upcoming stage plays
The Girl with the Ivory Ankle: A Montana Musical
will be going on the road!
Stay tuned for dates and times!
recent stage plays
March 15 - 16, 2024
Zootown Arts Community Center (ZACC)
Missoula, MT
Jay's short comedy The Meaty Gourmet
was part of
The Juice Box Organic One Act Play Competition
at the Lake Shore Center for the Arts
in Westfield, NY
May 26 - 28, 2023
Hot Water
A live reading of Jay's ten-minute play as part of the Montana Playwrights Conference
From Page To Stage in Helena, MT
April 22, 2022.
Pictured: David Singer and Shea Conley
Paul Allen (violin) with Jasmine Sherman and Nathan Adkins . . .
Cacophony
A live reading of Jay's ten-minute radio play as part of WOW Audio Showcase: A fundraiser for the literary and non-profit podcast Words Out West at the Zootown Arts Community Center, Missoula, MT
November 12, 2021
and Craig Menteer (drums)
Flotsam, Jetsam and Bill
Jay's one-act dark comedy
part of Bards of the Big Sky
at the
Helena Avenue Theatre, Helena, MT
September 16-19 & 23-26, 2021
presented in conjunction with the Montana Playwrights Network
Pictured: Director Pamela Jamruszka Mencher (back center) with cast
(L to R): Silas Easterling, Tony Schaan, Brian Massman, Bailey Osborne and April Kortz
The Vorbit Incident
Jay's full-length dark comedy
Havre, MT
October 11-13 & 17-19, 2019
presented in conjunction with
Montana Playwrights Network
Pictured: Mark Cichosz and Clayton Twombly
Television Blues
Jay's short comedy for
BoxFest Detroit 2019
August 16-24, 2019
Planet Ant Theatre
Hamtramck, MI
Pictured: Breon Canady
Raised in the Saddle:
The Phantasmagorical Journey
of a Future Rodeo Queen
Educational Outreach Tour
Fall 2017
It's the summer of 1919, and Alice Greenough, a teenage spitfire raised near Red Lodge, Montana, is on her way to her first rodeo competition in Forsyth.
Rolling across the Big Sky state via steam locomotive, Alice, who wears her smile like her hat—big and wide—can't help talking to the strangers she meets on the train, a who's-who list of famous Montanans including a ruthless copper king, a dedicated suffragette, and the Helena ranch hand with the movie-star looks.
Her dad always kids that "she has more nerve than brains." Maybe that's because her idea of fun is riding buckin' broncs named Whirlwind, Lightning, and Bone Crusher.
And Alice will need that 'iron will' she's known for because this train ride will prove every bit as exciting and challenging as sticking to the 1,200 pounds of buckin', snortin', and kickin' muscle that's waiting to greet her at her first rodeo competition!
An Unladylike Battle for Survival
in the Sunnyside Library:
An Out-of-Book Experience
with Jane Eyre
and Her Fellow Shelfmates
Educational Outreach Tour
Fall 2012
There’s a new librarian in town by the name of Kerosene Kevin and he’s brought with him a novel idea—books are for burning, not reading. Fortunately, during this 50-minute play, you’ll see that some of those living on the shelves of Sunnyside have decided to fight back.
After a narrow escape from the clutches of Kevin (and only first-degree burns), Jane Eyre has appealed to the Shelf People, but she’s only been able to recruit a small ragtag army.
Among her troops are Esperanza Cordero, a young girl from the Latino section of Chicago; a spirited and beautiful Sioux warrior called Red Dress; and a literate spider named Charlotte. Together, they devise a plan to put a damper on Kevin’s burning desire.
A life and death struggle has begun. Will the stories of these literary heroines continue to be told, or will they be snuffed out in flames?
Stay tuned!
Writing Wild:
The Adventures of Jack London
Educational Outreach Tour
Fall 2011
With hair bristling, mouth foaming and a mad glitter
in his bloodshot eyes, Jack London sprang
into the twentieth century and grabbed the complacent reader of saccharine words by the jugular.
Ready or not,
he sailed us out to the open sea, he carried us on his back through mile after mile of white wasteland, and with frozen fingers and a single match, he lit a fire where no other man could light one—and in our collective imagination,
that fire still burns bright.
Come hear French Frank, the gritty oyster pirate, Wolf Larsen, the demon captain of the Ghost, Broken-backed Ben, the philosophical hobo, and others, sharing the tales of America’s greatest storyteller. You’ll feel the fangs bite deep as you adventure along with the boy who by age fifteen already
looked on the world through the eyes of the wolf.
