are thrown into chaos.

A suite of laments chronicling the notorious life of the fictional Madame Blanc of the Hotel Noir—proprietor, patissiere, serial killer.
1) The Stain
2) Madame Blanc Takes a Lover
3) The Tax Man Calls
4) The Curtain Comes Down

The suite's concert premiere, in association with New Music Chicago, took place in October 2025. View the video recording here: https://youtu.be/TUmK_-vKPVA?si=eqLw4HEfhfaPVQqF

“Beginning,” a 20-minute chamber opera conceived while the librettist was recovering from Covid-19, is a story of attraction amid isolation, of freedom in captivity, and ultimately of resilience.

In the near future, in a world where people are divided into "essentials" and "non-essentials," and their lives governed by a faceless virtual regime, two would-be lovers meet—only to be forced into lockdown by an invisible scourge. “Beginning” has drawn comparisons to Orwell’s 1984 with a dash of the Decameron for piquancy.

Created by the female writing team of composer Katya Pine and librettist Germaine Shames, “Beginning” lays bare our darkest fears and fiercest hopes through the apocalyptic love story of two star-crossed dreamers.

Website: https://germainewrites.wixsite.com/beginning

*Finalist, Vanguard Fund Arts commission

Young Margaret Mead journeys to Samoa to study adolescence among unmarried females—only to find herself entangled in the illicit love affair between a Samoan princess and a Hippie time-traveler.

Fearing the exposure of her own clandestine affair with professor Ruth Benedict and determined to complete her field work under the exacting tutelage of mentor Franz Boas, Mead grapples with malarial fever, an inscrutable village chief, and a startling preview of her own future. With the stakes mounting and her grip on reality dubious, the young anthropologist learns a lesson in who is primitive, and who civilized, and leaves her island “paradise” forever changed.

Equal parts biography, fantasy and travelogue, Margaret Mead Dreams in Samoan accompanies one of the most respected and well-loved female scientists of all time on the maiden voyage that catapulted her to fame.

music: Gary King book&lyrics: Germaine Shames

Demo recordings: https://germainewrites.wixsite.com/mead-musical
(score in progress)

Video teaser: https://youtu.be/1UJ8SwGlbFA

A selection of plays offering female actors over 40 an opportunity to shine. Please follow links to learn more...

—ALTRUISM
https://newplayexchange.org/script/2030050/altruism

—SWEET SPOT
https://newplayexchange.org/script/2027366/sweet-spot-the-fleeting-glor…

—BLINDINGLY BRIGHT, SHATTERINGLY LOUD
https://newplayexchange.org/script/2711469/blindingly-bright-shattering…

—THE ROBOTICS of LOVE and LONGING
https://newplayexchange.org/script/2042657/the-robotics-of-love-and-lon…

—MOSQUITOES
https://newplayexchange.org/script/2044630/mosquitoes

—110 COLUMBIA HEIGHTS
https://newplayexchange.org/script/2028751/110-columbia-heights

—SCENES from an APOCALYPSE
https://newplayexchange.org/script/2049299/scenes-from-an-apocalypse

—OF HEAVEN and EARTH
https://newplayexchange.org/script/3249240/of-heaven-and-earth

A mysterious playwright writing from a remote island withholds the final scene of a murder mystery, driving the play's producer, director and cast to murderous thoughts and desperate acts. Which is more terrifying — life or death?

We may have lost our choice; we haven't lost our voice.

In May 2022, American women got a first glimpse of the Supreme Court opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade. Drafted by ultra-conservative Justice Samuel Alito, the opinion draws on the "wisdom" of a 17th century witch-burner to strip away women's right to bodily autonomy. In this epistolary lament, the choiceless sing truth to power.

"Of Murder and Madness"

Mimi Kincaid, once a beloved film star, languishes in an insane asylum. Has she lost her mind or is she one more rebellious woman shut away by a controlling husband? When Clarice Bleu, aka the Creole Oracle, goes to Mimi's aid, an unconscionable murder comes to light — and with it Mimi's
liberation.

"Between Two Deserts"

Coming to Jerusalem to fulfill her grandfather’s dying wish, American Chloe Baron finds herself poised on the fault line of three worlds — Muslim, Christian, and Jewish. A young Palestinian of noble birth and questionable motives fills her nights with passion, but lurking in the shadows, an Israeli detective gathers evidence that could land them both in prison.

