Bears
by Mark Rigney
The world is going to hell in a hand-basket, but neither Growl Bear nor Timmy Bear, two grizzlies stuck in a suddenly deserted zoo, have the least idea what a hand-basket might be. What they do know is that their keeper is in tears more often than not, and the treats they used to get from cheerful zoo visitors are long gone. Enter Suzie Wild Bear, a committed loner brought to the zoo for breeding purposes. As the zoo shuts down around them, the three bears form an alliance and escape to the supposed paradise of the wilderness.
- Cast Size: 2M 2W
- Running Time: 90+ minutes
- Royalty Rate: $75 per performance
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About the Playwright
Mark Rigney’s stage plays have been produced in twenty-three U.S. states (including off-Broadway) plus Australia, Austria, Hong Kong, Nepal, and Canada. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild and a past winner of the John Gassner Playwriting Award, the Maxim Mazumdar New Play Prize, and the Panowski Playwriting Award (twice). Additional published work is available from Playscripts, Inc., ArtAge, Heartland, Applause, and multiple editions of Smith & Kraus’s The Best Ten-Minute Plays. Over fifty of his short stories have found print, in venues ranging from literary (Witness, The Best of the Bellevue Literary Review) to fantasy and horror (Lightspeed, Cemetery Dance). His website is www.markrigney.net, and, when not adding to his extensive collection of antique brewery items, he maintains a lively outpost at the New Play Exchange.
We caught a production of this play some years ago in New York. The premise is a bit nutty, but the world has since caught up in craziness. The dialogue is witty and philosophical; the predicament relatable, and not just because we all get hangry from time to time. It’s not every play featuring talking animal characters that gains in relevance as time passes! Please feed these bears. The world could use their voices.
When I first read Bears I was immediately taken with it’s powerful message of humanity. Bears is not just a play it is an experience that travels from your brain to your heart and back again. It has the power to connect audience members through its message of survival, dependance and empathy. Bears is timeless, gently teaching you to not be afraid of the future by talking about it and by sharing it with everyone around you, The journey is unique and deeply moving.
I have read several of Mark’s plays, and he is a master of writing natural, fluid, engaging dialogue that is packed, though at times covertly, with provocative commentary on the human experience. And in Bears, he delivers again. What seems on the surface to be a simple play about a collection of animals, brings with it powerful undertones of how to be better humans. Bravo.
Review Bears.