The Garbologists
by Lindsay Joelle

Name: The Garbologists
Brand: Lindsay Joelle
SKU: 9780822242888
Rating: 4 (5 reviews)

The Garbologists Book Cover — The Garbologists Cover

Highlights

Female

Male

90 mins Present Day Bare Stage/Simple Set Contemporary Costumes/Street Clothes Comedy

Synopsis

Danny’s a white, blue-collar, New York City sanitation worker.

Marlowe’s the Black, Ivy-educated newbie who just joined his route.

Thrown together in the cab of a nineteen-ton garbage truck, they spend their first shifts sparring, one-upping each other, and practicing the secret art of mongo: hunting for discarded treasure.

But as their lives become increasingly intertwined, these two essential workers from different worlds discover there’s more that binds them than picking up the trash.

Press Reviews

"The Garbologists tells a story of how we hold on, let go, and remember—told through things we set out on the curb. Lindsay Joelle’s script is delightfully intimate, surprising, and profound, filled with sometimes unexpected laughter and even tears."
— onStage Pittsburgh

"Funny and poignant… a delicacy of a play…"
— Evanston RoundTable

"Exiting playgoers were saying ‘I never knew about any of this stuff.‘ And that glimpse of an unknown world (one we see every day) is part of the charm… In learning our way through this delightful dramedy, we all become students of garbage. We become Garbologists."
— The Philadelphia Inquirer

Characters

Character	Gender	Age	Description
MARLOWE Female (she/her). Late 30s. Black. First week on the job. Confident and competent, both physically and mentally. Keen sense of wit and irony. Vivid inner life; even when silent, her face speaks volumes. Practiced in making you think she’s got it all together, but she’s guarding a secret she doesn’t wear on her sleeve.	female	30s	Female (she/her). Late 30s. Black. First week on the job. Confident and competent, both physically and mentally. Keen sense of wit and irony. Vivid inner life; even when silent, her face speaks volumes. Practiced in making you think she’s got it all together, but she’s guarding a secret she doesn’t wear on her sleeve.
DANNY Male (he/him). 41. White. Nine years on the job. Mansplaining, dad jokes, and run-of-the-mill machismo thinly mask a profound desire to love and be loved. With less wear-and-tear, he might be attractive—ruggedly handsome, even—but you’d swallow hot coals before saying that to his face.	male	—	Male (he/him). 41. White. Nine years on the job. Mansplaining, dad jokes, and run-of-the-mill machismo thinly mask a profound desire to love and be loved. With less wear-and-tear, he might be attractive—ruggedly handsome, even—but you’d swallow hot coals before saying that to his face.