Eleanor Estes, author
Mary Hall Surface, playwright

93 pgs. 6 female, 5 male
Doubling is possible.

Sometimes saying nothing is as bad as saying something mean. That's what Maddie Reeves discovers in the play The Hundred Dresses, adapted from the 1944 book that has a Newbery Honor and a Caldecott Medal. Set in the 1930's, the story begins when the Petronskis, a poor Polish immigrant family, move to town. When Wanda Petronski tells Maddie's rich best friend Peggy that she has a hundred dresses, Peggy laughs in disbelief, pointing out that Wanda wears the same dress to school everyday. Why would you do that if you had a hundred dresses? From that point on, Peggy relentlessly teases Wanda about her dresses. While Maddie doesn't tease Wanda, she does nothing to stop it for fear of being teased herself. After the Petronskis suddenly move from town the children discover that Wanda made one hundred exquisite drawings of all types of dresses she'd imagined. The beauty of her work earns the awe and respect of her classmates, though Wanda will never know it because she moved away. Maddie begins to understand that it is more important to speak out and stand up for people, even if it is not the popular thing to do.

"Everyone has been in Maddie's situation. Everyone has faced peer pressure. These characters tell us that we, like them, can make the right choice next time." –Teen Tix, Seattle

"What sets the play…apart is its quiet, unexaggerated depiction of xenophobia, and how poverty comes in different sizes and shades." –The Seattle Times