Doug DeVita

Doug DeVita

Currently an advisory board member for All Out Arts, and formerly Artistic Director for Westside Repertory Theater, Doug has had work produced in New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, New Jersey, Connecticut, and London.

He has had work developed at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, and at ESPA/Primary Stages in New York. Doug’s play “Fable” was recently named one of the top ten plays on Tony Award-...
Currently an advisory board member for All Out Arts, and formerly Artistic Director for Westside Repertory Theater, Doug has had work produced in New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, New Jersey, Connecticut, and London.

He has had work developed at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, and at ESPA/Primary Stages in New York. Doug’s play “Fable” was recently named one of the top ten plays on Tony Award-Winning Producer Ken Davenport's "Broadway Producer Pick List 2019." Additionally, his play "Just A Rumor" (co-written with Gary Lyons) was an O'Neill Semi-Finalist; and his play "Phillie's Trilogy" was a Semi-Finalist for Barrington Stage Company's Burman New Play Award as well as winning Scrap Mettle Arts Inaugural Emerging Playwrights Competition, and four Fresh Fruit Festival Awards of Distinction. He also wrote the books for children’s musicals based on Shakespeare’s The Tempest and As You Like It, which were produced in New York at Vital Children’s Theatre.

He has studied with Mark Bly, Gary Garrison, Jacqueline Goldfinger, and Caleen Jennings at the Kennedy Center; with Robert Askins, Rogelio Martinez, Winter Miller, and Michael Walkup at ESPA/Primary Stages; and with Karen Hartman, Lyle Kessler, and Eric Webb. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild.

Plays

  • Phillie's Trilogy by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 32
    ·
    Cast: 
    7
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, drama + 1 more
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    Keyword: LGBTQ, Priest Sexual Abuse + 7 more
    Genre: dark comedy, drama, period
    Keyword: LGBTQ, Priest Sexual Abuse, abortion, aging parents, death of a parent, betrayal, gay bullying, Suburbia, 1970s
    Full-length, award-winning comedy/drama. Development at the Kennedy Center (with Jacqueline Goldfinger) and at ESPA/Primary Stages (with Rogelio Martinez.)

    Growing up in the “fabulous” 70s was no picnic for precocious budding writer Phillie McDougal. But despite the nuns, the priests, bullying classmates, and his parents, he lived to tell the tales, with results no one bargained for. Including...
    Full-length, award-winning comedy/drama. Development at the Kennedy Center (with Jacqueline Goldfinger) and at ESPA/Primary Stages (with Rogelio Martinez.)

    Growing up in the “fabulous” 70s was no picnic for precocious budding writer Phillie McDougal. But despite the nuns, the priests, bullying classmates, and his parents, he lived to tell the tales, with results no one bargained for. Including him.

    “Phillie's Trilogy premiered at the Fresh Fruit Festival recently, bringing with it a more desirable style of writing ... almost musical turn-of-phrase coupled with brilliant use of exposition and spot-on timing made the word as welcome as the deed."
    – Raymond Greenberg | Arts Independent

    NOTE: If you're looking for a play with diverse casting possibilities, any of my other plays can fit that criteria, but due to the specific setting and era in which this play takes place, all of the characters should be white.
  • Fable by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 15
    ·
    Cast: 
    7
    ·
    Genre: biography, comedy + 9 more
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    Keyword: June Havoc, Gypsy Rose Lee + 6 more
    Genre: biography, comedy, dark comedy, docudrama/historic, drama, fable/folktale, fantasy, movement/physical, parody/spoof, period, satire
    Keyword: June Havoc, Gypsy Rose Lee, Rose Hovick, gypsy, fable, Ethel Merman, Arthur Laurents, Jerome Robbins
    One-Act comedy/drama. Development at ESPA/Primary Stages (with Rogelio Martinez), Davenport Playwrights Workshop (with Eric Webb), and in workshops with playwright Karen Hartman. FABLE is on Ken Davenport’s list of the Top Ten Plays of 2019.

    “I think it is absolutely brilliant. It was fascinating to me because of course I was a part of it, but it was the appeal that Gypsy has that [Doug]...
    One-Act comedy/drama. Development at ESPA/Primary Stages (with Rogelio Martinez), Davenport Playwrights Workshop (with Eric Webb), and in workshops with playwright Karen Hartman. FABLE is on Ken Davenport’s list of the Top Ten Plays of 2019.

