House, Divided
 La Tempestad
 The Ballad of John Wesley Reed
 Girl Science
 The Allure of Oriental Wisdom
 Memorial Day (formerly Varia)
 Pride of the Lion
 The Dostoyevsky Man


 Monica for Chanukah
 Angie and Arnie Sanguine
 Edward and Ellie Supine
 The Lion Eats His Lunch
 The Lion in His Lair
 The Lion Leaves His Mark
 Prayers


 But Who's Counting?
 Emma Goldman Imagines the Millenium


 Just Before the War Between the Plates
 I Can Handle That


 Talking  with Lee Blessing

...with Tom Coash
...with Mary Fengar Gail
...with Richard Kalinowsky
...with Jamie Pachino
...with David Rambo
...with Jason Sherman
...with Naomi Wallace
...with Tom Gibbons
...with Dick Goldberg

For performance rights, please contact Elaine Devlin, Elaine Devlin Literary Agency, at edevlinbei@aol.com

Synopsis:

It's 1971. Abroad, the Vietnam War rages. At home, the country divides. In September, ALAN GILBERT, a smart but impressionable young man arrives in conservative Cantrell, Colorado from back east to begin his first semester as an English major at Colorado Land Grant University, the student of eminent (but alcoholic) scholar and raconteur Solomon Howard. ALAN is immediately befriended by JOHN WESLEY REED, a bona fide anarchist who lives proudly in a derelict 1949 Pontiac Torpedo (though it is on someone else's property and is in imminent danger of being hauled off.) JOHN knew Jack Kerouac, does a mean Groucho imitation, and can quote everything from the 12th century Art of Courtly Love to the poetry of Quentin Zubeck. ALAN also meets and falls achingly head-over-heals for CYNTHIA ALLISON, a zealous political organizer (and free love advocate) working to bring students and townsfolk in large numbers to an anti-war rally. While ALAN'S widowed landlord GUSSIE HASSON tries to persuade him to watch Bonanza reruns with her, and plots to sell off her farm land for a tract-housing development, ALAN'S new friends engage him in an intellectual and emotional tug of war, alternately seducing and alienating him, and ultimately teaching him vital lessons from the front lines in the struggle against the straight jacket of conventional behavior and conformist thinking.

Characters:

JOHN WESLEY REED - Squatter, scavenger, philosopher, lyricist, performer, poet, anarchist, shaman, outlaw, lunatic; age undetermined, probably 30's; grizzled enough to look 50.

ALAN GILBERT - College freshman; intellectual but unfocused, serious but naïve.

FRANK AZARA - Real estate developer, member of the county board of freeholders.

CYNTHIA ALLISON - Committed political activist and organizer. Slightly older than Alan, and more worldly

AUGUSTA (GUSSIE) HASSON - Alan's landlord, early sixties. Farm wife, now widowed. Old fashioned, maternal, opinionated.

Setting:

The main action of the play takes place by the side of Highway 44 North just outside of Cantrell, Colorado, the site of the "home" of JOHN WESLEY REED, which happens to be a 1949 Pontiac Torpedo with a permanently blown engine, its gray body pitted from years of hard weather. Other locations include Hasson's house, Alan's apartment, places around the campus of Colorado Land Grant University and locations around the town of Cantrell.

Time:

September, 1971

Playing time:

Two hours

Production History:

The Ballad of John Wesley Reed had its world premiere in March of 2005 at Theatre Catalyst in Philadelphia. It was directed by Rebecca Wright, Associate Producing Artistic Director of InterAct Theatre Company. The cast included Seth Reichgott as John, Kate Bailey as Cynthia, Rob Hargraves as Azara, David Raphaeli as Alan, and Martha Kemper as Mrs. Hasson. In April of 2005, the same cast performed a reading of the play at Abingdon Theater in NYC. The Ballad of John Wesley Reed has had several developmental table and staged readings. In June of 2002, the play was part of the National Showcase of New Plays at InterAct Theatre Company, a staged reading festival in Philadelphia, PA, hosted by InterAct Theatre Company. In October, 2002, it was an invited selection of the OctoberFest festival of new plays at Ensemble Studio Theatre in New York City. A third public developmental was held at InterAct in late October, 2002. The play was also performed as a semi-staged reading at New Jersey Repertory Theatre for two performances in March, 2004. All of these readings were directed by Roger Danforth, Artistic Director of the Drama League in New York.

