No Script: The Podcast

Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz is often considered the first Latina playwright. Her door-slamming farcical comedy "House of Desires" contains all the great elements of classic comedy: eavesdropping, ridiculous disguises, witty exchanges... and drag! Listen in as Jackson and Jacob discuss this surprising, delightful comedy. ------------------------------ To learn more about Sor Juana and "House of Desires," we recommend you check out the Expand the Canon podcast: https://www.expandthecanon.com/ ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Themed Month is here! Join Jackson and Jacob as they explore four "classic" plays. First up, William Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night," also titled "What You Will." Sometimes referred to as Shakespeare's perfect comedy, "Twelfth Night" is a love-triangle-romantic-comedy with a heavy dose of disguise, mistaken identity (twins are involved, of course), and dramatic irony. Listen in! ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

What happens when the music you love is also tangled up with the history you’re trying to forget? Lauren Yee’s play "Cambodian Rock Band" follows a father and daughter as they return to Cambodia, confronting the ghosts of the Khmer Rouge regime, and the choices made so long ago. Oh, and there’s a live rock concert happening along the way. Jackson and Jacob dig into Yee’s wildly theatrical collision of history, music, memory, and family. Join us for the conversation! ------------------------------ Please enjoy these other conversations on "Cambodian Rock Band": This interview with Lauren Yee for "Backstage Pass": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3v9kdD9k7c This interview with Yee for "Hyphen": https://hyphenmagazine.com/blog/2020/11/%E2%80%9C-play-gateway-many-other-stories%E2%80%9D-conversation-lauren-yee-her-play-cambodian-rock-band This panel on Asian American Arts Activism with Brooke Ishibashi and Joseph Ngo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=In36OnELzCY ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Gracie Gardner's play "Athena" follows two rival fencers who become training partners and, maybe, friends? Listen in as Jackson and Jacob celebrate Gardner's brilliance in dialogue writing and explore the play's structural twists and turns. ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Jackson and Jacob discuss Diana Son’s play "Stop Kiss." The story follows Callie and Sara, two women whose unexpected friendship develops into something more... and whose first kiss has devastating consequences. It’s a tender, often playful, and popular play. Listen in as J&J examine how Diana Son expertly moves her characters through a series of difficult, can't-go-back decisions! ------------------------------ Please enjoy these other conversations on "Stop Kiss": Marie Bernard's review in The Michigan Daily: https://www.michigandaily.com/uncategorized/stop-kiss-provides-simple-love-story/ This interview with Director Roberta Emerson: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_cYBbtrxaU Diana Son's interview with "Women in Theatre": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJzjMhIa-T0 This review for Rescripted: https://rescripted.org/2020/01/23/stop-kiss-pride-arts/ ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

What happens when a community built on inclusivity, empathy, and (especially) consensus suddenly has to make a decision that not everyone can agree on? In Jonathan Spector’s Eureka Day, the progressive parents and administrators of a Berkeley private school find themselves facing a mumps outbreak—and a seemingly simple question about vaccination quickly becomes anything but simple. This week on No Script, Jackson and Jacob chat about Spector’s sharply funny, deeply uncomfortable play. Listen in! ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Season 17 has arrived! Jackson and Jacob discuss the landmark musical "A Chorus Line" by Michael Bennett, Marvin Hamlisch, James Kirkwood Jr., Nicholas Dante, and Edward Kleban. Set during an audition for a Broadway musical, this deeply theatrical piece asks what happens when performers are stripped of their characters and asked to reveal themselves. Listen in as Jackson and Jacob explore the show's unforgettable characters, its innovative structure, and its complicated portrait of ambition, identity, and the lives of performers. ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Jacob hosts Eve Bianco, Ana Radice-Morras, and Violet Levinson of Red Door Productions to talk about their upcoming production of "Crimes of the Heart" by Beth Henley. See the show at Theatre 154 on Christopher Street in NYC (July 15-26, 2026). Get tickets here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/red-door-productions-presents-crimes-of-the-heart-by-beth-henley-tickets-1991060722218 Listen to our previous conversation about Crimes of the Heart (Season 8, Episode 19): https://open.spotify.com/episode/5A4qNrmbsOqmNabWI129bi ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Director Cora Therber joins the podcast to talk about "untitled hamlet play" by Rory O'Neill, which opens this weekend by LOVECHILD Theater in NYC. See the show at the John DeSotelle Studio, May 29 - 31, 2026. Get tickets through the LOVECHILD Insta (@lovechildtheaterco) or here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/lovechild-presents-untitled-hamlet-play-tickets-1988245208942 ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Jackson and Jacob discuss Dave Malloy's hit musical "Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812." This fiery piece adapts a small segment of Tolstoy's "War and Peace." Listen in to this final episode of Season 16! ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Rajiv Joseph's play "Mr. Wolf" follows the family of a kidnapped child when that child returns home. It's a poignant, theatrical story in which Joseph assembles the most complicated possible cast of characters to undergo this highly unlikely event. Listen in as Jackson and Jacob discuss Joseph's exploration of messy human relationship... and infinity? ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

