Plays and Scripts – English

Plays, radio plays and screenplays

Feel free to get in touch if you want to read or produce any of the plays below.

Representation for stage plays: Songbird Agency

To contact the playwright directly email oysteinbrager(a)hotmail.com

For stykker på norsk, klikk her.

The Nordland Railway: Tracks of War / Audio Fiction Podcast / 2024
By Øystein Ulsberg Brager
The dramatic history of the completion of the Nordland Railway during WW2 told through 16 short episodes, one for each stretch of railway line.
Produced by Nordland Teater.
Directed by Øystein Ulsberg Brager
Available in English and Norwegian. Original title: Nordlandsbanen: Krigsfangenes spor.
English translation by Neil Howard.

Madonna Spectacle / Audio Fiction Podcast Short Form Series / 2020
By Øystein Ulsberg Brager
The Drag Queen Madonna Spectacle is born! She lives and she struggles, but she overcomes.
Produced by Karin Heimdahl for the Listen, Rinse, Repeat Podcast.
1 w / 1 m / 4 undefined

Clouded Yellow / Play / 2020
By Øystein Ulsberg Brager
Jason runs into four women, pieces together the puzzle of their intertwined lives, and realizes that for better or worse, he’s been a central piece in the puzzle.
4 w / 1 m

The Amelia Project / Audio Fiction Podcast Series / 2017 – present
By Philip Thorne and Øystein Ulsberg Brager
The Amelia Project offers a very special service: Faking its clients’ deaths! Its eccentric clientele includes cult leaders, politicians and porn stars, all desperate to disappear and start over… But how long can the secrecy last?
Available on iTunes and most other podcatchers.

Willow Girls / Play / 2017
By Øystein Ulsberg Brager
Lillian and Joanna have never talked about the dramatic event that took place eight years ago, an event which shaped both their lives, and which was the cause of both great success and devastating tragedy. A career changing audition brings about a harrowing conversation which finally uncovers the truth.
Commissioned by Open House Theatre Vienna. Also available in a Norwegian translation by Maria Nygren, with the title Piletrepakten.
2 w

«We really connected to Joanna and Lillian – your writing imbues them with strong emotional truths.»
– Royal Court Theatre

A Magician’s Death / Play / 2016
By Philip Thorne and Øystein Ulsberg Brager
The famous magician William Elsworth performs the infamous Bullet Catch Routine – and gets shot dead. The fiction of the theatre turns rapidly into bloody truth, but off stage the lies still flourish, as no one wants to admit to murder…
2 w / 4 m

The One Who Did It / Play / 2016
The boy who killed Jane’s son has become a young man. He is about to be released from prison. Who is he? Does she dare to confront him? And should she?
Original language: Norwegian. Original title: Han som gjorde det. Translated by Neil Howard. Written with support from Fritt Ord, Norsk Kulturråd, Fond for lyd og bilde og Akershus Teater.
4 w / 3 m

Bearboy / Play / 2014
Imperfect, wordy and overtly allegorical, with too many characters and a couple of confusing anachronisms. Probably unperformable.
3 w / 4 m / 6 + undefined

Imitating Eloquence / Performance piece / 2008/2009/2015
A performance piece meditating on the nature of achievement and perception. The text gets adapted for every new performance, depending on the context.

Don’t make a scene / Short play / 2009
A man, a young mother, a little boy. Will she remember him? And can she forgive him?
1 w / 1 m

The perfect girl / Short play / 2007
A play for voices about the nature of perfection, beauty, desire and love.
2 or more performers

Structure I – VII for theatre / Text for the stage / 2007
This collection of conflicting words and concepts is a provocation for theatre makers wishing to pit themselves against a text that demands radical interpretation and an active level of co-writing and co-creation. The text is short, but there is no telling how long the resulting performance might be.

Dark, blue flower / Short play / Short radio play / 2006
Helen, a foreign correspondent for TV is reporting from a country where a civil war has just broken out. As the phosphate bombs fall around her, suppressed memories from her childhood are brought back and the borders between her own experience and the story she is reporting on start blurring.
1 w / 2 m

On emotions / Short play / 2006
Four unnamed characters discuss the meaning, danger and annihilation of emotions in this irreverent short text, where seemingly random associations constantly spark new tangents of thought and dialogue.
4 performers

And then I was unfrozen / Unfinished play / 2006
About the longing for a better life, the desire for immortality and the search for love. And cryogenic freezing.