    “I think it is absolutely brilliant. It was fascinating to me because of course I was a part of it, but it was the appeal that Gypsy has that [Doug] capitalized on and brought forth in a very delicious way.”
    – Lane Bradbury, Dainty June in Gypsy, 1959

    Who has the right to tell your story? Especially when it's the same story told from the differing memories of two legendary show business siblings? And one sister's version is about to become a big, Broadway musical that is also destined to become legendary? June Havoc was famously ambivalent about the show Gypsy, which her sister, the burlesque star Gypsy Rose Lee, referred to as her legacy. And in Fable, which is itself a fable about the creation of that musical fable, the sisters' loyalty to each other is tested in a mounting battle that takes place in rehearsal rooms, dressing rooms, onstage, backstage, and all in the memory of the aging Ms. Havoc as she faces her imminent death, still battling with fiction and truth in order to keep her own legacy alive.
  • The Fierce Urgency Of Now by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 14
    ·
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 2 more
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    Keyword: LGBTQ, office politics + 5 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama, satire
    Keyword: LGBTQ, office politics, Mad Men, coming of age, age discrimination, sexual discrimination, great role for an older woman
    Full-length, award-winning comedy/drama.

    “When staying the same becomes unbearable, we must burst out of our comfort zones.”
    – Dana P. Rowe
    "The Fierce urgency Of Now" is a fast-moving comedy that follows art director Kyle as he tries to discover his real self amid the power struggles and skewed priorities of a high-powered New York ad agency. After an office...
    Full-length, award-winning comedy/drama.

    “When staying the same becomes unbearable, we must burst out of our comfort zones.”
    – Dana P. Rowe
    "The Fierce urgency Of Now" is a fast-moving comedy that follows art director Kyle as he tries to discover his real self amid the power struggles and skewed priorities of a high-powered New York ad agency. After an office restructuring puts him in a new creative group run by the megalomaniac homophobe Kate, he finds an unlikely ally in copywriter Dodo, a living-legend from the era of “Mad Men” who not-so-gently prods Kyle to the uncomfortable but inevitable realization that “It’s time to take off. And soar.”

    "...a rapid-fire, well-timed character study filled with terrific one-liners, deep and even tearful relationship moments, and sage wisdom for the texting generation."
    – Evan Meena, Outer-Stage

    "The writing is fresh, funny, and smart without striving for hilarity. It hits where it's meant to hit."
    – Nancy Worssam, ArtsStage-SeattleRage
  • Goddess Of The Hunt by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 7
    ·
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 5 more
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    Keyword: modern myth retelling, social media + 2 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, farce, mystery/thriller, parody/spoof, romantic comedy, satire
    Keyword: modern myth retelling, social media, great LGBTQ roles, great role for an older actress
    Full-length dark comedy. Development at the Kennedy Center (with Mark Bly and Caleen Jennings) and at ESPA/Primary Stages (with Michael Walkup and Rogelio Martinez.)

    Semi-Finalist, B Street Theatre 2020 New Comedy Festival

    Just how well do you know all your "friends" on social media?
    In this fast-moving "light comedy about dark people leading private lives in...
    Full-length dark comedy. Development at the Kennedy Center (with Mark Bly and Caleen Jennings) and at ESPA/Primary Stages (with Michael Walkup and Rogelio Martinez.)

    Semi-Finalist, B Street Theatre 2020 New Comedy Festival

    Just how well do you know all your "friends" on social media?
    In this fast-moving "light comedy about dark people leading private lives in public places," when the grieving Charlie Windsor meets the gregarious Diana Black-White in a New York Theater District bar they become instant BFFs. Much to the consternation of his closest friend since childhood, Broadway actor Ed McGrath, Charlie is almost immediately hurled into an overwhelming whirl of dark secrets, questionable loyalties, and highly dysfunctional family dynamics; a world for which Charlie is completely unprepared. GODDESS OF THE HUNT is a gleefully silly homage to those romantic comedy thrillers of the 1960s via Roman mythology, updated to the creepy, contemporary world of social media and – perhaps too much – information sharing.
  • NELL DASH, The Gruesomely Merry Adventures Of An Irrepressibly Sensible Capitalist With A Vengeance by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 7
    ·
    Cast: 
    8–23
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, adventure + 9 more
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    Keyword: Jane Austen, Charles Dickens + 6 more
    Genre: adaptation, adventure, comedy, dark comedy, fable/folktale, farce, melodrama, mystery/thriller, parody/spoof, period, satire
    Keyword: Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, murder, Mayhem, 19th Century British Literature, Alternate history, great roles for women, fractured fairy tales
    Full-length comedy/satire.

    In the alternate London of 1820 during the reign of King Stanley V8, Elinor and Marianne Wood, the illegitimate daughters of Sir Henry Dashwood and his cook, have become Nell Dash and Nance. They find themselves whirling up against Fagin, The Artful Dodger, Miss Havisham, Celia and Polly Peachum, and a barber named Todd, among many others. Their vile half-sister-in-law...
    Full-length comedy/satire.

