Brendan Bourque-Sheil

Brendan Bourque-Sheil

Brendan Bourque-Sheil's plays include DOGROSE PATROL (O'Neill Finalist, written with Madison Smith), SUNRISE COVEN (Stages Theatre, Know Theatre of Cincinnati, Penny Seats Theatre), BETWEEN TWO CAVES (Landing Theatre, Garden of Voices), and THE BOOK OF MAGGIE (Finalist, Reva Shiner Comedy Award, Stages Theatre, Death and Pretzels Theatre Company). He has participated in the Stillwright Retreat and won...
Brendan Bourque-Sheil's plays include DOGROSE PATROL (O'Neill Finalist, written with Madison Smith), SUNRISE COVEN (Stages Theatre, Know Theatre of Cincinnati, Penny Seats Theatre), BETWEEN TWO CAVES (Landing Theatre, Garden of Voices), and THE BOOK OF MAGGIE (Finalist, Reva Shiner Comedy Award, Stages Theatre, Death and Pretzels Theatre Company). He has participated in the Stillwright Retreat and won the Writer's Colony's Real People Fellowship. For Alley Theatre's Department of Education and Community Engagement he's been a principal writer of 12 devised theatre plays for teens. For ten years, he has worked as a teaching artist for Alley Theatre, and a consultant in Creative Writing for the Kinder High School of Performing and Visual Arts. He also tells personal narrative stories for a live audience at shows including Grown-Up Storytime, City Cast Houston and World Channel's "Stories From the Stage." He enjoys long walks in graveyards.

Plays

  • Dogrose Patrol by Brendan Bourque-Sheil
    Recommendations: 1
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    Cast: 
    7–8
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    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 2 more
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    Keyword: centers Deaf characters, centers blind character + 4 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, mystery/thriller, period
    Keyword: centers Deaf characters, centers blind character, sign language, whodunnit, WWI, coming of age
    Written by Brendan Bourque-Sheil with Madison Smith.

    During World War One, the British government hired Girl Scouts to act as spies and couriers to protect King and country; this is the story of a troop who took their jobs way too seriously. Dogrose Patrol is a coming-of-age spy dramedy that follows a troop of teenage spies, as they investigate a mystery that calls into question where their true loyalties are.
  • Sunrise Coven by Brendan Bourque-Sheil
    Recommendations: 2
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    Cast: 
    5
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    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 3 more
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    Keyword: witches, magic + 3 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, farce, political, satire
    Keyword: witches, magic, medicine, alternative medicine, healthcare
    Hallie Heaton is a beloved Nurse Practitioner in a tiny Texas town beset by every economic and existential struggle one could think up. But after showing up in the ER one night with enough Oxy in her system to kill an elephant, she loses her medical license and has to forge a new path to treating her patients...by teaming up with a local witch and a drug dealer, to bypass the medical establishment. Magic and...
    Hallie Heaton is a beloved Nurse Practitioner in a tiny Texas town beset by every economic and existential struggle one could think up. But after showing up in the ER one night with enough Oxy in her system to kill an elephant, she loses her medical license and has to forge a new path to treating her patients...by teaming up with a local witch and a drug dealer, to bypass the medical establishment. Magic and Medicine collide and coalesce in Sunrise Coven, a dark comedy about healers, healing, and pharmaceuticals, in a town that’s barely holding on.
  • Between Two Caves by Brendan Bourque-Sheil
    Recommendations: 5
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    Cast: 
    2
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    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 1 more
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    Keyword: conspiracy, mental illness + 1 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, political
    Keyword: conspiracy, mental illness, living room
    A one-hour comedy thriller about modern conspiracy theory culture. Alex, the host of a successful podcast, is in the middle of a media storm, after hosting a controversial interview on her show, when Parker, an old friend from high school shows up at her door, to pitch her a wild story that he believes will launch both of them into the national spotlight. When Alex says no, the ensuing debate delves into...
    A one-hour comedy thriller about modern conspiracy theory culture. Alex, the host of a successful podcast, is in the middle of a media storm, after hosting a controversial interview on her show, when Parker, an old friend from high school shows up at her door, to pitch her a wild story that he believes will launch both of them into the national spotlight. When Alex says no, the ensuing debate delves into conspiracy theory culture, mental illness, and how we engage with people who's interpretation of reality is fundamentally different from our own.
  • The Book of Maggie by Brendan Bourque-Sheil
    Recommendations: 2
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    Cast: 
    5
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    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 4 more
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    Keyword: christianity, Jesus + 2 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, faith-based, fantasy, parody/spoof, satire
    Keyword: christianity, Jesus, Judas, religion
    Judas Iscariot and Pontius Pilate, whiling away the afterlife as frenemies in the eternal Inferno, are offered a chance for redemption by a sci-fi-writing Saint Peter. The assignment? Teach a suicidal woman the value of life—before the whole world goes to Hell.
  • My Favorite Funeral by Brendan Bourque-Sheil
    Cast: 
    1
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    Genre: biography, dark comedy + 1 more
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    Keyword: mental illness, ghosts + 5 more
    Genre: biography, dark comedy, drama
    Keyword: mental illness, ghosts, storytelling, solo show, ritual, parents, suicide recovery (none depicted)
    My mom was a witch. When I was 18, she made me join her in a ritual to get rid of a ghost that was haunting our apartment. Now I'm trying a similar ritual for a ghost that's haunting me. My Favorite Funeral is a one-hour solo show about living with suicidal ideation and hopefully one day living without it. Written for The Writer's Colony at Dairy Hollow's "Real People, Real Struggles,...
    My mom was a witch. When I was 18, she made me join her in a ritual to get rid of a ghost that was haunting our apartment. Now I'm trying a similar ritual for a ghost that's haunting me. My Favorite Funeral is a one-hour solo show about living with suicidal ideation and hopefully one day living without it. Written for The Writer's Colony at Dairy Hollow's "Real People, Real Struggles, Real Stories: Writing About Mental Illness" Fellowship.
  • Uncharted by Brendan Bourque-Sheil
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 1 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama
    Alyssa had no idea her father was a sperm donor, but now her previously unknown half-sister Liv has flown across the country to ask some questions about their shared genetic history that will force Alyssa to question how well she really knows her father and how this new sort-of sibling fits into her life.