Where to download stage play scripts?

Question

Anyone know of sites where I can download recent stage play manuscripts?Work is love made visible.? Kahlil Gibran

Usenet · Accepted Answer

Don't know if this is what you're looking for.
(Scripts from hit plays are usually published as books, so I just check them out from the LAPL. Publishers of recent hit plays are probably more zealous about defending their copyright than those who own the rights to film/TV scripts.)
http://www.singlelane.com/proplay/
http://www.simplyscripts.com/plays a h.html
http://www.eoneill.com/texts/index.htm
http://www.playscripts.com/

Usenet · Answer

http://www.stageplays.com/plays.htm
and there's this paysite. Looks like they have it all.

Usenet · Answer

Whoops. Looks like that last is just a bookshop.

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]Anyone know of sites where I can download recent stage play manuscripts? Work is love made visible. ? Kahlil Gibran[/nq]
So far as I know and I've actually looked on occasion, unless you're talking about a play that's in the public domain, you're not going to have much luck finding it on line.
The fact is, all of those screenplays that you find on line it's all pretty much a gray market. I won't say that none of it is legal or authorized. But virtually none of it is. It's ignored by the copyright holders because, quite simply, not enough people want to read screenplays, either to pay for them or for free, for it to be more than the most marginal of marginal markets.
Given the difficulties they've had trying to chase down the people who download movies for free which is something they really care about it's simply not worth it to them to expend time, money, and effort to chase down the people who upload and download screenplays for free unless it's something unproduced and highly restricted.

Plays, on the other hand they're very protective about. A screenplay, while, of course, it's copyrighted in itself, is really, constructively, merely the means to another copyrighted work the finished movie which is the real center of value. That's what they're thinking about.
But with the play productions are ephemeral. They come and go. The center of value for the copyright holder is the play itself. They are protective of unauthorized performances. Protective of unauthorized copying and distribution. Very protective of any copying or recording of the live performances.
So the sorts of on-line storehouses of screenplays often screenplays for very recent movies that you find on-line, I think you would be hard-pressed to find that sort of thing for recent plays.

We've kind of run into this question because we've got a kid who's an actor and so we find that we're called upon, on occasion to go looking for plays and so far as I can tell, unless you're going to order them from a company that specializes in that material like stageplays.com (luckily, we actually have a Samuel French book store in the city where you can actually go and buy plays but not many places have this) you're pretty much in the hands of fate.

NMS

Usenet · Answer

[nq:2]Anyone know of sites where I can download recent stage play manuscripts? Work is love made visible. [nq:1]So far as I know and I've actually looked on occasion, unless you're talking about a play that's in ... and buy plays but not many places have this) you're pretty much in the hands of fate. NMS[/nq]
Neil's basically right. I have on VERY rare occasions found the text for a modern script online - I like to work that way when rehearsing (very convenient for covertly learning your lines at work), and I only do it if I already have a legal copy of the script - but I usually find myself scanning the material in.
Sites like Project Gutenberg ...
http://www.gutenberg.org/
... have public domain plays, but nothing still under copyright.

You can order hardcopy plays online of course, via Amazon, etc., or directly through the major play publishers.
This site can help lead you to the publisher's site, if you don't know it (they also will sell it to you, apparently, but I usually go to the publisher)
http://www.playscripts.com/findaplay/
Here are the sites of the larger play publishers.
Applause (mostly classical, actually)
http://www.applausepub.com/
Broadway Play Publishing
http://www.broadwayplaypubl.com/
Dramatic Publishing
http://www.dramaticpublishing.com/
Dramatists' Play Service
http://www.dramatists.com/
Samuel French
http://www.samuelfrench.com/
Mostly musicals:
MTI (Music Theater International)
http://www.mtimusicalworlds.com/
TAMS-WITMARK
http://www.tamswitmark.com/

Mark Cipra
"Nothing is so dangerous as being too modern. One is apt to grow old-fashioned quite suddenly". Wilde
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