    In the alternate London of 1820 during the reign of King Stanley V8, Elinor and Marianne Wood, the illegitimate daughters of Sir Henry Dashwood and his cook, have become Nell Dash and Nance. They find themselves whirling up against Fagin, The Artful Dodger, Miss Havisham, Celia and Polly Peachum, and a barber named Todd, among many others. Their vile half-sister-in-law Lady Fanny Ferrars Dashwood, stops at nothing to keep them from getting a single penny of the fortunes accrued from the Dashwood Meat Packing Empire whilst at the same time trying to attain the two strands of pearls given the girls when they fled Devonshire years before, pearls which have mysteriously disappeared and have a strange history of their own.

    "We had our annual Playwrights Retreat where we read ...NELL DASH... It was the highlight of the weekend. There is a great deal of comedy coming from every corner of the dingy world it so effectively creates."
    – Kim T. Sharp, [Former] Associate Artistic Director, Abingdon Theatre Company
  • Just A Rumor by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 3
    ·
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 3 more
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    Keyword: Katherine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy + 5 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama, farce, romantic comedy
    Keyword: Katherine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, Hollywood, Fictional Hollywood History, Movie Legends, death, life
    Full-length, comedy/drama. Eugene O'Neill Semi-finalist, 2006

    Just A Rumor was co-written by Gary Lyons and Doug DeVita, based on an idea by Gary Lyons.
    Rosalynne Buchanan and Graham Harris are two Hollywood legends whose dynamic on-screen chemistry sparked an off-screen affair lasting 25 years. In 1968, a few weeks after completing their latest film together, Graham dies in the...
    Full-length, comedy/drama. Eugene O'Neill Semi-finalist, 2006

    Just A Rumor was co-written by Gary Lyons and Doug DeVita, based on an idea by Gary Lyons.
    Rosalynne Buchanan and Graham Harris are two Hollywood legends whose dynamic on-screen chemistry sparked an off-screen affair lasting 25 years. In 1968, a few weeks after completing their latest film together, Graham dies in the early hours of the morning in the house they both share. Rosalynne (Ross) has no choice but to inform Graham’s wife Leslie of his death. What happens when Ross and Leslie meet for the first time is the premise of “Just A Rumor,” a play that explores the nature of love, celebrity, gossip, truth, and how to get a dead movie star out of the kitchen.
  • Mothers, Martinis, and Death by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 2
    ·
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 4 more
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    Keyword: great for evening of short plays, features LGBTQ characters + 2 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama, political, satire, tragedy
    Keyword: great for evening of short plays, features LGBTQ characters, great roles for older performers, great roles for women
    Six short plays: Checking The Basement For Leaks, Repetition; How Mrs. Henson Killed Her Children; Nigel, Guys, and Dolls; Lord's Theory; and The Hamburdian Candidate.

    (Each of these plays are also available to be read individually.)
  • Complicity by Doug DeVita
    Cast: 
    10
    ·
    Genre: biography, docudrama/historic + 5 more
    ·
    Keyword: Henriette Deluzy-Desportes, Praslin + 6 more
    Genre: biography, docudrama/historic, drama, mystery/thriller, period, political, tragedy
    Keyword: Henriette Deluzy-Desportes, Praslin, King Louis-Phillipe, Victor Hugo, murder, revolution, scandal, Paris 1840s
    Full-length drama. Development at ESPA/Primary Stages (with Michael Walkup and Rogelio Martinez), Davenport Playwrights Workshop (with Eric Webb.) This is still a work-in-progress, and I am looking for further development opportunities.

    A jealous wife... An indifferent husband... A charming governess... And a horrific murder that rocked the foundations of a glittering, gossip-ridden, scandal-...
    Full-length drama. Development at ESPA/Primary Stages (with Michael Walkup and Rogelio Martinez), Davenport Playwrights Workshop (with Eric Webb.) This is still a work-in-progress, and I am looking for further development opportunities.

    A jealous wife... An indifferent husband... A charming governess... And a horrific murder that rocked the foundations of a glittering, gossip-ridden, scandal-plagued society to its core. And the reasons behind this crime – one of the motivating factors leading to the Revolution of 1848 which cost the last king of France his throne – are explored in Complicity; no one is completely guilty, yet no one is even remotely innocent.
  • Checking The Basement For Leaks by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 13
    ·
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: abortion, Housewives + 2 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama, period
    Keyword: abortion, Housewives, Middle-aged pregnancy, great roles for women
    10-minute play.

    Set in the fall of 1972, bored housewife Veronica and her best friend, neighbor Grace Bradley, meet in the posh finished basement of Veronica's house in the upper middle class suburb of Plandome, Long Island every afternoon to smoke, drink, and discuss their deep frustrations. Unbeknownst to them, this particular afternoon their conversation is overheard by their children,...
    10-minute play.

