Best of
Theatre

2005

Wicked: The Grimmerie


David Cote - 2005
    Two girls quite accidentally crossed paths: one, pretty and popular; the other smart and . . . green. The story of how these two unlikely friends became Glinda the Good and the Wicked Witch of the West has made for the most spellbinding musical in years: WickedWicked: The Grimmerie is the behind-the-scenes story of the hit that has captivated Broadway—and now the world. Designed to resemble the ancient book of spells that changes Ozian history, Wicked: The Grimmerie includes profiles of the cast and creative team, the complete, illustrated lyrics to all the songs, and more than 200 full-color photographs. Packed with thrillifying details, Wicked: The Grimmerie is also full of bonus features that will delight fans of the show, from an Ozian Glossararium and an Oz travelogue to a step-by-step look at how Elphaba gets green. No need for innuendo or outuendo: This is a must-have for Wicked fans of all ages.

Doubt, a Parable


John Patrick Shanley - 2005
    It is an inspired study in moral uncertainty with the compellingly certain structure of an old-fashioned detective drama. Even as Doubt holds your conscious attention as an intelligently measured debate play, it sends off stealth charges that go deeper emotionally. One of the year’s ten best.”—Ben Brantley, The New York Times“[The] #1 show of the year. How splendid it feels to be trusted with such passionate, exquisite ambiguity unlike anything we have seen from this prolific playwright so far. Blunt yet subtle, manipulative but full of empathy for all sides, the play is set in 1964 but could not be more timely. Doubt is a lean, potent drama . . . passionate, exquisite, important, and engrossing.”—Linda Winer, NewsdayChosen as the best play of the year by over 10 newspapers and magazines, Doubt is set in a Bronx Catholic school in 1964, where a strong-minded woman wrestles with conscience and uncertainty as she is faced with concerns about one of her male colleagues. This play by John Patrick Shanley—the Bronx-born-and-bred playwright and Academy Award-winning author of Moonstruck—dramatizes issues straight from today’s headlines within a world re-created with knowing detail and a judicious eye. After a stunning, sold-out production at Manhattan Theatre Club, the play has transferred to Broadway.John Patrick Shanley is the author of numerous plays, including Danny and the Deep Blue Sea, Dirty Story, Four Dogs and a Bone, Psychopathia Sexualis, Sailor’s Song, Savage in Limbo, and Where’s My Money?. He has written extensively for TV and film, and his credits include the teleplay for Live from Baghdad and screenplays for Congo, Alive, Five Corners, Joe Versus the Volcano (which he also directed), and Moonstruck, for which he won an Academy Award for original screenplay.

Passion Play (TCG Edition)


Sarah Ruhl - 2005
    Ruhl dramatizes a community of players rehearsing their annual staging of the Easter Passion in three different eras: 1575 northern England, just before Queen Elizabeth outlaws the ritual; 1934 Oberammergua, Bavaria, as Hitler is rising to power; and Spearfish, South Dakota, from the time of Vietnam through Reagan’s presidency. In each period, the players grapple in different ways with the transformative nature of art, and politics are never far in the background, as Queen Elizabeth, Hitler, and Reagan each appear, played by a single commanding actor.Sarah Ruhl’s plays include Dead Man’s Cell Phone, Eurydice, and The Clean House, which was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. Her work has been widely produced both throughout the country and internationally, and she is the recipient of the MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship.

The Women of Lockerbie (Acting Edition)


Deborah Brevoort - 2005
    She meets the women of Lockerbie, who are fighting the U.S. government to obtain the clothing of the victims found in the plane s wreckage. The women, determined to convert an act of hatred into an act of love, want to wash the clothes of the dead and return them to the victim s families. THE WOMEN OF LOCKERBIE is loosely inspired by a true story, although the characters and situations in the play are purely fictional. Written in the structure of a Greek tragedy, it is a poetic drama about the triumph of love over hate. Winner of the silver medal in the Onassis International Playwriting Competition and the Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays award.

Intimate Apparel


Lynn Nottage - 2005
    Esther, a black seamstress, sews exquisite lingerie for clients who range from wealthy white patrons to prostitutes. She has saved enough to allow her to dream of one day opening a beauty salon for black women, and at thirty-five years old, longs for a husband and a future. When she begins to receive beautiful letters from a lonesome Caribbean man who is working on the Panama Canal, it looks like life may be about to take a different course.This is the acting edition of the play.

