Jason Hall Writes

PLEASE NOTE: All material is copyright 2010 by Jason Hall. Please see the contact information page for production possibilities.

Below are a few of my recent short plays. All texts on this page are available as .pdf downloads for viewing.

Synopsis: Jeremy welcomes new dancer Mark aboard Noah's Ark, one of the displays at a biblically-themed strip club.
Background: this 10-minute play is an extension of a short play written for Ohio University's Madness show (see below for details) based on the prompt of restrictions.

Read the 10-minute play "Bible Thumpers."

Synopsis: As Walter nurses bruises from a fight, Jane wages a war of words to draw the story out of him. When a waitress--and witness--appears, Jane hopes to use the woman to get nearer to the truth.
Background: this piece was written for the RedEye Theater Project, a 24-hour play festival presented by energetic students at the University of Pittsburgh. My particular prompt was to write in a style inspired by Tom Stoppard and Edward Albee, although "True Story" owes more to Albee than Stoppard. 

Read the one-act play "True Story."

Synopsis: Trapped in an oatmeal cannister, Art, Cal and Bruce try to remember life before the oats.
Background: "Sex" is the third play in a cycle of six one-acts to form the series Among the Oats. Productions which staged three of the six plays have been performed at the University of Southern Maine-Gorham and in the 2008 Minnesota Fringe Festival. While the three characters and their set stays constant, each play explores a different aspect of life. The other plays are: "Dream," "Money," "Perfect," "Fashion" and "Death." 

Read the one-act play Among the Oats: "Sex."

Most Friday nights of the school year, the Ohio University playwriting MFA students present five-minute short plays on a particular prompt assigned earlier in the week. Experimentation is encouraged, and the evening show in front of a live audience proves an invaluable learning experience. Below are some samples of my Madness scripts. 

Written for Unicorn Madness. This piece was selected for the Very Short Play Festival IV in Northfield, MN.

Written for Single...and Hating It Madness. This piece was a finalist for the Flour City Theatre Company's Love Fest 2009.

Written for Sudden Death Madness. An intriguing prompt challenge: writers were told that people in a community will die without warning, and that their play could be stopped by the Specter of Death anywhere between two-and-a-half and four-and-a-half minutes. No one is certain when the fatal time would stop the play. 

Written for Mash-Up Madness. This prompt assigned writers to two-character scenes from existing scripts, then asked them to take one character away entirely while keeping the dialogue of the other. The challenge is to rewrite the scene in an entirely new context, keeping the one-sided dialogue intact. I was given a scene from Garson Kanin's Born Yesterday and was at a loss until Oscar Wilde stepped in.

Written for the Up in Arms heart/love benefit. This monologue was written for a February charity event, and I'm fond of the little piece.