    Set in the fall of 1972, bored housewife Veronica and her best friend, neighbor Grace Bradley, meet in the posh finished basement of Veronica's house in the upper middle class suburb of Plandome, Long Island every afternoon to smoke, drink, and discuss their deep frustrations. Unbeknownst to them, this particular afternoon their conversation is overheard by their children, Veronica's 12-year-old son Phillie, and Grace's 12-year old daughter Barbie.

    "Checking The Basement For Leaks" is the first part of the full-length Phillie's Trilogy, but was written to also stand alone as a short play.

    To find out what happens next, read "Phillie's Trilogy."
  • Gimme Carrot by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 11
    ·
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: fable/folktale, fantasy + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: Anti-Trump, features LGBTQ characters + 1 more
    Genre: fable/folktale, fantasy, political
    Keyword: Anti-Trump, features LGBTQ characters, dog character
    Trump has been acquitted. A gay man and his dog are worried about the future.
  • Nigel, Guys, and Dolls by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 11
    ·
    Cast: 
    1
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, drama
    ·
    Keyword: great LGBTQ role, angry monologue
    Genre: dark comedy, drama
    Keyword: great LGBTQ role, angry monologue
    5 minute monologue.

    In this monologue about mothers, martinis, and death, 50 year-old Nigel deals with his childhood the only way he knows how. Given his unorthodox upbringing, it's an unorthodox sort of not-quite-eulogy.
  • How Mrs. Henson Killed Her Children by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 11
    ·
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, drama + 3 more
    ·
    Keyword: Disney, dysfunctional family + 3 more
    Genre: dark comedy, drama, satire, tragedy, young audiences
    Keyword: Disney, dysfunctional family, teen suicide, social media, great role for a teenage boy
    10-minute play, in development.

    California housewife Marcy Henson just LOVES all things Disney – she even named her kids Sebastian and Chip, after the anthropomorphic characters in "The Little Mermaid" and "Beauty and The Beast." But does the rest of her family share her enthusiasm? Does she even care if they don't?
  • The Hamburdian Candidate by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 7
    ·
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, fable/folktale + 6 more
    ·
    Keyword: Anti Trump
    Genre: dark comedy, fable/folktale, fantasy, horror, parody/spoof, political, satire, science fiction
    Keyword: Anti Trump
    A word salad. The "dialogue" doesn't matter; it's nonsense. Horrible nonsense, but nonsense. The story is in the stage directions.
  • Lord's Theory by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 7
    ·
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: comedy, experimental + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: Titanic, 20th Century + 6 more
    Genre: comedy, experimental, parody/spoof, satire
    Keyword: Titanic, 20th Century, 2-minute play, chaos, tumult, spoof, pretensions, hopeful ending
    A spoof of 2-minute "Stream of pretentious-consciousness" plays.

    “Before the Titanic, all was quiet. Afterward all was tumult. That is why, to anybody who lived at the time, the Titanic more than any other single event marks the end of the old days, and the beginning of a new, uneasy era.”
    ― Walter Lord, A Night to Remember
  • Repetition by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 6
    ·
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: comedy, drama + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: LGBTQ, great LGBTQ role + 2 more
    Genre: comedy, drama, farce, holiday
    Keyword: LGBTQ, great LGBTQ role, 1980's, short play
    15-minute play.

    Childhood friends and next-door neighbors Phillie McDougal and Barbie Bradley are both soon to be 25, and they are both still virgins. Well, she is. The jury is out on him. Drunk and alone on New Years Eve, they decide to make love. It wasn't a good idea.
  • Princess of the Covidelevator (A Doug & Max Play) by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 6
    ·
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: covid19, features LGBTQ characters + 2 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, satire
    Keyword: covid19, features LGBTQ characters, cavalier king spaniel, Sneeze
    Doug and Max are on the elevator on their way to take a walk. Most residents of their building are very gracious about not crowding into occupied elevators. But not Nancy.
  • Mid-Day Masturbation by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 5
    ·
    Cast: 
    1
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, horror + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: Trump, coronavirus
    Genre: dark comedy, horror, political, satire
    Keyword: Trump, coronavirus
    It's not what you think. Or what you want.
  • Saving Pete McDougal by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 5
    ·
    Cast: 
    1
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: father, son + 3 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: father, son, death and grief, eulogy, love
    In this monologue, successful novelist Philip McDougal delivers the eulogy for his father Pete, a successful advertising executive who dreamed of being a novelist but never was, and comes to the realization that although their relationship was always strained there was love between them.
  • DISTRACTION!?! (A Doug & Max Play) by Doug DeVita
    Recommendations: 5
    ·
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: comedy
    ·
    Keyword: coronavirus, dog + 1 more
    Genre: comedy
    Keyword: coronavirus, dog, migraines
    Doug has a headache. Max wants to play. They agree to nap first. Then Doug hears something on the radio that annoys the crap out of him.