"Thelma and Louise Get An Abortion"

Thelma's pregnant. With abortion illegal in Texas and a network of bounty hunters hot on their trail, Thelma and Louise hightail it to California — committing a few felonies along the way.

"A Zillion Pieces"

When a young English teacher sojourning in Poconia receives an unexpected visit from his bipolar, menopausal mother, romance and grammar collide with the force of a meteorite crashing to Earth.

"The Reincarnation of Aunt Ratana"

Kate and Mali, a married gay couple, live happily in a San Diego bungalow with their rescue cat, Mung Bean -- until Mali becomes convinced that the feline is the reincarnation of her Aunt Ratana, a family pariah believed to have been a witch.

"Beginning"

Love. Lust. Lockdown...
In the near future, in a world where people are divided into
"essentials" and "non-essentials," and their lives governed by a faceless virtual regime, two would-be lovers meet — only to be forced into lockdown by an invisible scourge. In the vein of Orwell's 1984, "Beginning" is a story of attraction amid isolation, of freedom in captivity, and ultimately of resilience.

"Jiggy"

When two childhood friends from Newark, NJ reunite as young men, racial and class differences threaten the fragile bond of their once pure bromance.

"Russian Tango"

When a famous Russian author censors the debut novel of an obscure female wannabe, an American World Lit’ teacher learns a lesson in semantics, pragmatism, and the eloquence of a tango.

"The English Lesson"

When an aspiring Romanian actress and a recycled Shakespeare show up for an English lesson at the same time, their smug young teacher learns a lesson in art, love, and what endures.

"Margaret Mead Dreams in Samoan"

The famous anthropologist, delirious with fever, confronts the specter of an angry Samoan adolescent bent on exposing her. Is the uninvited informant Mead's nemesis or the key to her ultimate fulfillment? A phantasmagoric look at a brilliant, if tormented, mind turning on itself.

"Tea With Ali"

A rookie American journalist in pursuit of her first big story lands an interview with a Palestinian bomber convicted of the most notorious terrorist act of its time. Which one of them is more dangerous?

"The Betrothal"
While searching through the rubble of a recently demolished home, an abandoned Palestinian girl weaves an elaborate fairytale into which a rookie American journalist is irresistibly drawn.

"Rescue Mission"

A divorced middle-aged academic journeys to the wilds of Uganda to win back a childhood sweetheart more interested in apes than in men. Which one of them needs rescuing?

"Counter-Indications of Trance on the Male Libido"

Eavesdrop on a hypnotherapy session turned seduction as a flakey therapist and her Type-A patient escape to the carnal Eden of their subconscious minds.

"End Products"

A dying German philosopher and his young American wife complete their life’s work amid a barrage of clashing ideals and dismembered cats.

"One Soul, or The End of Life as We Know It"

An old woman and a young woman, one soul, spar their way toward the Apocalypse. How will the world end? Neither with a bang nor a whimper, but with fallen stars and amphibious angels.

"The Eternal Wife"

Honeymooning in the Eternal City, a bored newlywed learns a lesson in lust, longevity and the power of a sweet tooth from a Gypsy fortune-teller.

"What Never Was"

Tristan and Alexa, two twenty-somethings in love, have climbed a hundred peaks together. But when Tristan proposes marriage, Alexa reveals a lifelong dream that threatens to land them both in the abyss.

"The Nightlife of Cats"

When a lonely male window cleaner adopts a restless female cat, the line between domesticated and feral blurs. For one full-moon night, master and pet throw off the shackles of their respective roles and revel in primal abandon. *note: both stage and radio versions are available

"The Broken Heart of Lise Meitner"

It is hard to imagine a more dramatic life in Science, nor one more rife with moral dilemmas, than that of Lise Meitner. "The Broken Heart of Lise Meitner" probes Science’s darkest years through the story of one remarkable female physicist.