The Playbill Broadway Yearbook: June 2006 - May 2007: Third Annual Edition


Robert Viagas - 2005
    Many people who work on Broadway keep scrapbooks of their experiences, with photos, signed posters, ticket stubs, and of course Playbills . Playbill Books has expanded this idea into an annual project that is becoming a Broadway institution: The Playbill Broadway Yearbook . Taking the form of a school yearbook, the third edition is packed with photos and memorabilia from the 2006-2007 Broadway season. The new edition includes chapters on all 67 Broadway shows that ran during the season new shows like Curtains and Spring Awakening as well as long-running ones like Wicked . In addition to headshots of all the actors who appeared in Playbill, the book has photos of producers, writers, designers, stage managers, stagehands, musicians even ushers. The Playbill Broadway Yearbook also has a correspondent on each production to report on inside information: opening-night gifts, who got the Gypsy Robe, daily rituals, celebrity visits, memorable ad-libs, and more. Correspondents range from dressers and stage doormen to stage managers, dancers, featured players, and even stars of the shows.

No Applause--Just Throw Money: The Book That Made Vaudeville Famous


Trav S.D. - 2005
    From 1881 to 1932, vaudeville was at the heart of show business in the States. Its stars were America's first stars in the modern sense, and it utterly dominated American popular culture. Writer and modern-day vaudevillian Trav S.D. chronicles vaudeville's far-reaching impact in No Applause--Just Throw Money. He explores the many ways in which vaudeville's story is the story of show business in America and documents the rich history and cultural legacy of our country's only purely indigenous theatrical form, including its influence on everything from USO shows to Ed Sullivan to The Muppet Show and The Gong Show. More than a quaint historical curiosity, vaudeville is thriving today, and Trav S.D. pulls back the curtain on the vibrant subculture that exists across the United States--a vast grassroots network of fire-eaters, human blockheads, burlesque performers, and bad comics intent on taking vaudeville into its second century.

Monty Python's Spamalot: 2005 Tony Award Winner - Best Musical


Eric Idle - 2005
    Vocal selections from the uproarious Broadway production that won the Tony Award for Best Musical in 2005. Songs include: All for One * Always Look on the Bright Side of Life * Brave Sir Robin * Come with Me * Find Your Grail * Fisch Schlapping Dance * He Is Not Dead Yet * His Name Is Lancelot * I'm All Alone * King Arthur's Song * Knights of the Round Table * Laker Girls Cheer * Monks Chant * Run Away! * The Song That Goes Like This * Whatever Happened to My Part? * Where Are You? * You Won't Succeed on Broadway. Includes five pages of color photos.

Mercury Fur


Philip Ridley - 2005
    The party that he and his brother Darren have been planning has been brought forward - to tonight.In a lawless, ravaged city, where memories of the past have been brutally erased, the boys and their team survive by realising their clients' darkest fantasies. But just how far are they prepared to go in trading humanity for information? As the light fades and events spiral out of control it becomes clear that on the success of the evening hangs not just their security, but their existence. The world is at its worst?let the party begin. Mercury Fur is a challenging new work containing some explicit scenes that may cause offence.Published to tie-in with the play's premier at the Drum Theatre, Plymouth and The Chololate Factory, London in February 2005, produced by Paines Plough."Philip Ridley is a singular writer, a prolific polymath, probably a genius, and the creator of some of the most peculiar, grotesque and compelling British plays (and films) of the last several years" Time Out

Blackbird


David Harrower - 2005
    The production received the 2007 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play. In 2007, the play opened simultaneously at the Manhattan Theater Club in New York and and at American Conservatory Theatre, San Francisco.

Letters from Backstage: The Adventures of a Touring Stage Actor


Michael Kostroff - 2005
    His firsthand account of the exciting, funny, and sometimes bizarre highlights of his journey includes working at a temp job when his agent calls to say, “You got the part!”; singing on a revolving stage while lugging a dead body; seeing ghosts in haunted theaters; and much more. Along the way, anecdotes about nailing an audition, keeping a performance fresh, and getting along with fellow cast members give useful tips for working actors. Anyone who wants to know what a life in the theater is really like needs this intimate and unforgettable narrative.

