No Script: The Podcast

"Clarkston" by Samuel D. Hunter | S16.E06

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. 

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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: 

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

"Mothers and Sons" by Terrence McNally | S16.E05

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! 

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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/

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

"Two Trains Running" by August Wilson | S16.E04

Jackson and Jacob discuss one of America's most influential, profound playwrights: August Wilson. Wilson's play "Two Trains Running" is part of the Century Cycle. This play follows a group of regular's at a diner in the Hill District, a diner which is about to be torn down. Listen in! 

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Check out these other voices and their discussions of "Two Trains Running":

Interview with the cast of the 2019 Royal and Derngate production (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wc3g35R_vr0)

Director Lou Bellamy talks about the play (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6rOBnytq_0)

1991 Interview with August Wilson for the LA Times (https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-01-01-ca-7570-story.html)

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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/

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Twitter: https://twitter.com/noscriptpodcast/

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

"The Night Witches" by Rachel Bublitz | S16.E03

In this episode of No Script, Jackson is joined by Hope College professor Eric Van Tassell and director Dr. Daina Robins in a conversation about Hope's upcoming production of "The Night Witches," a powerful drama by Rachel Bublitz. The play follows the real-life bravery of the Soviet Union’s all-female 588th Night Bomber Regiment during World War II. Listen in!

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Get your tickets to Hope College's production of "The Night Witches" here: https://hope.edu/offices/events-conferences/tickets/index.html.

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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/

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

"Ballad of Yachiyo" by Philip Kan Gotanda | S16.E02

This time on No Script, Jackson and Jacob explore Philip Kan Gotanda's play "Ballad of Yachiyo." This powerful and poetic drama is set in the early 19th century in Hawaii. The play follows a young Japanese-American woman whose life is shaped by cultural expectations and personal yearning. She leaves home to live with a family who will teach her the graces of traditional Japanese arts like the tea ceremony. J&J discuss how the play weaves ritual, pottery, and puppetry into its narrative texture. 

Listen in! 

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Check out these other voices and their discussions of "Ballad of Yachiyo":

The LATW production

Gotanda's interview with American Theatre

The LA Times Review by Laurie Winer

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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/

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

"Merrily We Roll Along" by Stephen Sondheim and George Furth | S16.E01

In this episode of No Script, we dive into the fascinating world of "Merrily We Roll Along" — Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s bold musical that turns the traditional Broadway story backward. Based on the 1934 play by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart, the show traces the lives of three friends over two decades, but with a twist: it starts at the end and moves in reverse. We explore this reverse chronological structure, the repeated and transformed refrains, and how these three friends' relationship evolves (and devolves) over time.

Whether you love Sondheim, innovative storytelling, or musical theatre’s ability to explore life’s big questions, this episode offers insight into a bold, big musical that asks: What happens when we look back at our choices — and the friends we were once closest to?

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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/

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

"How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying" by Frank Loesser, Abe Burrows, Jack Weinstock, and Willie Gilbert | S15.E16

In the final episode of the season, No Script turns its attention to one of Broadway’s sharpest, wittiest, and most unsettling musical comedies: How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.

Based on Shepherd Mead’s satirical guidebook, How to Succeed skewers mid-century corporate culture while exposing timeless truths about ambition, power, masculinity, and conformity. Jacob and Jackson unpack how the musical’s bright score and buoyant humor mask a biting critique of the American workplace — and the myth of meritocracy itself.

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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/

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

"The Tragedy of Julius Caesar" by William Shakespeare | S15.E15

This week on No Script, Jacob sits down with singer-songwriter, composer, and emerging theatre-maker Grace Yurchuk for a rich conversation about Julius Caesar. They, of course, discuss the power of rhetoric in Shakespeare’s original political thriller and how Grace’s bold musical adaptation takes on that challenge.

Together, Jacob and Grace unpack what makes Julius Caesar such a gripping and surprisingly contemporary play: its uneasy relationship with power, the psychology of persuasion, the danger of rhetoric, and the shifting loyalties that drive the story toward tragedy. Grace shares her process of transforming a Roman tragedy into modern musical language.

Whether you’re a Shakespeare lover, a musical theatre fan, or an artist fascinated by adaptation, this episode offers a vibrant look at how old stories become new again — and how young theatre-makers like Grace Yurchuk are reshaping the classical canon with fresh perspectives and fearless creativity.

Tune in for a conversation full of insight, artistry, and the thrill of reinventing Shakespeare.

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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/

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

"Pride's Crossing" by Tina Howe | S15.E14

This week on No Script: The Podcast, Jackson and Jacob dive into Tina Howe’s lyrical memory play Pride’s Crossing — winner of the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best American Play and a finalist for the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

The play centers on 90-year-old Mabel Tidings Bigelow, once the first woman to swim the English Channel from England to France. From her croquet party in Pride’s Crossing, Massachusetts, time flows backward and forward as Mabel revisits a lifetime of opportunity seized and missed. Listen in as Jackson and Jacob unpack Howe’s impressionistic structure, the challenges of staging Mabel at multiple ages, and the opportunities this script offers directors, actors, and teachers—especially those interested in complex female protagonists, non-linear storytelling, and intimate ensemble work in a “big” memory play. They’ll also touch on where Pride’s Crossing sits alongside Howe’s other major works, like Painting Churches and Coastal Disturbances, in the landscape of contemporary American drama.

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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/

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.

"The Oregon Trail" by Bekah Brunstetter | S15.E13

In the finale of Adaptation Month, Jackson and Jacob discuss Bekah Brunstetter's play "The Oregon Trail." You guessed it -- the play is based on the famous video game and follows two sisters in two different timelines as they navigate life's difficult choices. Listen in!

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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/

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Thanks so much for listening! We’ll see you next week.