One-Act Plays by Modern Authors

This anthology captures a pivotal moment in theatrical history, when playwrights stripped away the elaborate conventions of Victorian drama to reveal something rawer and more immediate. The one-act form emerged in the early 20th century as a radical experiment: could profound emotional truth exist in a compressed space? Could stories resonate without the padding of multiple acts? The answer, as these plays demonstrate, was a resounding yes. Edited by Helen Louise Cohen, this collection gathers works from playwrights who embraced the challenge of brevity, crafting moments of intense psychological clarity that linger long after the final curtain. The plays here range from naturalistic domestic dramas to more experimental exercises, all while maintaining the form's essential promise: theatre that doesn't waste your time but demands your full attention. Whether read as performance texts or studied as historical documents, these works offer a window into an era when theatre was reinventing itself for modern audiences.