Books by Jeremy Dobrish

A rock retelling of the story of Orpheus and Eurydice through the eyes of Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love, combining elements from Dante's Inferno and Nirvana's lyrics, to explore the essence of faith and love. "adobe [theatre company] knows just how to retool old forms and artists … to produce new theater games. So its ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE begins with bad sex and ends with death and everlasting angst, with rock 'n' roll in the middle … Orpheus fronts and writes songs for his band In Your Thrace (That's right, the Greek Orpheus was from Thrace)… Myths and references crisscross brazenly. The playwright and director Jeremy Dobrish (adobe's artistic director) accomplishes all this with compact writing and versatile humor (sometimes he's witty, sometimes he's farcical, sometimes he's deliberately corny)… It's all quite winning. Young, smart, a trifle skittish about sustained emotion, but filled with comic pleasures."Margo Jefferson, The New York Times

Loosely based on a Grimm fairy tale, THE HANDLESS MAIDEN weaves together three stories, that of a miller and his wife who have fallen on hard times and whose story includes devils, wizards, and cross-country treks; that of an ambitious New York lawyer who decides to give it all up and travel to Seattle to see Bill Gates' mansion, her magic castle; and that of a man who is about to be married in Seattle but decides he must first see an old lover. Their stories ultimately converge in an enchanted diner."Jeremy Dobrish's delightful new comedy combines a Grimm's fairy tale with two contemporary stories, which being with a man planning his own wedding and a woman who is made a partner in her law firm before her husband is. Eight actors in dual roles segue easily from comedy to seriousness, from farce to realism and the piece brims with goofy charm. Three cheers for all involved ..." -The New Yorker"... crafty intermingling of folklore, musical comedy and soap opera ... another lighter-than-air vehicle on which to float an evening of stylish daffiness. Adobe productions resist categorization; THE HANDLESS MAIDEN can count among its inspirations the work of Stephen Sondheim, Rod Serling, Sid Caesar, Walt Disney and even Agnes Nixon." -Peter Marks, The New York Times

A car crash. Three people dead. One of them naked. It's up to a detective and a police officer to figure out what happened in this supernatural upside-down mystery. "Only the waggish adobe theater company could pull off a light, pleasant show in which everybody dies in a hideous car crash. Playwright Jeremy Dobrish crafts a modern fairy tale in this supernatural comic treat. In separate vignettes, each of the three central characters takes us back in time through the events leading up to the aforementioned catastrophe, which is catalyzed by a mysterious magical dog who grants each person what he or she most desires. In the case of seventy-year-old Abe that wish is youth; in that of Cathy, it is to be seen as beautiful in the eyes of her husband; and in that of Jonathan, it is not to be seen at all - to become invisible. In a refreshing twist on a hoary formula, everybody is ecstatic and even fulfilled upon having his or her heart's longing instantly come true ... Dobrish's highly original script." -Trav S D, Time Out New York "It's a shaggy hound that uncovers the scent of truth in SUPERPOWERS, Jeremy Dobrish's upside-down mystery. A detective and a uniformed officer try to piece together a car accident in which the driver and two pedestrians, one of them naked, die. This procedural gimmick - the police remaining clueless to the end while the audience discovers what happened - was popular a century ago and is still fun." -D J R Bruckner, New York Times

EIGHT DAYS (BACKWARDS) travels in reverse order through the previous eight days in the lives of 13 urbanites as they navigate missed opportunities and surprise connections in pursuit of romance and revelation. "EIGHT DAYS (BACKWARDS) is a breezy, psychologically precise and pleasantly dizzying ninety-minute set of interlocking New York sketches about power, relationships and the unknowable agonies of fate. Jeremy Dobrish, who usually writes for his own adobe theater company, has created a series of light but sharply observed snapshots that, as the title says, work backward over eight days in the lives of eighteen casually and/or intimately related character ... this is a summer show-jaunty and clever enough to hit a few truths with impressive economy and a sense of possibility. The characters have a range of class and age and, ultimately, we care enough about them to wish we could wan their future selves about what we know is ahead." -Linda Winer, Newsday