Mister Paradise and Other One-Act Plays


Tennessee Williams - 2005
    Most were written in the 1930s and early 1940s when Williams was already flexing his theatrical imagination. Chosen from over seventy unpublished one-acts, these are some of Williams's finest; several have premiered recently at The Hartford Stage Co., The Kennedy Center, the Manhattan Theatre Club and the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival. Included in this volume:These Are the Stairs You Got to WatchMister ParadiseThe PalookaEscapeWhy Do You Smoke So Much, Lily?Summer At the LakeThe Big GameThe Pink BedroomThe Fat Man's WifeThank You, Kind SpiritThe Municipal AbattoirAdam and Eve on a FerryAnd Tell Sad Stories of the Deaths of Queens...Long associated with Williams, acclaimed stage and film actors Eli Wallach and Anne Jackson provide a fresh and challenging foreword for actors, directors, and readers.

Utopia in Performance: Finding Hope at the Theater


Jill Dolan - 2005
    Utopia in Performance argues with eloquence and insight how theatre makes a difference, and in the process demonstrates that scholarship matters, too. It is a book that readers will cherish and hold close as a personal favorite, and that scholars will cite for years to come."---David Román, University of Southern CaliforniaWhat is it about performance that draws people to sit and listen attentively in a theater, hoping to be moved and provoked, challenged and comforted? In Utopia in Performance, Jill Dolan traces the sense of visceral, emotional, and social connection that we experience at such times, connections that allow us to feel for a moment not what a better world might look like, but what it might feel like, and how that hopeful utopic sentiment might become motivation for social change. She traces these "utopian performatives" in a range of performances, including the solo performances of feminist artists Holly Hughes, Deb Margolin, and Peggy Shaw; multicharacter solo performances by Lily Tomlin, Danny Hoch, and Anna Deavere Smith; the slam poetry event Def Poetry Jam; The Laramie Project; Blanket, a performance by postmodern choreographer Ann Carlson; Metamorphoses by Mary Zimmerman; and Deborah Warner's production of Medea starring Fiona Shaw. While the book richly captures moments of "feeling utopia" found within specific performances, it also celebrates the broad potential that performance has to provide a forum for being human together; for feeling love, hope, and commonality in particular and historical (rather than universal and transcendent) ways.

Quills and Other Plays


Doug Wright - 2005
    Gathered here are three of Wright's early plays, including Interrogating the Nude, a tongue-in-cheek reimagining of the uproar surrounding the debut of Marcel Duchamp's work in America; Watbanaland, a satiric dissection of yuppie desire and a haunting look at family and faith; and the Obie Award-winning Quills, which explores the boundaries of artistic expression and the dangers of censorship as they played out in the Marquis de Sade's final days at Charenton Asylum.

Local Acts: Community-Based Performance in the United States


Jan Cohen-Cruz - 2005
    Forged by the collaborative efforts of professional artists and local residents, this unique field brings performance together with a range of political, cultural, and social projects, such as community-organizing, cultural self-representation, and education. Local Acts presents a long-overdue survey of community-based performance from its early roots, through its flourishing during the politically-turbulent 1960s, to present-day popular culture. Drawing on nine case studies, including groups such as the African American Junebug Productions, the Appalachian Roadside Theater, and the Puerto Rican Teatro Pregones, Jan Cohen-Cruz provides detailed descriptions of performances and processes, first-person stories, and analysis. She shows how the ritual side of these endeavors reinforces a sense of community identification while the aesthetic side enables local residents to transgress cultural norms, to question group habits, and to incorporate a level of craft that makes the work accessible to individuals beyond any one community. The book concludes by exploring how community-based performance transcends even national boundaries, connecting the local United States with international theater and cultural movements.

Naked Playwriting: The Art, the Craft, and the Life Laid Bare


William Missouri Downs - 2005
    Naked Playwriting also offers sound guidance on marketing and submitting play scripts for both contests and production, protecting one's copyright, and working with directors and theater companies. Well-written, comprehensive, and filled with illustrative examples, Naked Playwriting includes both innovative and tried-and-true writing techniques, sage advice from veteran writers, a short study of the major schools of dramatic thought, and writing anecdotes. This one-of-a-kind playwriting book, which covers both the basics of playwriting and the practical advice on getting a play published and produced, will help both novices and working writers discover and improve their playwriting skills and see their plays performed on a stage.

