Ross Peter Nelson

Ross Peter Nelson

Ross Peter Nelson holds an MFA in playwriting from the University of New Orleans. His work has been performed across the US and on three continents. He has worked closely with Southern Rep, the Pear Avenue Theatre, and Playground San Francisco. In addition to his dramatic work, he has published award-winning short fiction, and two books on computers. In 2017, he served as playwright-in-residence at the Can...
Ross Peter Nelson holds an MFA in playwriting from the University of New Orleans. His work has been performed across the US and on three continents. He has worked closely with Southern Rep, the Pear Avenue Theatre, and Playground San Francisco. In addition to his dramatic work, he has published award-winning short fiction, and two books on computers. In 2017, he served as playwright-in-residence at the Can Serrat colony outside Barcelona. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild.

Plays

  • How to Poison the President
    After Maximilien Robespierre and Che Guevara find themselves reincarnated as cats, it becomes their mission to convert their owner to the cause of revolution and impress on her that it's her duty to assassinate the president.
  • Les Chiens Errants (The Stray Dogs)
    This play follows the creation and eventual dissolution of the friendship between Dalí, Buñuel, and Lorca beginning with their grad school days at the Residencia de Estudiantes in 1920's Madrid. Their shared love of art and literature gives way to rancor when sublimated sexual tensions rise to the surface. Sigmund Freud steps in to comment on the action, as do the ghosts of Oscar Wilde, Buñuel's...
    This play follows the creation and eventual dissolution of the friendship between Dalí, Buñuel, and Lorca beginning with their grad school days at the Residencia de Estudiantes in 1920's Madrid. Their shared love of art and literature gives way to rancor when sublimated sexual tensions rise to the surface. Sigmund Freud steps in to comment on the action, as do the ghosts of Oscar Wilde, Buñuel's father, and the Archbishop of Toledo. The poetry of Lorca is combine with the surrealist images of Dalí and Buñuel, and one character is turned into a teddy bear, creating an ever-shifting environment where the audience is never sure what will happen next.

  • Becoming Number Six
    Stephanie Dylar is disturbed when two shadowy figures claiming to be intelligence agents appear on her doorstep. The agents, Lovelace and Babbage, represent a government branch known as The Division, and inform her that her teenager Dakota may be involved in illegal computer activity. When Dakota subsequently goes missing, Stephanie turns to her friend Julia for help, and is confronted with the realities of...
    Stephanie Dylar is disturbed when two shadowy figures claiming to be intelligence agents appear on her doorstep. The agents, Lovelace and Babbage, represent a government branch known as The Division, and inform her that her teenager Dakota may be involved in illegal computer activity. When Dakota subsequently goes missing, Stephanie turns to her friend Julia for help, and is confronted with the realities of constant surveillance Julia brings the hacking group Incognito into the mix.
  • Tycho's Fool
    Tycho’s Fool explores the life and mysterious death of Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe. It is set in an extraterrestrial Kaberet Astonomiske, whose actors impersonate (among others) Aristotle, European kings, a dwarf jester, and a performing moose. The play combines the live acting with multimedia projections to investigate supernovae, Tycho's connection to Shakespeare, and just who killed the leading astronomer of the 16th century.
  • Colter's Hell
    Legendary mountain man John Colter is confronted by the animals (Coyote, Chipmunk, Raven, Trout, & Elk) whose environment he has begun to despoil. Ultimately, he comes face to face with Wishpoosh, the enormous, mythic albino beaver who confronts him with the consequences of a Lockean approach to nature. A madcap tour through the environmental consequences of our exploitation of nature featuring cameos by...
    Legendary mountain man John Colter is confronted by the animals (Coyote, Chipmunk, Raven, Trout, & Elk) whose environment he has begun to despoil. Ultimately, he comes face to face with Wishpoosh, the enormous, mythic albino beaver who confronts him with the consequences of a Lockean approach to nature. A madcap tour through the environmental consequences of our exploitation of nature featuring cameos by John Locke and commercial messages from Toronto Anal and Crazy Canuck's Bonnet Boutique.
  • Electric Madonna (or, Our Lady of the Galvanic Circuit)
    In 1852, John Murray Spear gave up his ministry for a new calling, spreading the message of Spiritualism bringing universal harmony to the earth by constructing an Electric Messiah. While Spear claimed that the spirit of Ben Franklin was dictating instructions for the device, the audience has Steampunk Ben to introduce the women whom Spear promised would serve as Madonna to his machine, the tangle of events...
    In 1852, John Murray Spear gave up his ministry for a new calling, spreading the message of Spiritualism bringing universal harmony to the earth by constructing an Electric Messiah. While Spear claimed that the spirit of Ben Franklin was dictating instructions for the device, the audience has Steampunk Ben to introduce the women whom Spear promised would serve as Madonna to his machine, the tangle of events and romantic relationships that followed, to question Mary Shelly and Ada Lovelace about the science involved, and to ultimately ask if our beliefs are so different from those of that era.
  • Simulacra
    In an abandoned building, Adolfo has discovered machinery that survived the cataclysm that rocked the earth a decade ago, and has fallen in love with the images they create. His idyll is disturbed when a Angela, a young militant from a religious sect discovers his hiding place. He tries to hold her off while his obsession with whether the images are real threatens his sanity. (50 min.)

    The play...
    In an abandoned building, Adolfo has discovered machinery that survived the cataclysm that rocked the earth a decade ago, and has fallen in love with the images they create. His idyll is disturbed when a Angela, a young militant from a religious sect discovers his hiding place. He tries to hold her off while his obsession with whether the images are real threatens his sanity. (50 min.)

    The play is inspired by "The Invention of Morel" by Adolfo Bioy Casares.
  • Zoloft Tango
    When Emily's computer suggests she try a new medication to combat burnout, not only does she find herself with a split personality, she falls in love with her co-worker, who appears to have become a penguin.
  • In the End
    Against a surreal landscape, a reportedly carnivorous chair awaits new prey. When a stranger arrives, the chair's self-appointed attendant warns the newcomer away, but the two become entangled in a battle for dominance. The question of who is predator and who is prey unfolds as the stranger and attendant face off in this dark comedy about sex, death, and the mating habits of bees.
  • Allegorical Construction with Ectoplasm and Soft Cheese
    When Salvador Dali travels to San Francisco for his first exhibition, he is visited by the ghost of Federico Lorca and three whores who died in the 1906 earthquake. Their stories of the disaster inspire the creation of one of his striking paintings.