Tita Anntares

Brief Synopsis. After an unexpected interruption, a tavern owner’s widow invites us to gather around her campfire while settlers moving West show us the true story of Shays Rebellion - not the version glorified by some Jan6 2021 insurgents at the US Capitol as justifying violence and praised on the t-shirt worn by our own home-grown terrorist when bombing innocents in Oklahoma, April 19, 1995.

In this full-length story theatre drama, two friends, Dan and Sam, celebrate victory in their war for independence with soldiers and camp-followers at a ramshackle tavern… but when they disagree about how to lead their new democracy, will they choose voting over violence? Soon these friends take up guns against each other, both sure they are saving their democracy from the other. As 13 terrified new nation states unite in under one Constitution in 1787 that does not dare include individual rights Americans demanded in 1776 – rights only tacked on at the back.

Brief Synopsis. After an unexpected interruption, a tavern owner’s widow invites us to gather around her campfire while settlers moving West show us the true story of Shays Rebellion - not the version glorified by some Jan6 2021 insurgents at the US Capitol as justifying violence and praised on the t-shirt worn by our own home-grown terrorist when bombing innocents in Oklahoma, April 19, 1995.

In this full-length story theatre drama, two friends, Dan and Sam, celebrate victory in their war for independence with soldiers and camp-followers at a ramshackle tavern… but when they disagree about how to lead their new democracy, will they choose voting over violence? Soon these friends take up guns against each other, both sure they are saving their democracy from the other. As 13 terrified new nation states unite in under one Constitution in 1787 that does not dare include individual rights Americans demanded in 1776 – rights only tacked on at the back.

A two minute monologue, Joey, older guy , JOEY, in a "military police" cap is in an airport waiting area and hears CNN recommend giving citizenship to an illegal birder-crosser who saw a crashed car, the driver dead, her young son crying in his carseat in the bac.Because the immigrant stayed with the child to comfort him, knowing the border patrol will arrest him at dawn. That triggers JOEY who rages against illegals and liberals who are soft on crime, letting i hordes of immigrants invade American... until another waiting passenger says something that, as the actual person told me, changes his perspective.

A 10 minute play developed for a Playground Experiement Challenge: Adam, an immigrant to the US rushes into the theater after masked armed men tried to arrest him af his regular Immigration meeting,. The woman who tripped the masked men, giving Adam a chance to run into the theatre, runs into the theater after him, telling him to stop... is she one of the attackers? Or...?

10 minute play. The driver of an assassin for a white supremacist group in 2020 returns to celebrate mission accomplished with his girlfriend… but experiences an unexpected reaction. Inspired by an FBI report.
As the play begins, Billy returns home to his girlfriend Sally who expected him much earlier but heard about the assassination on the tv news and wants to celebrate his successful action. Billy had felt justified in killing for an ideal but gradually feels an unexpected emotion - remorse. His growing awareness of our shared humanity leads the driver to want to turn himself into the FBI – as he actually did in the actual incident with his mother and father on each side.
Inspired by an actual FBI report: https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1285696/dl

Time: June 6, 2020; Place: Outside modest home in Millbrae in San Mateo County, CA.
Cast: 1 m, 1 f; Script: pages 9, including two photos. Timing: 10-20 depending on pacing.

Can Deena, a New York Jewish lawyer defend a young Saudi Muslim man, accused of raping and robbing an American man at knifepoint? Deena assumes he is guilty (why would any man make up those charges?!), but she believes the worst of the worst deserve counsel. When Mazen insists on his innocence and faces a prosecutor determined to convict the first Saudi of any crime in NYC since the attacks, Deena tries a Hail Mary: she asks the accuser's wife to look at evidence that might show innocence. In this story, based on an actual trial, some of the people work through fear and prejudice into unexpected connections with our shared humanity - some cannot take that journey.

(Cast: 6 - 3 women, 3 men; unit set) Unproduced so far. Inspired by actual trial in NYC 2010. The defendant asked me to write his story.
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Awards and placements (current and earlier drafts, some titled "Closets"):

Winner, Staged Zoom Reading September 2020 The Riant Theatre's Jocunda Festival, directed by Van Dirk Fisher.

Finalist, 2019 ScreenCraft Stage Play Contest.