"The Manifesto"

A musical revolution in fifteen minutes. The Communist Manifesto has been called "the most
influential book after the bible." Yet, in 1848, Marx and Engels were two scrappy, unknown pamphleteers speculating about a new form of society whose character and reach could barely be fathomed. In their shadow were Jenny Marx, a Baroness, and the Marx’s peasant housekeeper, Helene Demuth, whose contribution history has conveniently overlooked—until now.

"Santa Bernie"

When Bernie Sanders takes time off from the campaign trail to moonlight as Santa Claus, a single mom and her daughter get a brand new take on Christmas -- and a second chance to make the holiday their own.

"A Most Unsettling Fiction"

The year is 3000, and humankind's days are numbered. Under the watchful eye of an autocratic regime, an awakening female member of a dying species finds the most forbidden of treasures: a book.

"The Volunteer"

The year is 2044. In the wake of an eco-rebellion, an over-educated under-employed Millennial is summoned to a fateful job interview.

*All scripts available upon request

—Thelma and Louise Get an Abortion
a darkly comedic 10-minute play that resurrects two 1970s feminist icons immortalized on the Big Screen

—An Open Letter to Samual Alito
an operatic lament for solo soprano in the wake of the overturning of Roe v Wade

—How Mad Gertrude Went to Hell but Saved Her Own Soul
a ten-minute bio-drama centering Gertrude Beasley, an early 20th century birth control crusader incarcerated in an insane asylum

—Year of Thirteen Moons
the story of a rape survivor pressured into giving up her newborn son and left to live with the consequences, told through the eyes of a precocious preteen with her eyes on the stars

"Perfect"

That bag lady you pass on the street every day has a story, and it will scare you to death.

"My Grandmother and the Beach Boy"

Can a woman’s "golden years" begin at 17?

"I Dreamed I Was Brigitte Macron"

An aging, neglected woman projects her thwarted eroticism
onto a famous contemporary whose husband still appears to
desire her.

"The Thwarted Love of Anne Marie Schwarzenbach"

The fraught, frenetic, cut-short life of Swiss writer Annemarie Schwarzenbach can be distilled down to a single word: love. In this monologue, literary history’s "inconsolable angel" returns to share her story.

"If Only I Had Married Aiden Fuller"

There can only be one first love. A decades-long obsession culminates in radical acceptance.

"Stripped Bare"

A monologue of love and loathing. How to forgive the person we might have become?

—Lest We Forget What Sustains Us
a song cycle chronicling the natural history of Planet Earth from the Big Bang through planetary exodus
View here: https://youtu.be/95_Q1GgPbOM

—Altruism
An elderly wildlife carer returns home from the Australian Outback to the American Midwest to set her affairs in order—only to become embroiled in a family tragedy that could cost her the remainder of her life.
More info here: https://newplayexchange.org/script/2030050/altruism

—The Bird Lady
an opera about a girl who thinks she's a bird, her devoted gardener, and a crass intruder hellbent on building his dream house whatever the cost
More info here: https://newplayexchange.org/script/2002898/the-bird-lady-opera

—Property Line
an immersive TYA fable about birds, self-sacrifice, and the struggle to protect what one loves
More info here: https://newplayexchange.org/script/2037623/property-line

Leonora Carrington, recently divorced from her Mexican husband, hires a domestic — only to find herself harboring a fugitive who claims to be Our Lady of Guadeloupe. A phantasmagorical tale of two women sprung from insane asylums, grappling to throw off the straitjacket of shame and exclusion through the power of sisterhood.

Pushing back against a global spike in Jew hatred, three determined women set out to do the impossible: elect a Jewish President. Will they succeed? Ask Moses, a time-traveling rapper who knows a thing or two about overcoming impossible odds...

A seriocomic political caper about ethnic stereotyping, public trust, and the state of the American Dream.

Inspiration/Motivation:

Why has the United States never had a Jewish President? What would it take to get one elected? Josh the Plumber plumbs the darkly comedic electoral labyrinths of democracy within the larger context of family, purpose, faith and conscience. With democracy hanging in the balance, will we transcend the barriers of race and religion to elect leaders with a higher vision or succumb once again to bots and showmanship? May Josh count on your vote?

*This is a work-in-development ripe for workshopping.

