Inspired by Frank Wedekind’s controversial 1891 play about teenage sexuality and society’s efforts to control it, the piece seamlessly merges past and present, underscoring the timelessness of adolescent angst and the universality of human passion.Steven Sater’s plays include the long-running Carbondale Dreams, Perfect for You, Doll (Rosenthal Prize/Cincinnati Playhouse), Umbrage (Steppenwolf New Play Prize), and a reconceived version of Shakespeare’s Tempest, which played in London.Duncan Sheik is a singer/songwriter who also collaborated with Sater on the musical The Nightingale. He has composed original music for The Gold Rooms of Nero and for The Public Theater’s Twelfth Night in Central Park.

    From well-known auteur of the American theatre scene, Anne Bogart, And Then, You Act is a fascinating and accessible book about directing theatre, acting and the collaborative creative process.Writing clearly and passionately, Bogart speaks to a wide audience, from undergraduates to practitioners, and makes an invaluable contribution to the field tackling themes such as:intentionality inspiration why theatre matters.Following on from her successful book A Director Prepares, which has become a key text for teaching directing classes, And Then, You Act is an essential practitioner and student resource.

    They have hired a housekeeper named Matilde, an aspiring comedian from Brazil who's more interested in coming up with the perfect joke than in house-cleaning. Lane, the lady of the house, has an eccentric sister named Virginia who's just nuts about house-cleaning. She and Matilde become fast friends, and Virginia takes over the cleaning while Matilde works on her jokes. Trouble comes when Lane's husband Charles reveals that he has found his soul mate, or "bashert" in a cancer patient named Anna, on whom he has operated. The actors who play Charles and Anna also play Matilde's parents in a series of dream-like memories, as we learn the story about how they literally killed each other with laughter, giving new meaning to the phrase, "I almost died laughing." This theatrical and wildly funny play is a whimsical and poignant look at class, comedy and the true nature of love.

    Based on Barry Edelstein's twenty-year career directing Shakespeare's plays, this book provides the tools that actors need to fully understand and express the power of Shakespeare's language.

    In these pages Williams (1911-1981) wrote out his most private thoughts as well as sketches of plays, poems, and accounts of his social, professional, and sexual encounters. The notebooks are the repository of Williams’s fears, obsessions, passions, and contradictions, and they form possibly the most spontaneous self-portrait by any writer in American history.Meticulously edited and annotated by Margaret Thornton, the notebooks follow Williams’ growth as a writer from his undergraduate days to the publication and production of his most famous plays, from his drug addiction and drunkenness to the heights of his literary accomplishments. At one point, Williams writes, “I feel dull and disinterested in the literary line. Dr. Heller bores me with all his erudite discussion of literature. Writing is just writing! Why all the fuss about it?” This remarkable record of the life of Tennessee Williams is about writing—how his writing came up like a pure, underground stream through the often unhappy chaos of his life to become a memorable and permanent contribution to world literature.

    One of his best-loved and most famous plays, it exposes the lies plaguing the family of a wealthy Southern planter of humble origins.

    Actors always ask for notes on their performance, and they will take them from just about anyone. While people in other pursuits tend not to ask for performance ratings, actors demand them. Ron Marasco's Notes to an Actor grew out of the actor's profession-which, the author notes, is such a mysterious art. It is learned by experience, trial and error, and by succeeding and failing.

    Includes: Accident Waiting to Happen * Bride's Lament * Cold Feets * I Am Aldolpho * I Remember Love * Show Off * Toledo Surprise * and more.

    And there is Oshoosi, fresh out of prison, who always takes the wrong track. When his ex-cell mate Elegba gives him a clapped-out car, true freedom seems just around the corner... The Brothers Size is the European debut of an amazing young writer who plants Nigerian myth in the fertile soil of Louisiana. The play premiered at Drum, Plymouth, in October 2007, before touring and transferring to the Young Vic, London.

    Our piano/vocal selections feature 17 of the songs, including: All That's Known * The Bitch of Living * The Dark I Know Well * I Believe * Mama Who Bore Me * My Junk * Those You've Known * Touch Me * The Word of Your Body * and more. This souvenir folio also includes great color photos from the Broadway production. PARENTAL ADVISORY: EXPLICIT LYRICS

    This is a hands-on, step-by-step guide to Stanislavsky's famous 'System' illustrating, with exercises, each of his famous acting techniques.

    The harrowing Osama the Hero shows a group of neighbours taking ill-defined revenge on an odd-ball teenager in a climate of fear. In After the End a woman discovers she has been rescued from Armageddon by a paranoid ex-colleague with a nuclear bunker in his garden. And in a fractured narrative Love and Money portrays a marriage driven to brutal destruction by financial pressures.