To Be a Playwright


Neipris Janet - 2005
    Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Fewer Emergencies: Whole Blue Sky, Face to the Wall, Fewer Emergencies


Martin Crimp - 2005
    Fewer Emergencies'Things are definitely looking up--brighter light--more frequent boating--more confident smile--things are improving day by day--who ever would've guessed?'Fewer Emergencies premiered at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in September 2005.

Performance in America: Contemporary U.S. Culture and the Performing Arts


David Roman - 2005
    culture. Looking at a series of specific performances mounted between 1994 and 2004, well-known performance studies scholar David Román challenges the belief that theatre, dance, and live music are marginal art forms in the United States. He describes the crucial role that the performing arts play in local, regional, and national communities, emphasizing the power of live performance, particularly its immediacy and capacity to create a dialogue between artists and audiences. Román draws attention to the ways that the performing arts provide unique perspectives on many of the most pressing concerns within American studies: questions about history and politics, citizenship and society, and culture and nation.The performances that Román analyzes range from localized community-based arts events to full-scale Broadway productions and from the controversial works of established artists such as Tony Kushner to those of emerging artists. Román considers dances produced by the choreographers Bill T. Jones and Neil Greenberg in the mid-1990s as new aids treatments became available and the aids crisis was reconfigured; a production of the Asian American playwright Chay Yew’s A Beautiful Country in a high-school auditorium in Los Angeles’s Chinatown; and Latino performer John Leguizamo’s one-man Broadway show Freak. He examines the revival of theatrical legacies by female impersonators and the resurgence of cabaret in New York City. Román also looks at how the performing arts have responded to 9/11, the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, and the second war in Iraq. Including more than eighty illustrations, Performance in America highlights the dynamic relationships among performance, history, and contemporary culture through which the past is revisited and the future reimagined.

Well


Lisa Kron - 2005
    It explores the dynamics of health, family and community with the story of her mother’s extraordinary ability to heal a changing neighborhood, despite her inability to heal herself. In this solo show with other people in it, Kron asks the provocative question: Are we responsible for our own illness? But the answers she gets are much more complicated than she bargained for when the play spins dangerously out of control into riotously funny and unexpected territory.Lisa Kron has received numerous honors, including several OBIE Awards, the Cal Arts/Alpert Award, the Bessie Award and the GLAAD Media Award. Ms. Kron lives in New York City and Los Angeles.

Lea Goldberg: Selected Poetry and Drama


Leah Goldberg - 2005
    This new translation brings her voice to contemporary readers.

Plays 3: Haunting Julia / Sugar Daddies / Drowning on Dry Land / Private Fears in Public Places


Alan Ayckbourn - 2005
    It touches on the failures of education and parenting, on media pressure and overdoses. Kurt Cobain comes to mind. More universally, Haunting Julia mourns how in adolescence and adulthood, we do our loves wrong.' Financial TimesSugar Daddies'A timely warning about the dangers of role-playing and pretence . . . But the real fascination lies in watching Ayckbourn's own transformation from social observer to impassioned moralist.' GuardianDrowning on Dry Land'Ayckbourn at the top of his game.' Guardian'A coruscatingly acid and funny play.' The TimesPrivate Fears in Public Places'Ayckbourn's construction has a masterly clarity; his writing combines ruthless observation with mature tolerance. Nobody else writing today can create a sense of a complicated little world in 90 minutes, or make banal lives seem so unforgivably interesting. Listen: it's a master's voice.' Sunday Times

The Performer's Voice: Realizing Your Vocal Potential


Meribeth Bunch Dayme - 2005
    Through simple exercises, drawings, and clear explanations, the text takes a balanced, accessible pedagogical approach that emphasizes the infinite potential of the human voice.

Ethno-Techno: Writings on Performance, Activism and Pedagogy


Guillermo Gómez-Peña - 2005
    In Ethno-Techno: Writings on Performance, Activism and Pedagogy, he pushes the boundaries still further, exploring what's left for artists to do in a post-9/11 repressive culture of what he calls 'the mainstream bizarre'.Over forty-five photos document his artistic experiments and the text not only explores and confronts his political and philosophical parameters; it offers groundbreaking insights into his, and his company's, methods of production, development and teaching.The result is an extraordinary and inspiring glimpse into the life and work of one of the most daring, innovative and challenging performance artists of our age.