A SUITE OF 3 THEMATICALLY AND GEOGRAPHICALLY-LINKED ONE-ACTS:

GABROVO
A 28-year old copywriter in the throes of a premature life crisis takes a leave of absence, abandons his artist girlfriend, and journeys to Gabrovo, Bulgaria in the central Balkans to teach English to aspiring young capitalists. Will proud, remote Gabrovo be his salvation or his undoing? Ask his star pupil, that man-killer in the black stiletto boots…

A ZILLION PIECES
When a young English teacher sojourning in Moldova receives an unexpected visit from his bipolar, menopausal mother, romance and grammar collide with the force of a meteorite crashing to Earth.

THE ENGLISH LESSON
When an aspiring Romanian actress and a recycled Shakespeare show up for an English lesson at the same time, their smug young teacher learns a lesson in art, love, and what endures.

Mimi Kincaid, once a beloved film star, languishes in an insane asylum. Has she lost her mind or is she one more rebellious woman shut away by a controlling husband? When Clarice Bleu, aka the Creole Oracle, goes to Mimi's aid, an unconscionable murder comes to light — and with it Mimi's liberation.

A 25-year old copywriter in the throes of a premature life
crisis takes a leave of absence, abandons his artist
girlfriend, and journeys to Gabrovo, Bulgaria in the central
Balkans to teach English to aspiring young capitalists. Will
proud, remote Gabrovo be his salvation or his undoing? Ask
his star pupil, that man-killer in the black stiletto
boots...

A darkly comedic exposé of the lingering imperialism and
ethnocentrism underpinning English language acquisition.

Coming to Jerusalem to fulfill her grandfather's dying wish, American Eve Cavell finds herself poised on the fault line of three worlds—Muslim, Christian, and Jewish. A young Palestinian of noble birth and questionable motives fills her nights with passion, but lurking in the shadows, an Israeli detective gathers evidence that could land them both in prison.

Loosely adapted from the eponymous award-winning novel, Between Two Deserts is a tension-filled 50-minute one-act. Performed together with its companion piece, "A Day in Jerusalem", the duo turns a wide-angle lens on the intricate human mosaic behind the media headlines to explore the plight of ordinary people caught in the crossfire of the first Palestinian Uprising of the late 1980s. Each play may also stand alone.

—
Script available upon request.

A Suite of Unsettling Visions, comprising the following one-act plays:
—Beginning
—A Most Unsettling Fiction
—The Volunteer
—A Singular Destiny

It's not too late to save the world—or is it?

Thelma's pregnant. With abortion illegal in Texas and a network of bounty hunters hot on their trail, Thelma and Louise hightail it to California — committing a few felonies along the way.

(Attention women's theatres! Both a stage and radio version of this script are available.)

Three dark, if epic, life stories. What can we learn today from the unlikely example of these defiant, determined and damaged heiresses?

NASTY's website: https://germainewrites.wixsite.com/nasty

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs estimates that as many as 20% of returning combatants struggle with PTSD. Most do not seek help in transitioning back to civilian life.

In crafting "Bomb Squad Rhapsody," the creators endeavor to give voice to veterans suffering in silence and to foster empathy for their hard-fought journey home.

Composer: Jane K

Music: Jane Kozhevnikova Libretto: Germaine Shames

As the Nazis rampaged across Europe, heroes were born. One was a sixteen year old Polish girl who followed her heart and lived by her wits to save the lives of a dozen Jewish friends — one of whom was pregnant. More than forty years would pass before this miracle child and his rescuer would at last meet face-to-face. This is their story.

A work of fiction inspired by the life of Irene Gut Opdyke, Righteous Among the Nations.

Status: libretto complete, score in-progress; seeking development opportunities

Adapted from the eponymous novel by Edith Wharton.

Susy Branch and Nick Lansing, of socially prominent but no longer wealthy New York families, marry and enjoy a prolonged honeymoon through the beneficence of friends who provide luxury homes and money for a time. In keeping with their social aspirations, the couple agreed before their marriage that either one is free to divorce if he or she gets a "better chance.” As Susy grows jealous of her husband's attentions to a brainy young heiress and Nick becomes increasingly disgruntled by the moral compromises arising from his wife's social negotiations, their conditional marriage begins to falter.

A timeless portrait of a couple seduced by the trappings of privilege, tested by separation, and redeemed by the self-sacrifice demanded of a higher love.