Reviews for the Theater Catalyst production ofThe Ballad of John Wesley Reed:

Excerpts from: Veteran's Affairs, a review in the Philadelphia City Paper. March 24, 2005 by Toby Zinman, Theater Critic

"It is 1971: Vietnam is in flames, college campuses throb with political outrage, sex is everywhere and anywhere, and the cry of "Freedom!" is accompanied by upraised fists. Playwright Larry Loebell brings more than nostalgia to this smart new comedy."

"John Wesley Reed, a Vietnam vet, lives in an old, immobilized Citroen on the edge of some gorgeous Colorado property. The owners want desperately to develop it, and they want him off, out, gone. He lives on beef jerky and washes in the public library. A self-styled guru, he seems to be able to quote from every poem ever written and every movie ever filmed. In Seth Reichgott's bravura performance, Reed sometimes seems deeply damaged, sometimes dangerous, sometimes absurd, sometimes obscene; but always brilliant and seductive, a wild man impervious to conventional rules of behavior. Reed befriends a young college student (David Raphaely, conveying irresistible fresh-faced enthusiasm and eagerness) who becomes involved with a young woman (the excellent Kate Bailey) who seduces him into the protest movement. The opposition forces are a town official (Rob Hargraves) and the landowner/landlady (Martha Kemper)."

The play has moments when it lapses into rally mode, but most of the time it is very clever. It is also that rare case where the second act is better than the first. Rebecca Wright's direction is brisk and accomplished, undaunted by the script's tonal shifts. And you really have to hear the astonishing "Mr. Peenie" song.

Excerpts from: Of John Wesley Reed, a Most Unpredictable Guy, a review in the Philadelphia Inqurier, March 23, 2005, by Doug Keating, Inqurier Theater Critic

It's appropriate that the name John Wesley Reed should be in the title of the Ballad of John Wesley Reed.... Presenting himself is something John Wesley Reed delights in doing. A non-stop talker and manic show off, Reed is very much an in-your-face type. ...As played by Reichgott he is engaging company. (The play is) soundly constructed.... poetically eloquent.

Sample scene from The Ballad of John Wesley Reed:

One two three four, we resist illegal war! Students mobilized against the war. Protest the bombing. Send a message to Washington. Stand up and be counted. Students mobilized against the war. Rally for peace. Stop the bombing. (To Alan:) You here to volunteer?

I thought I might see if there was something I could do...

(Overlapping:) Affiliation?

Sorry?

Political affiliation. Student socialist league. Youth International party. Young Labor. Socialist Labor. Workers United? Communist Party? War Resisters League? Red Brigades. American Vets Against the War? Weather Underground? (A beat:) Radical Black Student league?

I'm an English major.

(Writing on her clipboard:) Unaffiliated.

Why do you need to know this?

P time. (He is blank.) Podium time. At rallies, we assign podium time by affiliation. All the orgs send foot soldiers. I keep track. Like a bank account. The more they send, the more P time their org gets.

So I'd be a foot soldier.

Right.

You don't feel there might be a little irony in...

You're not one of those are you? You think there's irony in carpet bombing? In napalm?

I'm free to volunteer Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday afternoons.

Drugs?

What?

Do you do drugs?

No. Well, no.

What?

Okay, pot. Occasionally. In high school. Not here. I mean not since I got here.

And that was like, yesterday?

Last week.

You're clean now?

Clean like not addicted?

Not carrying. Not using. No stash in your dorm room?

I have an apartment.

You know what happens if one of these hick town Barney Fifes finds one of us holding?

Busted.

Disgrace. All of our work here for nothing. The absurd rag they call a newspaper loves disgrace. It's a small town thing. They have a self-righteousness quota. The leaders of all those groups I mentioned, they frown on having their time wasted.

I'm clean.

You need to be disciplined. It's a movement. It's bigger than you.

What do you want me to do?

Billposter.

Oh.

Not sexy enough? Not important enough? You thought, what, you'd walk up to me and I'd say 'Wow, what potential. I'll tell you what. Forget getting any grass roots experience, we'll just go ahead and appoint you to the central organizing committee.'

I just thought...It's fine.

We're in a struggle...what did you say your name was?

Alan.

We're in a struggle, Alan, a struggle for their hearts and minds.

I know. I just want you to know...

It's all the same. Canvassing. Bill Posting. Speech making. Being a marshal at a rally. It's about turning the tide. You understand?

I was just trying to say, I can do other things.

Noted. Hammer one of these on every phone poll from here until you are out of posters and out of town.

For information about performance rights, please contact Larry@loebell.com.