CALL ME CRAZY is a comedy-drama written by psychologist Paula J. Caplan, Ph.D., based partly on her book, They Say You’re Crazy: How the World’s Most Powerful Psychiatrists Decide Who’s Normal.

CALL ME CRAZY won second prize in the Arlene and William Lewis National Playwriting Contest for Women and an award from the Rhode Island State Council of the Arts, and it was a finalist in two other new plays contests. It has been produced in New York City by Sage Theatre, where it performances were sold out, and it received a rave review in the “Off-Off-Broadway Review.” It has also been performed and/or had readings at the New Plays Festival, Coop Theatre (Somerville/Boston),  Women in Theatre (Los Angeles), and the Association for Women in Psychology national conference. Six major monologues from the play were performed as part of Potluck Productions’ (Kansas City) summer festival, and one of the monologues was performed as part of TheaterLab Houston’s Women’s Works in the Fringe Festival.

One of Paula’s favorite comments from an audience member after a performance of the play was, “It made me laugh. It made me cry. It made me think.”

When this play is performed, the playwright requests that the following announcement be printed in the programs or announced otherwise: “All of the events and stories in this play are true, especially the ones you will think I must have made up.”
   
Paula J. Caplan holds the copyright to this script. If you’re interested in a doing production or a staged reading, contact her at: paulacaplan(at)gmail.com

She also urges groups of friends, members of groups of psychiatric survivors or consumers and their friends and family members, and members of the mental health and related professions to get together informally and just read the script aloud. Readings can also be used as entertainment for fundraising events.

A DVD of a performance of this play is available from the playwright at paulacaplan(at)gmail.comfor $53.00 including postage and handling. The DVD also includes a post-performance discussion by a feminist psychologist, an anti-psychiatry author, and a psychiatric survivor. Many dozens of colleges and universities have purchased copies of the video and have used it entirely or in segments in their courses, including some courses for the training of clinicians.

This play can be read or performed with a minimum of props, costumes, and set.