Video trailer: https://youtu.be/C5GHeZ-t0mY

Katia Krafft, the most famous female volcanologist of the 20th century, passionately loved volcanoes and spent more than two decades crisscrossing the globe to study and film their eruptions. Venturing closer to their vortex than any other scientist dared, Katia (along with husband Maurice) captured breathtaking video footage of 150 active volcanoes while conducting groundbreaking on-site research. Much of what scientists know today about these fire-spewing behemoths derives from the Kraffts’ formidable body of work.

In 1991, Katia’s obsession with volcanoes cost her the remainder of her life. Not yet 50 years old, she raced to Japan for the eruption of Mt. Unzen, lingering on the volcano’s flank long after more cautious scientists had fled. With sudden ferocity the sleeping giant reared up and released an apocalypse of burning lava. Katia, caught in a fast-moving pyroclastic flow of doomsday proportions, died alongside her husband.

What to make of the cut-short life of Katia Krafft? Was she a martyr to the advancement of science or one more casualty of a dangerous love affair? What might have been her last fleeting thought as Unzen took her?

Composer: Amy Scurria

In 1954, in a rural Alabama town, a tired housewife taking a nap before her husband arrived home from work was struck by a meteorite — becoming the astronomical anomaly of her aeon, an overnight celebrity, and one very unhappy woman.

Her name was Ann Hodges, and this is the story behind the headlines, the truest fiction yet told about the unassuming Southern introvert thrust into the spotlight by a whim of nature.

A thematically-linked monologue collection for female-identifying actors over the age of 55.

A 15-minute musical re-telling of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz from the point-of-view of Toto.

Who will ever forget the sight of Bill Cosby, "America’s Dad," being marched off to prison in handcuffs? Last American Dream: A Docurequiem for Bill Cosby, recounts the fall of a beloved icon through the eyes of a grandmother hard-pressed to explain Trump-era social ruptures to a new breed of girl born in their wake.

*Libretto completed, Score in-progress

Lucy and Suzanne (aka Claude and Marcel), gender-fluid French artists, leave Paris in the late 1930s for a bucolic life on the Isle of Jersey — only to find themselves, a year later, under German occupation. Pacifist and anti-Fascist, they resist with the most powerful weapon they know: art.

Incarcerated, convicted and sentenced to death, these indomitable artist-provocateurs face imminent execution. Will they save themselves by asking for clemency or become one more pair of martyrs in a global bloodbath that has already claimed millions of lives? Which will prove stronger — the human instinct for self-preservation or the artists' determination to remain true to their highest ideals?

A high-stakes musical of queer love in a time of repression, an island abandoned to enemy forces, and the struggle of two artists to resist Hitler's war on everything they stand for and everything they cherish.
——
Artists Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore were an extraordinary couple who worked, lived and loved together for more than 40 years.

Claude Cahun was born Lucy Schwob in 1894. They came from an accomplished Jewish family of intellectuals and publishers. In 1918, they adopted the surname of their great uncle Léon Cahun, an Orientalist and novelist. Cahun published articles in journals, and in 1929 translated Havelock Ellis’ controversial theories, which introduced the possibility of a third sex, uniting masculine and feminine traits but existing as neither one nor the other.

Marcel Moore was the pseudonym used by Suzanne Malherbe, who was born in 1892. Their father was a professor of histopathology at Nantes School of Medicine. By 1916, Suzanne had earned recognition as a graphic artist, illustrating books and magazines and producing publicity material for leading figures in the world of avant-garde theatre and dance.

The couple moved to the Isle of Jersey in 1938, their families' favorite destination for summer holidays, and began their passionate and original resistance campaign in 1940. Claude’s already weak health suffered during the war and the few self portraits they completed after Liberation were dominated by the theme of death. Claude died in 1954. Marcel moved to a smaller island house and there committed suicide in 1972. The couple are buried together on Jersey, the inscription on their gravestone a testament to their questing spirit: "And I Saw New Heavens and New Earth."

*Libretto complete, score in-progress

It is hard to imagine a more embattled life, nor one that better illustrates social injustice, than that of Jeanne Deckers, aka “The Singing Nun,” aka “Soeur Sourire.”