    A play by the creator of the "West Wing" about the invention of television, "The Farnsworth Invention" focuses on the battle between Philo Farnsworth, the Mormon from who came up with the concept as a teenager, and David Sarnoff, the escapee from Russian pogrom who had become the ruthless head of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) and its subsidiary, the National Broadcasting Company (NBC).

    What's hiding behind those curtains on the stage? How does a huge set appear so quickly between scenes? Just two of the many questions answered in this visual compendium.

    Grey Gardens is based on the 1975 Albert and David Maysles film about Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis's eccentric aunt and cousin. The touching and sometimes heart-wrenching musical adaptation explores the dysfunctional relationship between former socialite Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter, Little Edie, as they languish in a derelict East Hampton manor, Grey Gardens. Propelled by Christine Ebersole's tour-de-force performance, the gorgeous score, and intricate lyrics, the Broadway musical has garnered much critical praise. "An experience no passionate theatergoer should miss." Ben Brantley, The New York Times

    Seth Rudetsky is the funniest man I know. Period.” —Kristin Chenoweth, Tony award-winning actress“Seth Rudetsky knows every skeleton in (or out) of the closet on Broadway and his passion, joy and encyclopedic knowledge of that Magic Kingdom inform every sentence of this book. He makes our age, this age, seem Golden, too, and he is right about that.” —Terrence McNally, playwright“I love Seth Rudetsky! He is Mr. Broadway! Seth's love for the Musical Theatre equals my own and his knowledge of all things Broadway is an obsession to be cherished. His chronicle of the journey of starstruck kid to Broadway pianist/conductor is a wonderful every-theatre-kid tale with wicked humor and New York City savvy, sass and insight. I LOVE THIS BOOK!” —Betty Buckley,Tony award-wining actress/singer"Seth Rudetsky belts a high comedic note in this hilariously reflective, mile-a-minute insight about the real people who travel the Great White Way."—Ana Gasteyer, Actress/Singer, "Saturday Night Live", "Wicked""Seth Rudetsky's book is everything you want to know about Broadway AND Funny!"—Lea DeLaria, Actress/Comedian, "The Rocky Picture Horror Show"“Seth Rudetsky works in the pits, but his book is anything but. A laugh-filled excursion to Broadway with a guide who knows where all the phantoms are buried. Even if the closest you ever get to the Broadway jungle is second mezz at “The Lion King,” you'll have a good time” —Bruce Vilanch, Actor-Writer-One-time-SquareWelcome to life beneath the wicked stage!Stephen Sheerin was born to play on Broadway—or at least, under it. He’s a musician, a conductor, and his dream is to music direct a big Broadway musical. After years of toiling in the pit of some of the best-loved (and loathed) hits on the Great White Way, he’s just been given his big break. Can life really be going that well? Of course not—his family is driving him crazy and his boyfriend can’t seem to get rid of his other boyfriend. Then there’s Stephen himself—neurotic and bitchy—who realizes that maybe total happiness is over-rated.

    It takes a lot of hard work before an actor even gets a part. A career is apt to be short-lived. The field is incredibly competitive. Cream does not always rise to the top. And yet actors young and old line up by the thousands wanting to do it. What fuels this desire? What is it that drives actors to withstand the frustration of not getting parts, of getting bad parts in bad plays, of being mistreated by directors, misundertood by audiences, misinterpreted by critics?With a nod to the Paris Review's Writers at Work model, Actors at Work looks at the way some of our most respected stage and film actors today approach their calling. In a collection of interviews with a dozen artists, including Philip Seymour Hoffman, Patti LuPone, and Billy Crudup, the book explores not only the impetus to perform but also key topics about the process and profession, including the way actors approach a role, what techniques they use to deal with directors and other cast members, the ways in which they use their own personal lives in their work, and their influences, idols, and insecurities. The result is a book that actors will find indispensable and fans will find irresistible.

    Includes: Never Swim Alone, The Soldier Dreams, You Are Here, In on It, and A Beautiful View.

    This is especially true when a client does not have a target sound in his or her response repertoire. Eliciting Sounds: Techniques and Strategies for Clinicians is a quick, easy-to-use compendium of techniques for immediately evoking any phoneme targeted for remediation. This new edition of the classic resource continues to provide the most clinically relevant information in a compact, accessible format. No clinical speech-language pathologist should be without Eliciting Sounds.