Freaks and Fire: The Underground Reinvention of Circus


J. Dee Hill - 2005
    and the über-kitsch of Cirque du Soleil, tightly knit alternative circus troupes like Yard Dogs Road Show, Flam Chen, Circus Contraption, and other over-the-top groups bring thrill-starved audiences sometimes disturbing, sometimes exhilarating riffs on the classic circus. From the sick shockfests of the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow to the anarchic burlesque of the Bindlestiff Family Circus to the obscure but elegant puppetry of the Cloudseeding Circus of the Performative Object, Freaks and Fire celebrates the world of the underground circus. The voices of the performers themselves describe the grit and glamour of their art — from chaos-inducing performances to paying the rent. J. Dee Hill's provocative text and Phil Hollenbeck's lurid images explore the role of these self-styled freaks in society, along the way giving a snapshot of society itself, of the large audience these neo-vaudevillians seek to dazzle and challenge.

Sarah Bernhardt: The Art of High Drama


Carol Ockman - 2005
    Yet her importance extended beyond the world of theater—she was an icon of French nationalism, a target of both admiration and scorn, an artist and sculptor, and a trendsetting avatar of style. This fascinating book examines the many sides and talents of Bernhardt, from her beginnings at the Comédie Française through her international stardom. Wonderfully illustrated, the book features an unprecedented collection of images relating to Bernhardt’s life, including paintings, posters, photographs, costumes, jewelry, stage designs, self-portraits, and sculptures.Bernhardt orchestrated a brilliant sixty-year career as an actress and entrepreneur, becoming a revered patriotic figure in her native France and a beloved star in America, where she undertook nine successful tours. Along the way she sat for the most fashionable artists of her time, became the most photographed woman in the world, and attached her name to everything from hair curlers to liqueurs. This book brings the incredible Sarah Bernhardt to life for contemporary readers and highlights her historical significance and integral place in modern culture.Featured illustrations include:• Art Nouveau posters by Alphonse Mucha depicting Bernhardt in her most famous roles• Designer costumes, tunics, tiaras, and jewelry• A human skull, a gift from Victor Hugo• Portraits of the actress by Jean Cocteau, Félix Nadar, Andy Warhol, and others

Caffe Cino: The Birthplace of Off-Off-Broadway


Wendell C. Stone - 2005
    As Off-Off-Broadway productions enjoy a deserved resurgence, theatre historian and actor Wendell C. Stone reopens the Cino’s doors in this vibrant look at the earliest days of OOB.Rife with insider interviews and rich with evocative photographs, Caffe Cino: The Birthplace of Off-Off-Broadway provides the first detailed account of Joe Cino’s iconic café theatre and its influence on American theatre. A hub of artistic innovation and haven for bohemians, beats, hippies, and gays, the café gave a much-sought outlet to voices otherwise shunned by mainstream entertainment. The Cino’s square stage measured only eight feet, but the dynamic ideas that emerged there spawned the numerous alternative theatre spaces that owe their origins to the risky enterprise on Cornelia Street.

The Light in the Piazza


Craig Lucas - 2005
    The Light in the Piazza has ravishing power. It’s as if Guettel were determined to capture the golden light of Tuscany in a bottle. His lyrics are remarkable, and the book, written by Craig Lucas, is written with characteristic empathy and humor. Brilliant.” –Frank Rich“The Light in the Piazza beautifully captures the eternal allure of Italy. . . . The story wraps itself around your heart.”—Chicago Sun-Times“Sumptuous and romantic. Guettel’s music and lyrics represent a genuine expense of spirit. The Light in the Piazza offers a complex contemplation of the well-defended emptiness of every man and woman. It doesn’t want theatergoers to feel good; it wants to make them feel deeply. And it does.” –New YorkerComposer Adam Guettel, best known for his Floyd Collins, has teamed with Prelude to a Kiss playwright Craig Lucas to create a passionate and soaring new musical. Based on Elizabeth Spencer’s 1960 novella, The Light in the Piazza is the story of a young American woman whose chance encounter with a charming young Italian man in a Florentine piazza sets off a whirlwind romance, with an unsettling revelation.Craig Lucas is a playwright, screenwriter and director. His plays include Prelude to a Kiss, Reckless, Blue Window, God’s Heart, The Singing Forest and Small Tragedy. His screenplays include Longtime Companion, The Secret Lives of Dentists and The Dying Gaul, which he also directed. Mr. Lucas’ awards include the L.A. Drama Critics Award, an OBIE Award for Best Play and Best Director, and the Excellence in Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.Adam Guettel is a composer/lyricist living in Seattle, where he is Artist in Residence at the Intiman Theatre. His other work includes Floyd Collins and Saturn Returns (recorded by Nonesuch Records as Myths and Hymns). Mr. Guettel’s awards include the Stephen Sondheim Award, the ASCAP New Horizons Award, and the American Composers Orchestra Award.