Semifinalist; 2019 Diverse Voices (We Screenplay);

Honorable Mention, New Works of Merit 2019 Playwriting Contest;

Athena Reads (Athena Theatre, Feb 2019);

Selected by National New Plays Network as one of 10 plays for readings of excerpts at Dramatists Guild 2018 annual conference;

Earlier drafts:

2016 TRU Voices Reading Series;

Finalist, MT Works;

Semi-Finalist: Ashland New Plays; Beverly Hills Theatre Club; Bay Area Playwrights Foundation;

Honorable Mention, Arch and Bruce Brown Foundation’s contest for plays about actual events/people that position LGBT life positively.

Script analysis by writer-director-actor Kareem Fahmy through Maia Directors.

In SAM'S RABBLE, Sam Adams and Captain Daniel Shays celebrate victory after the American Revolution, but soon they’re trying to destroy each other, both sure they’re saving their new democracy – the true story of a rebellion that triggered the uniting of the 13 new nations under one Constitution... not the story glorified by many Jan 6 2021 insurgents and praised on the t-shirt worn by Timothy McVeigh on the day he bombed Oklahoma in 1995.

The story starts as settlers moving West have circled their wagons outside a ramshackle tavern, a Native American tied by the neck to a wheel. After the tavern owner’s widow tries to get the drunk guarding the captive to free him, she gathers us around her campfire for the story of Shays Rebellion in 1787 that triggered calls for an American aristocracy to control mob-o-cracy.

With news that the 12 other nations are planning to merge their armies and crush the rebellion before it spreads across borders, Sam sends out the army of Massachusetts to shoot or hang his friends and terrified the 13 newly independent nation states into uniting under one Constitution that didn’t dare mention people’s rights that Sam and Dan – had to be tacked on to the end later.

When Shays lands in a dungeon, Sam has already said he would hang even his own son - with his own hands - if he took up arms against the people’s elected government. Will hang his friend or give all insurrectionists amnesty if they show remorse for choosing violence over the vote?

Time: 1781-1787 (Prologue and Epilogue in 1795).
Cast: Nine. 6 men, 3 women.
Unit Set: Settlers on their way West show their story, outside a ramshackle tavern, taking bits of costume from their covered wagon and a few props or painted backdrops (or projections) to indicate locations. (Story theater/Poor Theater structure)
Length: About 2 hours. 124 pages of script (pages 5-130, including some visuals or links, stage directions) See page 131 for Scene page #s (working scripts can have a TOC!)
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Status: Unproduced, un-optioned, unpublished. Just finished umpteenth revision in Sept 2023.

Development: Written and revised based on table reads and courses led by playwrights (Rogelio Martinez at Primary Stages ESPA, Michele Lowe and Austin Pendleton at Dramatists Guild Institute, Winter Miller at Playwrights Center (online); also after a dramaturgical script analysis of an early draft by Gwyn MacDonald. Awaiting new script analysis by playwright/director Octavio Solis and probably more revisions/enhancements.

Main questions now are about clarity of the story arc balanced with development of full characters, need to turn yet more exposition into action or trash it, smoothness of storytelling transitions, pacing, etc. (Not worried about a cast of 9 even if that means the play can only well-funded or community and university theaters where actors work for love and/or learning.)

Contest: An early draft was one of two winners in the “Stageplay” category of the Moondance International Film Festival’s Stage Play category (2017)

When a national crisis inflames fear and blame between races and income groups, can we find ways to reconnect as Americans? We are in early February 2009, rural Tennessee, just after Obama’s inauguration when families are losing jobs and homes after the ‘08 financial crash. Past angers are brewing between an African American WWII veteran and the Irish-American sheriff who almost killed him during the voting rights struggle in the late 50s/early 60s. Luanne, the sheriff’s granddaughter, interrupts their battle to the death when she arrives hell-bent on getting to the first meeting of the Tea Party on February 16 to “Take our country back!” This mix of ages and races simmers into unexpected reconciliations and boils over into a very American - and loving - rebellion. (Previous title BREW)

CAST: 7; SET: One. Revised after a table reading with Arthur French as Mac and after AACT.org feedback
Former title listed with contests: Embers of Tent City

Economic crisis in rural TN. February 2009. Aging African American WWII veteran, Mac emboldened by Obama's first inauguration, lands in a battle to the death with the retired Irish American sheriff Jeb who almost killed him in the voting rights struggle in the 60s... but the sheriff's granddaughter, Luanne, interrupts them when she arrives hell-bent on getting to the first meeting of the Tea Party to "Take our country back" Cast 4, One set (field near porch of a ramshackle farmhouse). One act/30 minute version of my 7 character full length play "Brew."

