Tess' Last Night

What's the character breakdown?

Well, it's a musical so it's a little harder to gauge, but you can do it with 8 men and 8 women (which gives you the 4 male and female leads, and an 8 person chorus).

How long is it?

It's a full-length musical, 101 pages long.  It plays at 2 hours with an intermission.

A musical?  Did you write it all yourself?

Nope, I just wrote the book.  The very talented Joel Weiss wrote the music and lyrics.

Has it been produced?  

Yes, two productions, one at the Mazer Theatre and one at the Greenwich House Theatre (as part of the NY International Fringe Festival), both in New York City, both in 2003.

What's it about?  

Tess, a fresh-faced young girl from the mythical kingdom of Canada, pursues her twin dreams of children's theatre stardom and love.  With her pure heart and plucky personality, Tess braves the treacherous world of sex, drugs and New York children's theatre.  In no time, Tess is playing all seven dwarfs at once, marrying the director who discovered her, becoming the new children's theatre It girl, losing her fame and love, and finding it again in the wilds of Buffalo and the arms of a puppeteer.  Through the successes and the heartbreaks, Tess never wavers from her dreams or loses her accent.

Can I read a sample?  

Of course you can!  You can read it right here.

Any critical response?

You bet.  Doug DeVita of OOBR.com wrote, "With cheeky aplomb, Tess' Last Night skewers the time-honored conventions of the backstage musical. Set in the insular world of children's theatre, Tess' Last Night may be laced with too many in-jokes to make it as commercially viable as another recent Off-Off-Broadway musical that went on to fame, Tonys, and a long run on Broadway, but it nevertheless has more pointed satire and genuine belly laughs than most shows of this genre. David L. Williams's book is the strongest asset here: delightfully crude, self-deprecatingly hilarious, and always on-target as it lampoons classic backstage clichés with racy, adult humor."

Any pictures of past productions?  

Soon.

Has it been published?

Not yet, but I'll always entertain offers.