The following plays have been written or are currently being written by Rob.
For decades now, legends of a witch named Mary Rutherford buried in an obscure woodland cemetery north of Hanover, Ontario have intrigued many. Local youth spread the tales to frighten their peers, and use the grave-site as a partying location. But who was the real 'Mary Rutherford', and where have all the various and conflicting legends about her come from?
Through poetry, music, multimedia, and conventional dialogue, The Rural Legends of Mary Rutherford follows both the stories of an 'Isabella Rutherford' as her family emigrates from Scotland to Canada in the 1860s – and a group of rural teens in modern day who enjoy partying at the supposed haunted grave-site that lies down the winding dark and narrow 'Rutherford Road'.
This work is an unusual mix of traditional indigenous performance with Vaudevillian theatricality to bring many acts together about a woman whom many American historians obsess over. ID her and John Smith have a Disney romance? Was her later life as 'Rebecca' an enlightened one, or just a way of making her presentable to a culture afraid of 'savagery'?
This play was commissioned by the McMaster First Nations Student Association and has not yet been publicly performed. Currently it cannot be requested as it is being rewritten.
Not too many years ago, Sony patented the neural interface, for future use in video games. But, while most of us see this as some sort of fantasy, the technology is already there, it just need to be developed and made affordable for the mass market. What happens to memory in a future where one can share memories as easily as we share files over the Internet?
John is unconnected due to an unusual condition. Amber is weening herself off the neural Internet due to fears arising from her haunted memories. Kurah can't remember what memories are his any more, or who he is out of the millions of people he has memories from.
Currenly in second draft, submitted for a playwriting competition.
Chris is in a holding cell for young offenders in Detroit. He's got some zero tolerance punishment coming his way for near-fatally wounding two other youth, and is going to be taken out of school to be placed with other violent kids like him in youth detention. Jelima is in a holding cell in Darfur, after being captured as a prisoner of war for being an enemy combatant. He's going to be brought into a reintegration programme so he can attempt to be normal again.
They are both 13 years old.
Heavenly Bound explores the seeming paradoxical response to violence in youth in the West and in counties in conflict.
Currently in first draft.