Our Short Plays are a Tall Order

Producing a show of short plays is not for the weak of heart. Certainly not the way we do it. 

The stories in Our Stories must be about the South Asian community in America. Because of this narrow focus we have very little pre-existing material to work with. In the first Our Stories, staged in 2021, all the plays were written and developed for the show. In OS2, just one play out of nine already existed. Another one was a short film that was rewritten as a play. The remaining seven plays were written and developed for the show.

Our work begins with selecting stories, not short plays. Stories that speak to certain aspects of our community’s lives here. And then begins the hard work of developing these stories into scripts, and then from scripts into short plays. Playwrights and directors iterated on scripts until they were good enough to take to the rehearsal floor. Rehearsals began with readings and more rewriting. Cast members contributed to the development as well. And then finally came the more familiar terrain of putting up a play from a script.

We began with a blank slate in Dec 2022. In our first meetings, with a few BADCo insiders, we just talked about topics and stories. And now, almost 10 months later, we will have nine plays go on stage in two languages where talented actors will bring these moving, funny stories to life.

Our Stories 2. Opens Oct 6. Don’t miss it!

You can learn more about the short plays of OS2 here (English, Tamil). We have Talkbacks with the playwrights after certain shows. Details on our show page.

– Basab Pradhan, Artistic Director