Best known for her hit song “Dominique,” which in 1964, against all odds, placed at #1 on the U.S. Hit Parade (edging out the Beatles), the shy young Dominican nun catapulted to stardom. Two years later, Debbie Reynolds starred as Jeanne in the Hollywood film, The Singing Nun—the same year that Jeanne, disillusioned with Church politics and considered a bad influence”by her Mother Superior, left the convent forever. Jeanne’s stated reason for leaving was “to be closer to the people.” But, outside the convent walls, waited quite another reason: Annie Pécher, the young woman Jeanne loved and with whom she would spend the rest of her life.

Shunned by her fellow nuns and denied the right to use the name “Sister Sourire,” the only name by which her European fans knew her, Jeanne reflected, “Life is a struggle. And I struggle.”

Jeanne was not the first nun to have a difficult adjustment to life outside the convent, yet her journey is unique. Having tasted international celebrity while hiding a forbidden attraction, when the convent doors closed behind her, she emerged into a world rocked by loud music, social upheaval and women’s liberation.

Character Breakdown

We currently conceive the work as an all-female opera with four main characters: Jeanne, Annie, the Mother Superior of Jeanne’s convent, and a young autistic woman, Esperance, who, educated by Jeanne and Annie, now narrates their story.

Music

Her Soul Flew Through the Clouds will be an accessible classical opera with a structure containing an overture, recitatives, arias and duets, and leitmotivs for each of the four main characters (Jeanne, Annie, Mother Superior and Esperance) that will evolve and reflect musically their dramatic arc throughout the opera. The orchestra will not only provide the background for each scene, but will also participate actively in a continuous dialogue with the voices on stage, providing comments, reactions and highlighting the dramatic key points.

As some of the composer’s main influences in composition are Italian Bel canto and French Romantic Grand Opera, the opera will have a melodic style, accessible from the first hearing without the need of any prior explanation. In addition, the composer’s Masters’ studies in Film Scoring will lend complementary tools and a 21st-century perspective.

The opera is full-length with an estimated 20 musical numbers. There will be four female voices accompanied by an orchestra. The singers will be: a lyrical soprano (the character of Annie), a high mezzo-soprano for the character of Esperance (in the vein of Mozart’s Dorabella or Cherubino), a lyrical mezzo-soprano for Jeanne, the Singing Nun, and a deep contralto for the character of Mother Superior (modeled upon Verdi’s Azucena).

The intended orchestration is: 1 flute, 1 oboe, 1 clarinet, 1 bassoon, 3 French horns, 1 trumpet, 2 or 3 trombones, timpani, percussion (bass drum, cymbals, triangle…), first and second violins, violas, cellos, double basses, harp. The orchestration will be adapted to the Crane Opera Orchestra’s forces.

Synopsis by Scene

Prologue: At the convent gates, Jeanne and the Mother Superior say their goodbyes. Torn between her vows and long-suppressed desire for independence, Jeanne wavers, but Esperance draws her irresistibly toward an uncharted future. At her back, the Mother Superior intones, “God will find you.”

Scene One: Jeanne and Annie move into a dingy flat. Jeanne, at once terrified and intoxicated by newfound freedom, grapples for a new identity. What is her and Annie’s role in this brave new world?

Scene Two: Jeanne, Annie and the Mother Superior watch the film, “The Singing Nun,” each wishing for the virtues embodied by carefree, flawless Debbie Reynolds. The contrast between their experience of the religious life and the spectacle unfolding on the Big Screen could not be more blatant. (Nonetheless, this scene more than any other will bring the characters’ shared humanity to the fore with gentle, self-deprecating humor.)

Scene Three: Jeanne begins writing protest songs at odds with Church doctrine and emerges as a champion of women’s rights. Many of her most devoted fans desert her. Bereft but unrepentant, she prepares to go on tour.

Scene Four: Jeanne, painfully shy, struggles to earn a new fan base. The tour goes badly. When Jeanne develops an array of physical symptoms, her doctors prescribe barbiturates—to which she becomes addicted. Returning home to Annie, the two women resolve to open a school for children with special needs (including Esperance). Having found renewed purpose, they look to the future with hope.

