Richard Alleman

Richard Alleman

Richard Alleman (Playwright) has written for Vogue magazine for over three decades. He has also written for The Economist, British and German Vogues, Travel + Leisure, Condé Nast Traveler, In-Style, and Milieu. He is the author of the classic guides Hollywood: A Movie Lover’s Guide and New York: A Movie Lover’s Guide (Random House/Broadway Books), which he recently updated for their new electronic editions. He...
Richard Alleman (Playwright) has written for Vogue magazine for over three decades. He has also written for The Economist, British and German Vogues, Travel + Leisure, Condé Nast Traveler, In-Style, and Milieu. He is the author of the classic guides Hollywood: A Movie Lover’s Guide and New York: A Movie Lover’s Guide (Random House/Broadway Books), which he recently updated for their new electronic editions. He co-wrote the screenplay for the film Casa Hollywood, and his play Scenario of Death was produced Off-Broadway at the Nat Horn Theatre. His one-act plays Quiet Car and Adrift were just presented at New York City's Frigid Festival. Based in London from 1998 to 2008, Alleman worked as an actor on both stage and television. His favorite role was that of an aging Tom Cruise in several episodes of Armando Iannucci’s BBC comedy series Time Trumpet. He holds a BA in Drama from the University of California, Berkeley.

Plays

  • Bag Lady by Richard Alleman
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: fashion, disillusionment + 2 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, parody/spoof
    Keyword: fashion, disillusionment, ageism, enlightenment
    A young woman from Ohio has come to New York in search of a modeling career as well as a new wardrobe Taking a break from shopping in a Greenwich Village park, she chats on her i-Phone with a girlfriend back home and tries to avoid the old man who has sat down next to her.

    Note: "Bag Lady" can be performed as part of "Fashion Victims," a trilogy of one-act plays by Richard...
    A young woman from Ohio has come to New York in search of a modeling career as well as a new wardrobe Taking a break from shopping in a Greenwich Village park, she chats on her i-Phone with a girlfriend back home and tries to avoid the old man who has sat down next to her.

    Note: "Bag Lady" can be performed as part of "Fashion Victims," a trilogy of one-act plays by Richard Alleman, all dealing with the world of fashion. The other two plays are "#HeToo" and "No Room at the Ritz"
  • #HeToo by Richard Alleman
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: fashion, Glam + 1 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: fashion, Glam, Law and Order
    A male model tries to cash in on the #MeToo movement by claiming he was sexual abused by a word-famous photographer.
    Note: This play can be produced as part of a trilogy of one-acts by Richard Alleman, all set in the world of fashion and titled "Fashion Victims." The other two plays are "Bag Lady" and "No Room at the Ritz" (below).
  • "No Room at the Ritz" by Richard Alleman
    Cast: 
    2–3
    ·
    Genre: comedy, satire
    Genre: comedy, satire
    A legendary editor-in-chief discovers she's been fired, but nobody's told her.

    Note: This play can be part of "Fashion Victims," a trilogy of plays set in the world of fashion. The other two plays are "Bag Lady" and "#HeToo" (see below)
  • Adrift by Richard Alleman
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, fantasy + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: dark comedy, Dystopia
    Genre: dark comedy, fantasy, political, satire
    Keyword: dark comedy, Dystopia
    A wealthy WASP couple try to escape the horrors of a dystopian world by living full-time aboard a luxury cruise ship. (This play can be produced as a double bill with "Quiet Car," below.)
  • Quiet Car by Richard Alleman
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: dark comedy, unexpected twists
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, fantasy, satire
    Keyword: dark comedy, unexpected twists
    Two strangers–one craving peace, the other attention–are forced to share the last two seats in the Quiet Car of an Amtrak train. (This play can be produced as a double-bill along with "Adrift," above.)
  • The Bunner Sisters - a new play inspired by an Edith Wharton novella by Richard Alleman
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, drama + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: Edith Wharton
    Genre: adaptation, drama, period
    Keyword: Edith Wharton
    While Edith Wharton is perhaps best known as a chronicler of upper-class life during America’s late-nineteenth-century Gilded Age, she took aim at the other end of the social spectrum in her little-known novella Bunner Sisters. Set in a tenement basement in Lower Manhattan in the 1880s, Bunner Sisters follows the lives of two spinster sisters trying to eek out a living as seamstresses. When an unattached man...
    While Edith Wharton is perhaps best known as a chronicler of upper-class life during America’s late-nineteenth-century Gilded Age, she took aim at the other end of the social spectrum in her little-known novella Bunner Sisters. Set in a tenement basement in Lower Manhattan in the 1880s, Bunner Sisters follows the lives of two spinster sisters trying to eek out a living as seamstresses. When an unattached man enters the picture, their complacent existence is upended. Sensitively adapted for the stage by playwright Richard Alleman, The Bunner Sisters takes audiences on a dramatic journey to a not so innocent age, with many of the same problems we face today—from income inequality to the precarious status of women. * * *




    "Rich and warmly rendered. An unforgettable time in the theater."--Anna Deavere Smith* * *


    "Richard Alleman's stage adaptation of Edith Wharton's 'Bunner Sisters' gives voice to New York City's turn-of-the-last-century 'women of no consequence' and gives us a window into their world. Watching the play, one has the feeling of opening a curiosity box filled with manners, customs, and objects of another time; but it is also filled with a series of desperate choices reluctantly made in a wasteland of options. The very stuff of drama and no less tragic than that of Agamemnon."--Ann Roth