Drama clubs get super with new plays about Ms. Marvel, Squirrel Girl, and a few very famous Asgardians.
Marvel Entertainment has teamed up with legendary script-publishing company Samuel French to create a series of one-act plays bringing Marvel heroics to the high school drama stage.
The new initiative, called Marvel Spotlight, will lead off with three plays. Actor and writer Christian Borle (Smash) pens Hammered: A Thor and Loki Play, a tale of the young Asguardians in a war of one-upmanship as they try to impress their parents.
Karen Zacarías (Native Gardens, The Book Club Play) will write Squirrel Girl Goes to College: A Squirrel Girl Play, which will focus on the sunny hero’s personal transitions in a new stage of life. Mirror of Most Value: A Ms. Marvel Play by playwright, composer, and lyricist Masi Asare (The Family Resemblance) explores Kamala Khan as she comes to term with her own flaws.
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Staging super-powered heroes, even if they are teenagers, will come with some challenges. Asare tells the New York Times that Kamala’s abilities to shift her shape and form required “inventive” staging from test productions. The productions employed “all kinds of things from shadow puppetry to inflatable boxing gloves, clown shoes and ribbon or fabric for long arms and legs,” to convey Kamala’s Inhuman powers.
“That stuff is fun and hopefully provides opportunities for theatrical magic, but what people are responding to the most is Kamala’s journey as a character in the play,” Asare says.
In keeping with their target audience of high school drama productions, the licensing fees for the Marvel Spotlight plays will be kept affordable. Physical copies of the plays will also be available for purchase.