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Canadian Plays
Welcome to the Canadian Plays section where you will find plays published
in English from across Canada and plays in translation from
French Canada. Plays
are listed by playwright, by last name. Please note this section
is under revision, with more formatting and images to come.
A / B
/ C / D / E /
F / G / H / I / J / K / L / M /
N / O / P / Q / R / S / T / U / V / W /
X / Y / Z
Canadian Anthologies
If you are unsure of the author's name, please to to our search
engine and enter the title of the work you are interested in.
Plays by Canadian playwrights are now appearing on stages around the world
both in their original language and in translation. Many are award winners
both in Canada
and abroad. The creative imagination of the Canadian playwright knows
no bounds and the publishers, equally creative, strive to produce beautiful
editions for the
reader. Our annotations are brief but we strive for acuracy in
the description.
We stock and sell plays from Dramatists Play Service, Dramatic Publishing Co. and Samuel French Ltd. If you require cast breakdowns or any other information, please
feel free to call us at (416) 922.7175 (toll-free 1.800.361.3414) or email us at
action@theatrebooks.com.
New & Featured Canadian
Plays
 Lucy
Damien Atkins
A world-renowned and much-respected anthropologist, Vivian is most comfortable in her world of quiet solitude, balking at even the smallest of interactions with the outside world. Her life is abruptly changed, however, when her ex-husband shows up and asks Vivian to reassume custody of their thirteen-year-old autistic daughter, Lucy, while he settles in with his new wife. Overwhelmed by the particulars of Lucy's care and unable at first to connect with her daughter, Vivian soon realizes that she and Lucy are more alike than she ever could have expected -- a revelation that has powerful and disturbing consequences. m2, f3. Softcover, 84 pp. $16.95.
 The Madonna Painter
Michel Marc Bouchard
At the end of the First World War, to protect his village from the Spanish flu epidemic brought home by returning soldiers, a young priest recently arrived in the Parish of Lac St-Jean commissions a wandering Italian painter to decorate the walls of the local church with a fresco dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The presence of the foreign artist, his choice of a local virgin to serve as a model, and the frighteningly strange nature of his work will upset this lives and change the fate of the entire community. m3, f4. Softcover, 94 pp. $16.95.
 Jocasta Regina
Nancy Huston
As Oedipus, Creon and Tiresias continue to fight it out in public, as the plague continues to wreak havoc in the city, we slip into the bedrooms, kitchen and infirmary of the palace of Thebes ... and learn at last, some two and a half millenia after Sophocles' Oedipus Rex, what went on in the indomitable heart heart and mind of Queen Jocasta. Softcover, 115 pp. $18.95.
 Iskooniguni Iskweewuk
Tomson Highway
The Rez Sisters in its original version: Cree. Softcover, 127 pp. $16.95.
 Harvest and Other Plays
Ken Cameron
The past infiltrates the present and real life exists alongside the world of the imagination in this collection of three plays by Calgary-based writer Ken Cameron. In Harvest, Cameron turns a real-life incident involving his parents into a comedy about a rural couple who unwittingly rent out their farm to a marijuana grow-op. Softcover, 211 pp. $23.95.
 Lady in the Red Dress
David Yee
Max, a lawyer for the Canadian Department of Justice, is losing his mind. In one nightmarish week he has been shot, punched, stabbed, had a heart attack, and is having conversations with dead men. A modern-day noir noir, Lady in the Red Dress is a darkly comic story about the skeletons in our closets and the consequences of our inactions told by one of Canada's most unorthodox young playwrights. 4m, 1f (both with doubling). Softcover, 94 pp. $16.95.
 Shakespeare's Dog
Rick Chafe
With his sights on London and his family in Stratford, young Will is torn between the two loves of his life: the theatre and his wife. Set in a wild world full of unpredictable creatures -- beasts, beggars, witch hunters, and actors -- it's an Elizabethan-era collision of lust, love, and lives. Softcover, 121 pp. $16.95.
