A Basketful of One-Act Comedies - five brief humorous plays book advertising by Norman Weinstein
"Hey, Noah, Wait for Me!" is a satiric fantasy involving an out-of-control animatronic Tyrannosaurus rex cavorting in the Garden of Eden and then turned loose on sweet young Prudence's field trip by an evil secular humanist. The results are quite devastating both physically and philosophically. In the very human "Lov [sic] Story" we meet a wise New York cop, a foolish young man and an equally foolish young woman who meet in Times Square on a freezing day and manage, as the cop warned might happen, to blow a potential relationship by telling lies to impress each other. "Way it goes," as the cop observes. "Ménage à Trois" involves a lovers' triangle consisting of a smug but stupid husband, a phony lover from long ago, and a timid, self-effacing wife/lover whose brains and memory far outclass both husband and former lover when the three rendezvous in New York City and she reveals them for what they truly are, a rather pitiful pair. "Mirror Mirror..." offers a cautionary lesson in interpersonal dynamics: we should beware of what we wish for, especially if we consider our family normal. The play presents a sweet, highly moral middle-class mother, a gentle but eBay-addicted father, and a slightly goofy teenage daughter; they all make wishes before an altogether effective magic mirror, which as much as anything deals in truth. In "A Tuber Melanosporum Affair" we watch France and an American backwoods county join spiritual hands in the noble cause of truffle cultivation. However, love-struck Miranda is fed up with her family and anything related to truffles, including her sweetheart's devotion to his French-inspired hot-air balloon and its tie-in to the truffle industry. A mystery develops when sabotage by pig occurs, but then, truffles being what they are, what once seemed sadly impossible is happily turned about.