A play about actual killing of a federal building guard by Boogaloo Bois to try to make Black Lives Matter protesters at a George Floyd rally look violent, anger the police and achieve their goals of a second civil war, but between races so whites can again dominate. Premiere will be in October 2021 with American Lives Theatre in Indianapolis. Selected for Reading in PCSF Festival of Short Play in July 2021.)

Two character plus narrator, simple location, 5-10 minute play, depending on how staged: Billy, a member of the Boogaloo Bois returns home after a Black Lives Matter/Police Reform protest demonstration in San Francisco against the killing of George Floyd, tells his girlfriend Sally how he drove another member looking for ways to kill in order to make the protesters look violent and start a new 'civil war' between police and black/white activists... and something unexpected happens.

Based on actual incident. Optional projection of photos of victims and link to FBI reports:
-- FBI Special Agent Brett Woolard: https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1285696/dl
-- Former FBI Agent Frank Figliuzzi: https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/trump-s-silence-boogaloo-bois-shows-he-is…

Written before Jan6 2021 - I worry that it has become too relevant to elections today. (Names of assassins changed in play to protect the guilty from fame) Script includes a poem for Darnella who recorded on her cell phone the murder of George Floyd so that the world could know what was happening -- and continued even when the policeman suffocating George Floyd looked straight at her and her cell phone camera.

Short Play video with actor Jr Carter
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwGZScfg_7g&t=29s

An aging former African-American WWII veteran and leader of a voting rights struggle when in 1959 he mobilized thousands to register to vote despite knowing that they would be evicted from any rental or sharecropper cabins, barred from local doctors, stores and gas stations so they had bot get to Memphis 50 miles away. McFerren sheltered about 300 families in army tents. He hopes the audience will understand the struggle for first class citizenship has not ended.Stories told by McFerren to the writer.

Reading at Crossways Theatre, NYC March 2 2020 by actor JR Carter March 2 2020, 7:30 PM,
http://resumes.actorsaccess.com/jrcarter and https://www.imdb.me/JRCarter

Connie Winston on stage directions - www.ConnieWinston.com

Three poems from my unpublished book "MammalTalk" that were published in the Pomona Valley Journal on pages 47, 70 and 120-121 at:
http://www.pomonavalleyreview.com/pdf/PVR%2012/PVR%2012.pdf

Unpublished 10-15 minute political drama/comedy.

We are backstage, maybe at a bar in the theater. We see the back of a woman, Kitty, in a long velvet gown, leaning over a podium. Giving an unseen audience in front of her a very raunchy talk. Backstage, closer to us, a businessman, Lee, watches. At the end of a talk, Lee brings Kitty back to meet us and introduces us as members of a group that finances political campaigns in return for specific types of laws. We realize they are going to sign a contract to set Kitty up as the executive director of a club that will help stop news reports of politicians involved in sexual harassment lawsuits – a sensuous haven where elected government representatives and industry leaders can find safe sex, hidden from news reporters.

But Kitty has her own plan... and gradually we watch the signing ceremony morph into an unexpected crime scene.

Short one-act (10 pps), simple set; cast (2(: sensuous young woman and businessman.

A young woman from a low-income neighborhood, has graduated from an entrepreneurship program and turned a failing fast food chain into a success, but now must deal with an ebola outbreak. Surrounded by demonstrators, despite warnings from the program head, a man she refuses to let herself love, she invites the activist leaders into her company, sure she can use her street smarts to buy them out. She's kidnapped, forced to watch videos of industrial farming, then escapes, shocking her investors with a plan to run a company that is not only profitable, but fair to employees, animals and consumers. Selected as one of 10 (out of 750) Best Scene Screenplays in the Mystery category, https://crimemysteryfestival.com/2019/01/25/top-10-crime-mystery-screen…

Screenplay - After getting her Afghan client acquitted of false charges in NYC, but the trial outted him Deena goes with her client home to Afghanistan, sure she can protect him from his father, a tribal chief. A stone door in a bleak Afghan mountain opens and the father greets her graciously, invites her into an elegant, glittering mansion carved into the mountain. He gives her tea, seems to welcome her, but as she is escorted to her room, she finds herself locked in a harem with her client's sisters and hears her client being dragged to gay jail for flogging. She is at first contemptuous of what seem to be dependent, enslaved women... but she soon realizes only they can come up with the strategies that may free her and her client.