 Afterimage
Robert Chafe
Lise Lacoeur was used to being shunned. Her gift of seeing flashes of the future has left her as an outcast in her town. But Lise's life of solitude comes to an end when burn victim Winston Evans is admitted to the hospital where she works. Years later, two of their children, outcasts themselves, struggle to find their own place within the community. But Leo, their middle child, has other worries much closer to home. While familial tensions mount and buried secrets are revealed, the Evans family comes to see the monumental effect that even the smallest spark can create. 4m, 4f . 83 pp. $16.95.
 The Eyes of Heaven
Beverley Cooper
Fifteen-year old Eloise and her mother Glen are struggling mightily to deal with the recent death of the man who was both father and husband. Problems escalate when Eloise returns home from a gravel-pit party with a wild story about a big glowing light that chased her through a field. When the story hits the local newspaper, the whole community gets involved ... and life for Eloise and Glen changes forever. m-1, f-3. Softcover, 85 pp. $14.95.
 Home Coming
Leeann Minogue
When Jerry Wilson's broken leg spurs him and his wife Marlene to retire a little earlier than expected, their son Greg comes back from the city to take over the family farm. But everyone soon discovers that retirement isn't quite as idyllic as it looks in the commercials. m-2, f-3. Softcover, 108 pp. $14.95.
 The Trespassers
Morris Panych
Fifteen-year-old Lowell is no average teenager, and his grandfather, Hardy, is no conventional role model. Whether urging the boy to pilfer peaches from an orchard, arranging for his sexual initiation, or teaching him the importance of gambling, Hardy is the despair of Lowell's born-again mother, Cash. Buth how far into forbidden territory has Lowell actually ventured. m3, f2. Softcover, 95 pp. $16.99.
 Welfarewell
Cat Delaney
Unsatisfied with her meagre government pension, 80-year-old Esmerelda Quipp resorts to a desperate (and hilarious) plan to get her sent to a place where she can be guaranteed food, shelter, and good company -- jail. However all does not go as planned when the perfectly lucid senior citizen finds her public defendor trying to get her off with an insanity plea. 1m, 7f. Softcover, 84 pp. $11.99.
 String Quartet
Ronnie Burkett
4 plays by Ronnie Burkett: Tinka's New Dress, Street of Blood, Happy, and Provenance. Softcover, 266 pp. $29.95.
 One Voice: House & Here Lies Henry
Daniel MacIvor
Angry, hilarious, personal and wildly entertaining, House and Here Lies Henry are two of the most celebrated solo works by award winning playwright Daniel MacIvor. Softcover, 89 pp. $16.95.
 Toronto the Good
Andrew Moodie
Accusations of racial profiling are leveled against a Toronto police officer after she arrests a black man for illegal firearm possession. When top crown attorney Thomas Matthews is assigned to prosecute the accused against a left-leaning white attorney, tensions mount and personal politics bubble to the surface. From an ostensibly routine traffic stop, each character must come to terms with the racial politics and how they have shaped their own beliefs and prejustices. 6 actors, multiple roles. Softcover, 120 pp. $17.95.
 Scratch
Charlotte Corbeil-Coleman
When fifteen-year-old Anna is told that her mother is dying of cancer, she responds in the only way that she knows how: by ignoring the issue. Friends and family try to help, but Anna becomes increasingly frustrated by their attempts. And, if that weren't enough, the situation is made even worse by a raging case of head lice. Told by Anna with assistance from her best friend, father, aunt, and her dying mother, Scratch is a fresh, funny, and realistic play about the urgency of life an the heartache of loss. 2m, 4f. Softcover, 81 pp. $16.95.
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Forests
Margaret in Search of Herself and other plays
Anne & Gilbert: A Musical
Shadows on Oak Island
Still Laughing: Three Adaptations by Morris Panych
The Cage and L'Ile de la Demoiselle
The Gull
Billy Twinkle: Requiem for a Golden Boy
The Morning Bird
