THE PETALUMA RADIO PLAYERS: Recent Episodes
The Petaluma Radio Players
In less than four years on the San Francisco Bay Area theatre circuit, after breathing new life into radio classics like 'The Shadow' in 2015, followed by the staging of 'Slay Bells Ring (Are you listening?),' four comedic original one-acts which played to sold out houses at the Hotel Petaluma in 2016, the Petaluma Radio Players, the North Bay's most eclectic and energized radio theatre company, are continuing to churn out a cornucopia of radio plays including vintage dramas like 'One Way Passage' (1932) and 'Trifles' (1916), and modern fare like the tear-jerking 'The Next Move' and in-stitches comedic noir parody, 'Story: A Detective Story.' We produce two radio plays per month. Join our podcast. Join our mailing list: info@petalumaradioplayers.com. Prepare to giggle and cry.
NOT HERE YET by award-winning New York playwright, William Ivor Fowkes. If the trains run on-time, well most of the time, why would the world's busiest subway system need a stay-at-home spouse to reassure would-be passengers that one is coming along any minute now? Is there something in her own life that seems to be stuck in-transit? Is it perhaps too late for this empty housewife to get her relationship back on track?
PLAYWRIGHT BIO:
William Ivor Fowkes is a playwright and author based in New York and Connecticut. He has been a FINALIST for the Reva Shiner Comedy Award and the W.Keith Hedrick Playwriting Contest and a SEMIFINALIST for the Playwrights First Award, the Promising Playwright Award, and the Princess Grace Playwriting Award. His plays have been presented in 14 states. Several have been published. For more information about the playwright and his works, please see my website, www.williamivorfowkes.com.
Behind-the-scenes with PRP producers Kendra Murray and Ralph Scott during 'The Greater Good,' a half-hour KPCA-FM (103.3 Sonoma County, CA and www.kpca.fm) that celebrates community involvement, hosted by Barton Smith. (Special producer-producer wedding recap if you listen through the end!)
One man's emotional junk is another man's personal fortune in this unsettling one-act drama by Ohio playwright, Trace Crawford.
The Petaluma Radio Players present a comedy by Peter Marino and Tom Ecobelli that puts the dead pan in bed pans. Can laughter raise your blood pressure? Perhaps. But if nothing else, the Grandmother in this story will likely cure your funny bone from the aches and pains induced by perpetually clicking your TV remote.
CHEKHOV'S REVENGE by Roy Proctor. Though Anton Chekhov is widely revered as the father of modern drama here in the West, did you know that in his native Russia, he is better known for the hundreds of short stories, novellas and sketches he authored during his medical school days until he died of tuberculosis in the early 20th century at the age of 44? Well, the comic timing and irony in the next two scenes is likely to kill you, too… with laughter.
Delusion and illusion hit a Christmas Eve cross-current, and Santa must face off with his conflicted reality.
PLAYWRIGHT BIO:
Vivian C. Lermond is an award-winning playwright who has penned 36 one-act plays that have entertained audiences in the US, Mexico, England and Scotland. Her full-length drama/comedy, 'Back to Bethlehem (PA)', premiered Off-Broadway in 2006 at the Manhattan Theatre Club. In addition to her stage plays, Vivian has also written two full length screenplays that were awarded first place in two highly competitive screenwriting contests. Vivian has taught playwriting at a local college and has facilitated playwriting workshops at writing conferences. She is currently Executive Story Editor for Gallagher Literary, an LA talent management company, where she evaluates pitches and screenplay submissions. She also freelances for afilmwriter.com, where she is a script analysis specialist for stage plays. Vivian has been a proud member of The Dramatists Guild since 1998.
When NPR affiliate, KRCB-FM, Radio 91, brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
When NPR affiliate, KRCB-FM, Radio 91, brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
When NPR affiliate, KRCB-FM, Radio 91, brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
When NPR affiliate, KRCB-FM, Radio 91, brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
When NPR affiliate, KRCB-FM, Radio 91, brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
When NPR affiliate, KRCB-FM, Radio 91, brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
When KRCB brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
When NPR affiliate, KRCB-FM, Radio 91, brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
When NPR affiliate, KRCB-FM, Radio 91, brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
When NPR affiliate, KRCB-FM, Radio 91, brought in the Petaluma Radio Players to record ten on-air promos, they probably had no idea what they were in for...
Long time building resident, Gillie (SHIRLEY BENNETT) shares support and gossip with new-in-town tenant, Mara (DORI O'DEA) in 'The Sentinel,' a half-hour drama by New Jersey playwright Hal Corley which asks audiences to consider the uncomfortable superimposition of old time neighborhood values onto de rigeur measures to ensure self-preservation in a world of suicide and stalkers. Troupe member Emily Lord makes her directorial debut in this Petaluma Radio Players production.
Our drama during this week's presentation will make you long for the days of your youth when you couldn't wait for the bell to ring and detention to be over. When your favorite subject was lunch, not math or biology, gym or poli-sci. After all, who needs gym and poli-sci when there were politics and summersaults aplenty in the Teachers Lounge? At least at this high school. The Petaluma Radio Players present our first installment from the 1950s classic 'Our Miss Brooks' radio series. This episode: 'A Plaque for Mr. Conklin.'