Scene Five: Belgium’s internal revenue service claims that Jeanne owes back taxes totaling $164,000.00 on profits from “Dominique.” Having taken a vow of poverty and assigned all royalties to her former convent, Jeanne appeals to the Mother Superior, trusting that the claim will be withdrawn. Instead, a battle ensues.

Scene Six: As the battle escalates and Jeanne relapses into illness and addiction, the Church offers a nominal settlement—which Jeanne hastily accepts, hoping to forestall foreclosure on Annie’s and her school. In a masterstroke, she decides to “resurrect” Sister Smile and resume her singing career in order to raise cash to pay their growing debt.

Scene Seven: Jeanne’s attempted comeback takes a toll on her nerves and health without alleviating her plight. The two women at last break their vow of chastity and become the lovers they were always meant to be.

Scene Eight: Belgian authorities close down the school; bailiffs strip it bare. Esperance flashes back to the final defeat, remembering her broken young self and how Annie and Jeanne had lifted her out of isolation and pain. The Mother Superior admits her own guilt, but the Church still does nothing substantive to help the two women as they spiral down into poverty and desperation. Pushed beyond their capacity to cope, they plan their suicide.

Scene Nine: Jeanne and Annie execute their plan. When, days later, authorities forcibly enter the women’s locked flat, they find the women’s two lifeless bodies, love letters, and a final request: that they be buried together. Esperance looks up and sees their souls soaring through the clouds.

Themes and Impact

In the ongoing battle for LGBTQ rights, it is easy to forget how far we have come. Back in the early 1960’s, when Jeanne Deckers left the convent and chose to cohabit with Annie Pécher, to “come out” was not an option. Even now, gay individuals from religious backgrounds or with a religious calling are doubly challenged: Even as societal prejudices abate, anti-homosexual theology and doctrine leave an indelible imprint.

Today, in this country and elsewhere, there exists widespread social malaise, and with it waning hope in our shared future. An exemplary, if embattled, life such as Jeanne’s raises universal questions regarding society, values and the worth of each individual. How can an ordinary person act in accordance with conscience and yet toe the line of social convention? Does capitalism discourage people from doing good? What keeps the examined life livable? Jeanne, despite her personal martyring, continued to the end to look out at the world through fresh eyes and to make a difference in the lives of others. Surely hers is a life worth singing about.

"A Day in Jerusalem" explores the plight of ordinary people caught in the crossfire of the first Palestinian Uprising of the late 1980s. Loosely adapted from the playwright's award-winning novel, "A Day in Jerusalem is a gritty 45-minute one-act. Performed together with its companion piece "Between Two Deserts", the duo turns a wide-angle lens on the intricate human mosaic behind the media headlines. Each play may also stand alone.

—script available upon request

When assorted rejects from a once-popular TV comedy show converge for a televised reunion, the vibe on set quickly veers from humor to soap opera. Is life funnier in retrospect? Can adults still have fun?

*Script available upon request. Stage play can be adapted to a Zoom or audio format.

A compulsive free spirit quarantined in tight quarters with an equally compulsive spouse falls smitten with a cold-blooded roommate — who just happens to be a lizard.

Script available upon request.

Paired one-act plays adapted from the eponymous novella and short story by Edith Wharton.

The Touchstone

A mediocre lawyer desperately needs money so that he may marry his beautiful socialite fiancé. Having once been pursued by a famous and recently deceased author, he still has her passionate love letters. Overcoming his scruples, he removes his name from the letters and sells them for publication, making a fortune and building a marriage based on the betrayal of another.

Will his mounting shame and guilty conscience destroy the one love that can redeem him?

The Muse's Tragedy

The young disciple of a renowned poet chances upon the poet’s much talked-about Muse during a sojourn in Venice. They spend a week together—ostensibly, to collaborate on a biography. Instead, romance blossoms, only to be cut short by a startling confession.

Can a Muse inspire the most sublime sonnets in the history of poetry and yet not be loved?

—script available upon request-

An interracial Jewish-Agnostic lesbian couple navigate the sociopolitical black holes of a post-pandemic world. With so many public figures misbehaving, the troubled partners, opposites, ponder the concept of hell. Does such a place exist — and, if not, is it time we build one? How to survive a "tinder box" year in an era destined to live on in infamy?