Elephants And Coffee


Not enough Vodka; Too much Coffee (Glenbrook Players, Mae West Festival and SUNY Brockport productions)

Synopsis:

A woman, on her way to see her therapist, happens across an elephant. The elephant, being physically clumsy with human things, spills coffee on her and falls in love. She, being emotionally clumsy with natural things, fails to recognize a fellow soul when she sees one. Later, she realizes she may just have passed up the opportunity of a lifetime. After all, love can be found in the most unexpected places. But is it too late?

Character List:

Elephant (M, 30s)
Woman (F, 30s)

Setting & Requirements:

Set on a street corner and in an elephant graveyard. Running time around 13 minutes

Production History:

Elephants and Coffee though currently unpublished, has been widely produced and has the following production history:

Elephants and Coffee had its first staged reading at the Last Frontier Theatre Conference, in June 2002. Erica Yoder played Woman, and Richard Bolster played Elephant. The play won both the Best Ten Minute Play Award and the Audience Choice Award.

At the same time, the play was having a workshop production with Offstage Theatre Company in Virginia.

In July, City Theater Company produced it as part of their annual Delaware Ten Minute Play Festival.

In September 2002, Elephants and Coffee won the Sonomoa Repertory Theatre New Play Award (15 Minute Play division) and was presented as a staged reading with Carl Mossberger and Sonia Watson.

SUNY Brockport produced the play for their Festival Of Tens, in Feb 2003 (review available). Jennissa Hart played Woman, with Josh Rice as Elephant. This production was directed by Ruth Childs.

In March 2003, Elephants and Coffee was selected as a winner of the 2002 Five and Dime Playwriting Competition, and was staged by Cross Currents as part of the festival of winning plays.

Josh Rice and Jennissa Hart at SUNY

It was produced as a semi-finalist (and later finalist) for the American Globe New York Fifteen Minute play festival in April 2003. Christian Ely (who had also directed Ophelia's Hamlet and Will and The Ghost) directed the show. Eric Altheide (who played Will in the off-off Broadway production of Will and The Ghost) played the Elephant. Danielle Ozymandias (who played Cordelia/Mary in The Ghost of Molly Malone in San Francisco) played Woman. The won the Alan Minieri Award and the production received honorable mention awards for both actors, the director, and the writer.

Elephants and Coffee also received its Australian premiere in April 2003 with Glenbrook Players. The show was directed by another dear friend, Danny Kingsley (who also directed Black Saturday) and featured Geoffrey MacPherson and Murray Wilson.

At the same time that it was running in Australia, the play was also going up as part of the Heartlande Theatre Company's annual Play by Play Marathon, in Michigan (Heartlande produced Monologue For Lady Macbeth a year earlier).

In July, it went up again as part of the Vortex Theatre's Quickie Festival in New Mexico.(festival review)

Elephants and Coffee was chosen as a finalist for the 2003 Heideman award for Actors Theatre of Louisville / Humana Festival.

Kokopelli Theatre Company in Anchorage presented Elephants and Coffee as part of a Monday night fundraiser event on February 23rd, 2004. This event took place in a resteraunt/bar and used wait staff for cast in a series of ten-minute plays.

Elephants and Coffee had a six week run as part of the City Theatre of Florida's Summer Shorts Festival 2004. (Reviews available) This terrific equity festival of short plays runs at two different theatres in Florida. Other writers included Christopher Durang, Rich Orloff, Steven Dietz, Lucinda McDermott and Cusi Cram. In this production the Elephant was played by Stephen Travillion and Angie Radosh played the Woman.

Stephen Travillion and Angie Radosh for City Theatre in Florida

Elephants and Coffee was also part of the Mae West Festival at the Capitol Hill Arts Center in Seattle. Zanne Gerrard directed, Ian Gerrard played Elephant and Jenny Buehler played Woman.

In August 2004 it was one of five winners selected for the 15 Minute Festival in Belfast Maine.

Blue Roses Theatre Compnay produced excerpts from the play in an evening tribute to featured writers (including John Yearley, Kate Snodgrass and Gary Garrison) at the 2005 Last Frontier Theatre Conference. Blair Sams played Woman, and Jimmy Ireland played Elephant.

It was restaged for the Heartlande Theatre Retrospective in 2006.

Ian Gerrard and Jenny Buehler for the Mae West Fest

In summer 2006, it was part of Veer West Production's Original Short Play Festival...

And was also produced in MA by Theatre At First for their third annual festival of one acts.

North Park Vauderville produced it as part of their festival in October 2006.

ACME theatre in MA has it as part of their line up for their Winter Festival be done in Januay 2007.

Merriweather Press will be publishing an excerpt as part of an anthology being put together by SUNY Potsdam now available.

Elephants and Coffee was produced by Turtle Shell Productions as part of their 8 Minute Madness Festival in NYC in Feb 2008.

Sample Dialogue:

ELEPHANT: I have the answer.

WOMAN: To what?

ELEPHANT: The answer. You know, to your question.

WOMAN: Which question?

ELEPHANT: The question is not important. It's the answer that matters.

WOMAN: And the answer is?

ELEPHANT: Let's run away together.

WOMAN: To the circus?

ELEPHANT: No, from it.

Blair Sams and Jimmy Ireland for Blue Roses Theatre Company at the Last Frontier Theatre Company.

WOMAN: Impossible. What else exists?

ELEPHANT: Plains. Freedom. Wide open spaces beneath a sky so blue and high and sharp, you could cut yourself on it.

WOMAN: I've thought about cutting myself.

ELEPHANT: There you are then. The answer.

WOMAN: (to the audience) My therapist...my ringmaster.... He likes to set me homework exercises. Every week I have to come up with a new reason not to do it, not to take a knife and.... Last week's reason? I haven't seen the Great Wall of China. (a beat) Sometimes I think I'm crazy. Some days I think I'm Shirley Temple and on those days I stand under the shower singing Animal Crackers In My Soup. And then it occurs to me that maybe I'm not crazy at all. That's what scares me the most. The possibility that I run with the herd. (to Elephant) I can't. It's complicated. You wouldn't understand.

ELEPHANT: Of course I would. I love you.