CONTAINS NUDITY, by Auckland, New Zealand playwright Rex McGregor. Set in a nursing home where spending one's twilight years is taken to an entirely new dimension. Who knew rest homes could be so...animated?
'THE GREYSON VARIATIONS,' by Nelson Clark. This P.R.P. radio drama is a study in what is real…and what you perceive is real. The play exposes the depths one researcher will go to embrace the human soul even if we're compelled to ask if the soul is real...or created. And what does 'created' mean, after all? And what, exactly, defines humanity? Is the answer black and white. Or perhaps a shade of grey somewhere in between, somewhere within ….The Greyson Variations.
DIOGENES' LANTERN by J.J. Steinfeld
The play, featuring performances by Dori O'Dea and Tom Wilson, steps inside the place between this world...and the next where a man comes face to soul with his deceptive past.
WINNER IN THE 'SILVER Division' at the 2018 'HEAR Now' Festival in Kansas City, MO.
The not-for-the-faint-of-heart fairy tale for non-traditional children...and the grandparents who recite to them. Written by renowned American playwright, Donna Latham, and performed in an interpretive, choral style, this radio drama marks the directorial debut of PRP's Kendra Murray and the Company's 'Director-in-the-Round' program. This play is sure to leave your teeth chattering and your knees knocking. But it could be worse. God forbid you, our radio audience, ever find yourself accidentally knocking upon the door of Mr. Fox. (Recorded live at Readers Theatre, Petaluma, California.)
A comedy of musical chairs (and place settings) by Alice Gerstenberg. First premiered on stage in 1920. Brought to the airwaves in 2017 by the Petaluma Radio Players.
Experts from Health, Nutrition, Transportation, Banking, Agriculture, Insurance, Housing, Vet Med, Telecommunications, Education, Counseling, even Tai Chi will join us for three hours to help Sonoma County, California rise from the ashes.
Playwright Philip Ventrella's new take on a classic 1940s film noir-on-radio drama where the story structure and all of its sordid elements take on the lives of the characters who play them. This quarter-hour comedy will see, or rather hear audiences laughing their butts off.
How long will one father go to earn the appreciation of his wife and sons? And how long does he plan on staying in the bathtub? In this squeaky clean comedy by playwright Steven Lubliner, the radio audience comes face to suds with the sub-surface drama of family dynamics in a story that will surely clean up 'bathroom humor.'
This performance includes a special interview with the producers.
A half-hour radio play by New York playwright, William Ivor Fowkes that compels audiences to ask: 'What is worse? To lose a grip on memory? Or to face what memory refuses to silence?' Starring Tom Wilson and Linda Jay (her debut performance)
When a Nebraska farmer dies at the end of a rope in his bedroom, and the county Sheriff and young D.A. show up to investigate, their particularly male point of view might be blinding them to clues that are right before the womenfolks' eyes. In this classic one-act play by early 20th century breakthrough Feminist playwright and novelist, Susan Glaspell, gender roles are as much a factor in solving a murder as are the knitting needles and dirty kitchen towels and dead canary that point to a caged life set free. Or was it?
The recording of this play was made possible by a generous grant from OUT WEST GARAGE of Petaluma, California. (outwestgarage.com)
Recorded at KPCA-FM (103.3), 'SELDOM SEEN, NEVER HEARD,' is an original radio play written by Maryland inmate Larry Bratt. For his relentless efforts to improve inmate life and reform the penitentiary system, Bratt has received accolades from social justice groups, prison associations, and government agencies, including the Maryland Attorney General's office. In 'SELDOM SEEN, NEVER HEARD,' a prisoner befriends two robins who have built a nest outside his cell window. Through them, the prisoner's spirit is renewed, providing him room to consider whether the real bars restraining him might, in fact, be those inside his own mind. The play taps the talents of eight actors from the P.R.P. troupe and will be directed remotely from Austin, Texas, via Skype, by P.R.P.'s post-production supervisor, John Biehl.
A quarter-hour radio drama by P.R.P.'s staff playwright, Steven Lubliner, featuring a most unconventional detective. Part Philip Marlowe, part Doctor Who, the cunning and attractive Ivory Pointer substitutes a strange cell phone-sized device in lieu of a magnifying glass that transports her clients through time to track down the mysteries of their pasts.
This play-within-a-play opens with the butler, holding a gun, standing over a body. The butler assures us that things are not what they seem and that this is not a simple case of the butler did it. Instead, he introduces us to the other suspects: the body's former business partner, his ex-fiancée, his current fiancée, and her friend. But that's when the play begins...or falls apart, for the actors are as jealous, petty, and conceited as the characters they play. A troupe of egotistical actors who can't even stage a mystery without murdering it! Written by Karl Garner.
If you're going to mug this couple in an alley, be sure to bring some Excedrin. They're not black belts in karate, but they will chop you down to size with their relentless banter. Written by playwright and children's book author, Natasha Yim.
The morning paper broke the story: First National Bank was hit by a robber wearing a black Homburg hat and concealing a pistol. Now, to the shock of bank owner, Frank Baxter, and his socialite wife, Gloria, a young man wearing the same hat has boarded their train and entered their car. What is a desperate, elite couple to do? What else? Written by new playwright, Kate Crockett Juliana.
Sometimes naughty is nice when the classic Christmas tale is punctuated by the rhythm of Tommy guns and retold through the longing eyes of a mob boss. Written by P.R.P.'s own Steven Lubliner.