Best of
Theatre

1956

Pygmalion / My Fair Lady


George Bernard Shaw - 1956
    Then, Aphrodite, taking pity on this man whose love could not reach beyond the barrier of stone, brought the statue to life and gave her to Pygmalion as his bride. Centuries later, George Bernard Shaw captured the magic of this legend in his celebrated play, Pygmalion. Pygmalion became Henry Higgins, a professor of phonetics, his statue an untutored flower girl from the streets of London, and the barrier between them is class.. Shaw expected Eliza to end up with Freddy and run a flower shop.In My Fair Lady, Alan Jay Lerner takes the legend one step further—the barrier is swept away and Higgins and Eliza are reunited as the curtain falls on one of the loveliest musical plays of our time—winning seven Tonys® for its original Broadway production, and seven Oscars® for its film adaptation.--back cover

My Fair Lady


Alan Jay Lerner - 1956
    Higgins wagers that he can pass her off as a Duchess in a matter of weeks. But what will become of Eliza when the bet is over? This edition of ‘My Fair Lady’ includes the complete script and a selection of black and white stills from the Oscar-winning film starring Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison.

Four Plays: Summer and Smoke / Orpheus Descending / Suddenly Last Summer / Period of Adjustment


Tennessee Williams - 1956
    "The innocent and the damned, the lonely and the frustrated, the hopeful and the hopeless . . . (Williams) brings them all into focus with an earthy, irreverently comic passion."--Newsweek.

Long Day's Journey into Night


Eugene O'Neill - 1956
    First published by Yale University Press in 1956, it won the Pulitzer Prize in 1957 and has since sold more than one million copies. This edition includes a new foreword by Harold Bloom.The action covers a fateful, heart-rending day from around 8:30 am to midnight, in August 1912 at the seaside Connecticut home of the Tyrones - the semi-autobiographical representations of O'Neill himself, his older brother, and their parents at their home, Monte Cristo Cottage.One theme of the play is addiction and the resulting dysfunction of the family. All three males are alcoholics and Mary is addicted to morphine. They all constantly conceal, blame, resent, regret, accuse and deny in an escalating cycle of conflict with occasional desperate and half-sincere attempts at affection, encouragement and consolation.