Ethnodrama: An Anthology of Reality Theatre


Johnny Salda-a - 2005
    In his introduction to ethnodrama and to the plays themselves, Saldana emphasizes how a credible, vivid, and persuasive rendering of a research participant's story as a theatrical performance creates insights for both researcher and audience not possible through conventional qualitative data analysis. With their focus on the personal, immediate and contextual, these plays about marginalized identities, abortion, street life and oppression manage a unique balance between theoretical research and everyday realism.

The Singer's Musical Theatre Anthology Volume 1: Soprano Accompaniment C Ds


Hal Leonard Corporation - 2005
    Two accompaniment CDs in each package which match the books containing a collection of songs from the musical stage, categorized by voice type. The selections are presented in their authentic settings, excerpted from the original vocal scores.

Actors on Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night's Dream


F. Murray Abraham - 2005
    Murray Abraham provides a joyful commentary on playing the character of Bottom in A Midsummer Night's Dream, his favorite role in his forty-year career in the theater. Writing with both insight and passion, Abraham not only shares his own experiences in playing Bottom in different productions-most notably and most fondly at Joseph Papp's Public Theater in New York City in 1987-but also analyzes the play's characters and breaks down its language to assist the reader in understanding the richness of the humor and the sheer inventiveness of the plot.

Basic Sewing for Costume Construction: A Handbook


Rebecca Cunningham - 2005
    Its clearly laid-out projects cover hand stitching, hand sewn fasteners, and seams, all while teaching a simplified approach to pattern making. Readers learn to translate their body measurements into patterns for garments of their own design. They follow the steps from developing a pattern, to preparing a fitting muslin, to creating a finished garment. Each project builds on the previous one to develop a full understanding of the costume construction process.

The Complete Professional Audition: A Commonsense Guide to Auditioning for Plays and Musicals


Daren Cohen - 2005
    There are 184 college theater programs and 108 performing-arts high schools. There are 578 acting schools and coaches in New York City and Los Angeles alone. The Complete Professional Audition is the one book all of those actors need-because before actors can act, they have to pass the audition! Here's practical, hand-holding advice for choosing material, rehearsing, warming up, staying calm, standing out in a crowd, understanding casting, avoiding pitfalls, following up, getting the right headshot and resume, and accepting an offer. There's even a section on handling rejection-not that The Complete Professional Audition user is ever going to need that, of course. Ultra-useful appendices of recommended songs and monologues (yes!) make this the complete guide for everyone with an audition coming up.- Designed for both play and musical auditions- There are 300,000 actors and acting students in the US-and all of them want an edge at the audition- Through his workshops and seminars, author Darren Cohen knows exactly what actors need to pass an audition and get that part- Practical, down-to-earth ideas that work

The Ultimate Audition Book, Volume 4: 222 Comedy Monologues, 2 Minutes & Under (Monologue Audition)


John Capecci - 2005
    PThe Hottest Collection of Comedy Monologues Available! brbrIf you've ever searched for a good comic monologue - whether for a professional audition, a class, or a competition - you know how frustrating the hunt can be brbrEditors Irene Ziegler John Capecci have combed over some of the world's best comic writing to bring you 222 Comic Monologues at Two Minutes and Under brbrIt's all funny stuff here - classic and contemporary works; roles for men and women ages 7 to 100 brbrYou'll find entertaining pieces from writers as varied as Christopher Durang and Langston Hughes, Dorothy Parker and Steve Martin, Margaret Cho and Moliere brbrYou'll also find shades of comedy from light to dark - situational humor, word play, absurdity, and surrealism brbrThese monologues are alternately romantic, silly, militant, downright zany-first-rate character work by both new and established comic writers

