What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
#1What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 7/9/20 at 9:32am
Just had this random thought and wanted to ask it. I was thinking more along the lines of straight plays, but Im open to any answers, and Im not excluding plays that also have female leads, and a more limited number of male supporting players.
For the record, I already have two that come to mind: Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike for plays and Nine for musicals. But let me know what other shows apply to this criteria that Im missing.
Broadway61004
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/14/11
#2What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 7/9/20 at 10:28am
From a musical standpoint, Stop The World I Want To Get Off is another good example (only 1 male character who is the lead with an all-female ensemble and either 1 woman playing all the other female principal roles or the roles can be split among multiple women).
The first play that comes to mind is Some Girls by Neil Labute (I guarantee there are far better plays that fit this description, this is just the first one I thought of for some reason).
LarryD2
Broadway Legend Joined: 9/1/14
Ravenclaw
Leading Actor Joined: 9/16/17
#4What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 7/9/20 at 11:31amJake’s Women by Neil Simon
Jarethan
Broadway Legend Joined: 2/10/11
#5What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 7/9/20 at 11:38am
Hot Pants said: "Just had this random thought and wanted to ask it. I was thinking more along the lines of straight plays, but Im open to any answers, and Im not excluding plays that also have female leads, and a more limited number of male supporting players.
For the record, I already have two that come to mind: Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike for plays and Nine for musicals. But let me know what other shows apply to this criteria that Im missing."
I don't think your Sonya example holds up. It has a cast of 5, I think. Two mean, three women. It is an ensemble cast if there ever was one. The role of Vanya is not the lead IMO...he has that big scene late in the play, but that doesn't mae him the lead.
I agree with Nine. That was the first thing I thought of.
#6What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 7/9/20 at 12:56pm
There's the musical "No one called ahead" by Paul Gordon (1 man, 5 women - and each one has at least one solo song).
"Little Women" and "We are the Tigers" are other female heavy musicals but since I haven't seen either I can't say if there's a real male lead role as well...
I know you are looking more for straight plays but I can't really think of one.
#7What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 7/9/20 at 4:33pm
This is a tough one. After scrolling through the list of shows I've seen, the best example I can think of for plays (not musicals) is Teenage Dick, by Mike Lew.
The lead is male, and there is one more male supporting character, while the other 4 supporting characters are all women. So the cast is 66% female, with a male lead.
ViniFromBrazil
Stand-by Joined: 1/26/16
ViniFromBrazil
Stand-by Joined: 1/26/16
Alex Kulak2
Broadway Legend Joined: 9/11/16
#10What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 7/9/20 at 11:40pm
Women Laughing Alone Eating Salad is a play about the commodification of femininity, and it's central character is a man.
#11What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 7/14/20 at 7:57am
Women and Wallace - Jonathan Marc Sherman
Last of the Red Hot Lovers - Neil Simon
The House of Blue Leaves - John Guare
"You travel alone because other people are only there to remind you how much that hook hurts that we all bit down on. Wait for that one day we can bite free and get back out there in space where we belong, sail back over water, over skies, into space, the hook finally out of our mouths and we wander back out there in space spawning to other planets never to return hurrah to earth and we'll look back and can't even see these lives here anymore. Only the taste of blood to remind us we ever existed. The earth is small. We're gone. We're dead. We're safe."
-John Guare, Landscape of the Body
Updated On: 7/14/20 at 07:57 AM
toottoot
Understudy Joined: 6/17/20
henrikegerman
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/29/05
#13What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 7/18/20 at 11:26am
Can think of two Neil Simon ones, Last of the Red Hot Lovers and something with Alan Alda... Jake's Women I think it was called
The Loves of Anatole.
Platanov/Wild Honey/The Present
Ivanov
Strindberg's The Father
The Ferryman (of course it's also male heavy, duck heavy, goat heavy...)
Don Carlos
TakumaTanaka
Swing Joined: 8/15/20
#14What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 11/2/22 at 2:58am
ça vient de m'arriver Maison des feuilles bleues - John Guare
#15What are Female Heavy Plays with a Male Lead?
Posted: 11/3/22 at 3:51pm
Blithe Spirit. 2M 5W. The only other male besides Charles is a smaller supporting role.
