Ducks at 35,000 and Other Plays

All four of the these plays involve a woman and man who are strangers to each other until happenstance causes them to meet in a confined space. Through self-disclosure their lives touch and perhaps change. Each play uses the stage “gimmick” of being able to hear the characters’ thoughts as well as their spoken words. Although the themes are on the serious side there is much humor. In "Ducks At Thirty-Five Thousand," a young man who is planning a suicide and a young woman who is planning an abortion meet on an airliner. As he finally reveals his plan, her reaction surprises them both. In "Flamboyant Man in the Rain," a cartoon show writer who is getting bad reviews and an about-to-be-fired hairdresser land in the same taxi cab in the middle of a rain storm. After initial-humorous-hostilities toward each other they realize their plights may have much in common. In "Bush Rats in the Elephant Grass," an inner-city school teacher and a yuppie find themselves trapped on an elevator overnight. The teacher enters the elevator knowing that she has a life-decision to make while the yuppie leaves the elevator having made one. In "Frozen Waffles on the Interstate," a lady truck driver picks up a blind Vietnam vet. Both their lives seem to be in a holding pattern and they challenge each other to make changes.