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Kitchen Recipes by Steve A. Rowell
#2005-0017
ISBN #1-933159-21-9
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Cast Requirements:
 | ALBERT SANDERS
- Male seen from his 20s to his 80s. He is
desperately trying to hold his fragile family together. WWII veteran who marries his
school sweetheart. Tries to create the perfect 50s life and family, only to come up with
something totally different—totally American. |
| ROSE SANDERS
- Female seen from her early-20s to late-40s.
A mentally disturbed wife and mother who has trouble coping with the freedom of suburbia.
She sacrifices her family life and pays the price. |
| BETTY SANDERS - Female seen from her teens to early 50s.
The oldest child, she is a lesbian trying to cope with her sexual preference and her
family through the 1950s and 1960s. |
| JAMES SANDERS - Male seen from his teens to 50s. A
disenfranchised individual who looks to television to fill his emotional void. He is the
middle child, striving for his father’s approval and traumatized by his mother’s
death. |
| CHARLES SANDERS - Male seen from his teens to his 50s. Lost
soul searching for personal satisfaction. The youngest of the siblings, he is given
everything, not allowed to grow until he gives it all away. |
| NARRATOR - An unchanging ghostlike presence that guides the
audience through the lives of the family by means of a television cooking show. A
reflection of 50’s TV. Sees the plot in simple, bold strokes. |
| ENSEMBLE
 | Actor #1 - Female late 20s. Portrays Lizzy Evans - neighbor and friend of Rose |
| Actor #2 - Female late 20s. Portrays Jane Franks - neighbor and friend of Rose, and the
Woman who inhabits house after the Sanders. |
| Actor #3 - Male early-30s. Portrays Ken Franks - Neighbor who seduces Rose, and the
Psychiatrist who examines James |
| Actor #4 - Male early-30s. Portrays Dan Evans - Neighbor and friend of Albert,
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| Realtor and the Man who inhabits house after the Sanders |
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Synopsis
Kitchen Recipes is a full-length dramatic play in two acts told in a non-linear
format. The play depicts a family starting out in the 1950s in suburbia and follows them
for sixty years. It incorporates a narrator who drifts through the play and the players
representing their lives in cooking metaphors.
The Setting
Unit set: a kitchen that is remodeled between acts
ACT 1
| 2000 - The siblings sit at the kitchen table to discuss the next day. They are taking
their father from the home he has lived in for 30 years and putting him into a nursing
home. |
| 1950 - Rose and Albert Sanders are newlyweds. They are busy with their lives creating
the new social structure of the era. They raise their children and relate to neighbors. |
| 2000 - Later in the evening, the siblings awake and continue bickering and remembering. |
| 1960-70 - The children grow into adulthood and bring on problems. Rose commits suicide,
leaving only a note. Albert finds he cannot bring himself to read it, so he hides it in a
kitchen drawer. |
ACT 2
| 1970s - A funeral. The siblings look for answers, trying to deal with what has happened. |
| 1980-90 - The children return to their father on independent visits relating their new
lives and attempting to stay in touch. |
| 2000 - The siblings gather their father’s belongings and get him ready to go.
Albert stands at the drawer where the note is hidden but still cannot open it. |
| The Future - The new owners of the house are awakened in the night to find Albert, now
suffering from Alzheimer’s, in their kitchen. The couple find the unopened note in
the clutter and read it to a catatonic Albert. |
_________________________
Author Biography
Playwright Steve Rowell is a resident of Lake Mary, Florida. He is
a member of the Dramatist Guild, Central Florida Theatre Alliance, and the
Playwright’s Round Table as well as a member of the board of directors for the
Florida Children's Repertory Theatre. Rowell participated in the first CFTA “Play in
A Day” and has been produced locally by Playwright’s Round Table, Southern Winds
Theatre, The Peoples Theatre, and Performance Space Orlando. He wrote a monologue for the
City of Orlando’s Millennium Celebration at Lake Eola. Steve’s adaptation of A
Christmas Carol - “Tiny Tim; A Christmas Carol Revisited” will debut this winter
at the Main Street Theatre in Mansfield, Texas. For more information, visit Steve
online at www.stevearowell.com.
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“ I find the play to be sensitive, with
interesting character and relationships. It's also interesting theatrically, with the
device of going back and forth in time. The device of the cooking show narration is
good—just what we want to do with this theatre company.”
- Lorree True, Director, Deptford Players, New York
“Rowell’s Kitchen
Recipes dishes up a filling offering with distinct flavors and textures. It depicts the
new culture shaped by the suburbs. Rowell’s use of culinary metaphors provides a
welcome contrast to a stern tale told with intelligence and understanding.”
-Susan Rowland, Limelight Theatre, St. Augustine, FL |