This season's Themed Month, Paula Vogel Month, wraps up with her most famous play. The incomparable "How I Learned to Drive" is a haunting, hilarious piece of theatre. Listen in as Jackson and Jacob revisit its whirling theatricality and specificity. ------------------------------ Please enjoy these other conversations on "How I Learned to Drive": Playwright Sarah Ruhl's essay on the play: https://www.3viewstheater.com/views/how-i-learned-from-how-i-learned-to-drive Paula Vogel's essay on the play for American Theatre: https://playmakersrep.org/enduring-lesson-learned-drive/ Vogel's video essay when the Broadway run was cancelled due to Covid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEGTp8542LE Interviews with the Second Stage cast: https://www.broadway.com/videos/153901/beyond-broadway-how-i-learned-to-drive/ Cleveland Play House Artistic Director Laura Kepley on the play: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEb5KIYg5_E ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Jackson and Jacob discuss Paula Vogel's play on "Othello." "Desdemona, A Play About a Handkerchief" (great title!) explores the behind-the-scenes action of "Othello." It contains Vogel's characteristic humor and irreverence, while also asking important questions about our relationship to Shakespeare's famous play. Listen in! ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Paula Vogel Month continues! Jackson and Jackson discuss Vogel's hauntingly brilliant one-act play "The Long Christmas Ride Home." The story follows one family across a particularly memorable Christmas holiday. Vogel deploys her characteristic sense of theatrical intimacy, using puppets alongside narrative actors to bring the supernatural to bear on the play. Listen in! ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

We kick off Paula Vogel Month with her newest play, "Mother Play: A Play in Five Evictions." Jackson and Jacob discuss this theatrical look at a family across time. A semi-autobiographical piece, "Mother Play" is described by Vogel as her way of saying "Hi Mom." Listen in! ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Lauren Gunderson's adaptation of JM Barrie's famous Peter Pan stories is full of humor, imagination, and robust stage challenges! Listen in as Jackson and Jacob discuss "Peter Pan and Wendy," a play in which Gunderson refocuses the narrative on Wendy and Tiger Lily, even while she delivers much of what audience's expect from the story of Neverland. ------------------------------ Our first episode about Lauren Gunderson was Season 5, Episode 12, her play "I and You" -- https://noscriptpodcast.podbean.com/e/no-script-the-podcast-s5-episode-12-i-and-you-by-lauren-gunderson ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

This week on No Script, Jackson and Jacob discuss a play which has been called a combination of "Death of a Salesman" and "Our Town." Emily Feldman, a sharp and theatrical emerging playwright, has always wanted to write a play with a Stage Manager character, like in Thorton Wilder's famous play. Now she has. Her play "The Best We Could" explores some of the same themes and structure as Arthur Miller's classic, while taking place in a highly contemporary world. Listen in. ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

In this episode of No Script, Jackson and Jacob discuss Irish playwright Marina Carr. Her play "Woman and Scarecrow" is a gallows comedy about a woman on her death bed, and the strange figures (some supernatural!) which surround her. Listen in! ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

Jackson and Jacob discuss a play from a pair of plays by popular contemporary playwright Samuel D. Hunter. "Clarkston" is set in a small town along the Lewis and Clark Trail. It follows two men working night shift at a Costco. Listen in as J&J discuss the play's complicated discussions of legacy and society. ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

This week on No Script, Jackson and Jacob (finally) discuss a play by Terrence McNally. "Mothers and Sons" is a small, intimate play about two people meeting nearly two decades after they both lost someone close to them. The play also tracks how the world has changed since the AIDS crisis. Listen in! ------------------------------ Please consider supporting us on Patreon. For as low as $1/month, you can help to ensure the No Script Podcast can continue. https://www.patreon.com/noscriptpodcast ----------------------------- We want to keep the conversation going! Have you read this play? Have you seen it? Comment and tell us your favorite themes, characters, plot points, etc. Did we get something wrong? Let us know. We'd love to hear from you. Find us on social media at: Email: noscriptpodcast@gmail.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/No-Script-The-Podcast-1675491925872541/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/noscriptpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/ ------------------------------ Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.