Michael Hollinger

SING THE BODY ELECTRIC

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I SING THE BODY ELECTRIC 

by Michael Hollinger

Full-length Drama


Jess is tanking in Physics, so her mom, Doris, hires Lloyd to help her pass. But she’d rather study his son, the survivor of a lightning strike that killed his girlfriend a year ago, and tattooed his body with elegant scars. When Lloyd and Doris hit it off, these two broken families are bound ever closer, inexorably—with explosive results. An intricate, atmospheric tale of love, sex, and the unseen forces that draw us together and drive us apart.

“Hollinger’s greatest strengths [are] his ability to interweave comedy and pathos and his elegant craftsmanship...SING THE BODY ELECTRIC builds to a climax with increasingly brisk crosscutting vignettes, with hardly a wasted word and a cast that ably manages its emotional twists and leavening of humor.”
—Philadelphia Inquirer

“Hollinger’s ear for speech and easy humor is unerring—the ordinary becomes extraordinary.”

—Philadelphia Magazine
Cast of Characters

(3W, 2M)
JESS — She/her, 17.
DORIS — She/her, Jess’ mom, 40s.
BLAKE — He/him, 18.
LLOYD — He/him, Blake’s dad, 40s.
CLAIRE — She/her, 30s-40s.

Please consider all racial/ethnic combinations in casting actors,
including mixed families.
Place
South Florida, indoors and out.

Time
The present. Late Spring.

The play runs approximately 90 minutes, and should be performed
without intermission.

 

Author

Michael Hollinger

Michael Hollinger’s plays include nine works premiered at Philadelphia’s Arden Theatre Company, including An Empty Plate in the Café Du Grand Boeuf, Incorruptible, Tiny Island, Red Herring, Tooth and Claw, Opus, Ghost-Writer, Under the Skin, and the musical TouchTones (co-authored with composer Robert Maggio).  Plays premiered elsewhere include Sing the Body Electric at Philadelphia’s Theatre Exile; Hope and Gravity at Pittsburgh’s City Theatre; Cyrano (translated, and co-adapted with Aaron Posner) at Washington’s Folger Theatre; and the musical A Wonderful Noise (co-authored with Vance Lehmkuhl) at Creede Rep.  Together these works have been produced throughout the U.S., off-Broadway, and abroad (London, Paris, Tokyo, Athens, Poland and Slovenia).  Awards include an ATCA/Steinberg New Play Citation, an L.A. Drama Critics Circle Award, a Mid-Atlantic Emmy, an Edgerton Foundation New American Plays Award, the Frederick Loewe Award for Musical Theatre, four Barrymore Awards (including the F. Otto Haas Award for an Emerging Theatre Artist), nominations for Lucille Lortel and John Gassner awards, and multiple fellowships from the Independence Foundation and Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.  Michael is a Professor of Theatre at Villanova University (where he received his MA in Theatre), Artistic Director of Villanova Theatre, and a proud alumnus of PlayPenn and New Dramatists.  He shares a life with actor/teacher/director Megan Bellwoar and their children Benjamin and Willa.

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