Ellen Terry


Joy Melville - 2005
    She was notorious for flaunting the moral code of her day, marrying three times and having illegitimate children

Rainer Werner Fassbinder and the German Theatre


David Barnett - 2005
    David Barnett helps to unlock the much-discussed theatricality of Fassbinder's films by showing its many concrete sources. As the first study of Fassbinder's work in the theatre, as a playwright and director, this book presents full contextualization of his work within the upheavals of its times. Readers are introduced to the cultural history of the West German theatre in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The Gay and Lesbian Theatrical Legacy: A Biographical Dictionary of Major Figures in American Stage History in the Pre-Stonewall Era


Billy J. Harbin - 2005
    A fascinating journey awaits them all in this highly recommended volume.”—Broadside: Newsletter of the Theatre Library Association The Gay and Lesbian Theatrical Legacy collects in a single volume biographies of more than one hundred notable figures whose careers flourished in the years before the 1969 Stonewall Riots marked the beginning of the gay and lesbian civil rights movement in the United States. The leading lights in American theater have included innumerable individuals whose sexualities have deviated from prevailing norms, but this history has until recently been largely unwritten and unknown. This book contributes significantly to the recovery of this history, fashioning a much fuller, more nuanced portrait of American theater as it evolved and shedding light on the influence that sexual desire may have had on professional choices, relationships, and artistic achievements. The Gay and Lesbian Theatrical Legacy collects biographies and portraits of influential actors, playwrights, composers, directors, designers, dancers, producers, managers, critics, choreographers, and technicians who made their mark on the American theater. Its broad coverage provides an extended glimpse into lives and careers that intersected and into networks of affiliation that made theatrical history and, by extension, social and cultural history.  The late Billy J. Harbin was Professor of Theater, Louisiana State University. Kim Marra is Associate Professor of Theater, University of Iowa. Robert A. Schanke is Professor of Theater Emeritus, Central College, Pella, Iowa.

Five Performing Arts: Tom Stoppard, Charles Rosen, Jonathan Miller, Garry Wills and Geoffrey O'Brien (New York Review Books Collections)


Robert B. Silvers - 2005
    Tom Stoppard considers ways of controlling how an audience gets information while watching a play and Charles Rosen reflects on the very physical relationship between the musician and the instrument.

Upstaged: Making Theatre in a Media Age


Anne Nicholson Weber - 2005
    Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The Art of the American Musical: Conversations With the Creators


Jackson R. Bryer - 2005
    What is it about this truly indigenous American art form that has made it so enduringly popular? How has it survived, even thrived, alongside the technology of film and the glitz and glamour of Hollywood? Will it continue to evolve and leave its mark on the twenty-first century?Bringing together exclusive and previously unpublished interviews with nineteen leading composers, lyricists, librettists, directors, choreographers, and producers from the mid-1900s to the present, this book details the careers of the individuals who shaped this popular performance art during its most prolific period. The interviewees discuss their roles in productions ranging from On the Town (1944) and Finian's Rainbow (1947) to The Producers (2001) and Bounce (2003).Readers are taken onto the stage, into the rehearsals, and behind the scenes. The nuts and bolts, the alchemy, and the occasional agonies of the collaborative process are all explored. In their discussions, the artists detail their engagements with other creative forces, including such major talents as Leonard Bernstein, Jerome Robbins, Bob Fosse, Liza Minnelli, Judy Garland, Barbra Streisand, Jule Styne, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, Alan Jay Lerner, Zero Mostel, and Gwen Verdon. They speak candidly about their own work and that of their peers, their successes and failures, the creative process, and how a show progresses from its conception through rehearsals and tryouts to opening night.Taken together, these interviews give fresh insight into what Oscar Hammerstein called "a nightly miracle"—the creation of the American musical.

A Beautiful Fairy Tale: The Life of Actress Lois Moran


Richard Buller - 2005
    Scott Fitzgerald and the inspiration for the character of Rosemary in his Tender Is the Night. As a young girl, Lois moved to Paris with her mother and thrived in the artistic and literary glow of the city. She danced with the National Paris Opera at age 14 and also was cast in two French films. Samuel Goldwyn, on a European tour in search of new talent, saw her work and was impressed. He cast her in what would become one of the best-known films of the era. With her performance as Laurel, the emotionally conflicted daughter in Stella Dallas, Lois Moran became an overnight sensation and took Hollywood by storm, and on her own terms. The author corresponded with Lois Moran during the last five years of her life. He had full and exclusive access to her journals, scrapbooks, and photos. In telling the Lois Moran story, Buller illuminates the history of film, theater, and television. He also includes a thorough and unique account of the actress's relationship with Fitzgerald. HARDCOVER

The Compact Bedford Introduction to Drama


Lee A. Jacobus - 2005
    Adapted from the fifth edition of The Bedford Introduction to Drama, this concise version provides more plays, more commentaries, and more editorial features than any other brief anthology, making it -- like the longer edition -- the most comprehensive anthology of its kind.

Theaters [With CDROM]


Craig Morrison - 2005
    The first comprehensive study of American theaters, it illustrates their wide range from raucous music halls to vaudeville, from circus to grand opera, from World's Fair to Coney island, from nickelodeon to glorious picture palace. Also featured are theaters for burlesque, theaters afloat, military theaters, Shakespearean theaters, summer theaters, theaters and African-Americans, and arenas (when a stage just won't do), enlivened by a cast of entrepreneurs and showmen who were the movers and shakers of our theatrical heritage.

The Nature Treasury: A First Look at the Natural World


Lizann Flatt - 2005
    Twenty-two richly detailed panoramic spreads transport readers to some of the most fascinating places on earth, along the way highlighting animals, plants, elements, and environments. Over 100 animals and plants are here, shown in their native habitats from North American forests and African savannas to Arctic tundra and tropical coral reefs. Special introductory sections explain how living things grow and show the major animal and plant families. "Up Close" pages reveal secrets of such familiar things as air, trees, water, and grass. Featured facts cover such child-friendly subjects as animal camouflage and how rivers form, while a glossary helps parents and teachers answer young readers' questions.

India's Shakespeare: Translation, Interpretation and Performance


Poonam Trivedi - 2005
    This collection of essays examines the diverse aspects of Shakespeare's interaction with India, since two hundred years ago when the British first introduced him here. The collection of essays emerging from first hand experience, discuss several contexts in which Shakespeare was read, taught, translated, performed, and absorbed into the cultural fabric of India, presented in a variety of critical positions.

Stars On Stage: Eileen Darby & Broadway's Golden Age: Photographs 1940 1964


John Lahr - 2005
    A collection of the best photography of Broadway from the 1930s to the 1960s by legendary theatrical photographer, Eileen Darby

Staging Anatomies: Dissection and Spectacle in Early Stuart Tragedy


Hillary M. Nunn - 2005
    Nunn here traces the connections between the London public's interest in medical dissection and the changing cultural significance of bloodshed on the early Stuart playhouse stage. Considering the playhouses' role within the social world of early modern London, Nunn explores the influence of public dissection upon the presentation of human bodies in well-known plays such as King Lear, as well as in a wide range of often neglected early Stuart tragedies like The Second Maiden's Tragedy and Revenge for Honour. In addition to dramatic texts, the study draws heavily on anatomy treatises and popular pamphlets of the time. Incorporating views of anatomy's significance from a wide range of sources, this study shows the ways in which early Stuart dramatists called upon Londoners' increasing fascination with anatomical dissection to shape the staging of their tragedies.

Greek Tragedy and the British Theatre 1660-1914


Edith Hall - 2005
    Archival research has excavated substantial amounts of new material, both visual and literary, which is presented in chronological order. But the fundamental aim is to explain why Greek tragedy, which played an elite role in the curricula of largely conservative schools and universities, was magnetically attractive to political radicals, progressive theatre professionals, and to the aesthetic avant-garde. All Greek has been translated, and the book will be essential reading for anyone interested in Greek tragedy, the reception of ancient Greece and Rome, theatre history, British social history, English studies, or comparative literature.

The Mark Experiment


Andrew Page - 2005
    Think what this might mean to your understanding of the life and ministry of Jesus. If you are looking for a new way into Mark's Gospel and if you long to allow the Gospel to help you worship and experience Jesus, The Mark Experiment is the book for you.