    Have we got a story for you Everyone knows their songs. Few know their story. Named for a bowling alley that refused to book them, The Four Seasons--Frankie, Tommy, Bob, and Nick--were four high school dropouts who emerged from New Jersey to become true American Idols: one of the biggest American pop music sensations of all time. With a shiny doo-wop sound highlighted by lead singer Frankie Valli's stratospheric falsetto, they wrote their own songs, invented their own sounds, and sold 175 million records worldwide--all before they were thirty."Jersey Boys," Broadway's 2006 Tony Award(R) Winner for Best Musical, is the electrifying tale of the Seasons' rise, the moment they established their signature sound with their breakout hit "Sherry"; becoming a sensation on" American Bandstand, " of being young and full of hope and dreams and promise; of riding the rocket of success against the irresistible pull of the Jersey mob and the old neighborhood. Like the show itself, this gorgeous, full-color companion book captures the magic and the original excitement of the band's life and times through all-new interviews with the band members. It also features the show's libretto; interviews with the show's writers, director, and cast; and over 200 photos from the band members' personal collections of rarely seen memorabilia. For anyone who's ever sung along or danced to "Oh, What a Night ," "Walk Like a Man" or "Big Girls Don't Cry," and for those just discovering the timeless sound of The Four Seasons, " Jersey Boys" is the ultimate keepsake.

    In this disarmingly accessible study of the art of acting he shares his unique experience and range of expertise. An Actor's Tricks offers a meticulous scrutiny of the actor's preparation for performance and comes with a foreword by Peter Brook.Drawing on an unrivalled wealth and range of expertise in the fields of acting, directing and training, Yoshi Oida and Lorna Marshall provide an authoritative and fascinating study of the art of the actor.In scrutinising the process of performance from the twin perspectives of the actor and director, An Actor's Tricks is filled with hints, insights and stories from productions with Peter Brook and from around the world.Beginning with the daily preparation to train the body, it moves to the process of rehearsal for a performance right up to the moment when the actor steps onstage. An appendix of practical exercises is included for the actor to follow.The books combines principles and techniques from both Western and Eastern disciplines of acting to provide a masterful study essential for every actor and director.

    L. Travers's beloved novels to the stage. Well-known British writer and radio personality Brian Sibley tells Mary Poppins's story, from her obscure origins in Travers's Australian childhood and her progress through the series of books Travers began to write in 1934, to her incarnation by Julie Andrews in one of the most successful Disney films of all time, to her long-awaited landing onstage in London's West End. A long-time friend of Travers and co-writer with her of an unproduced sequel to the film, Sibley offers unique insights into the idiosyncratic author's complex relationship to her heroine, and the decades-long series of proposals and negotiations that finally resulted in Disney Theatrical Productions joining forces with the Cameron Mackintosh Theatrical Group to realize Travers's stories as a spectacular work of musical theater. Sibley's details the entire development process of the show's script, music, choreography, and design, culminating in a glorious opening night on December 15, 2004 in London's Prince Edward's Theatre, as Mary Poppins is met by cheering sold-out houses and critical raves. In the book's second half, Michael Lassell gives a fascinating backstage account of the show's transfer to Broadway, including the show's American casting and important changes to its book, lyrics, and designs, as the creative team strives to "plus" Poppins to perfection.

    Hold tight as the ordinary turns extraordinary in Mark O’Rowe’s exhilarating new play. A blackly comic vision of Dublin infested with demons, from the author of Howie the Rookie.

    His well-meaning sister Joan and brother-in-law Harry try and make time for him in their busy lives, but no one can get through. Following the burglary of his apartment, Joan is baffled to find her brother blissfully happy and tries to unravel the story behind Beane's mysterious new love Molly.

    This volume, selected and edited by Kenneth Tynan's biographer, Dominic Shellard, brings together the best of Tynan's theatre writing drawn from his 12 years as a theatre critic (1951-63).

    Traditional shadow play techniques are covered, together with modern methods and recent explorations, puppet design, lighting and staging, and even techniques for creating translucent figures.

    This is a hugely original play, both magical and moving, that confirmed Anthony Neilson as one of major voices in contemporary British Theatre. The entire original cast and creative team have been reunited for this keenly anticipated revival.Lisa Jones is on a journey. It's a colourful and exciting off-kilter trip in search of one lost hour that has tipped the balance of her life. The inhabitants of the wonderful world she finds herself in - Dissocia - are a curious blend of the funny, the friendly and the brutal. As Neilson himself put it, 'If you like Alice in Wonderland but there's not enough sex and violence in it, then Dissocia is the show for you'.Realism premiered at the Edinburgh International Festival in 2006. It follows the life of one man during an ordinary day but veers off from the commonplace to become a deliriously surreal trip inside his wayward imagination. It was described by the Guardian as a 'bold and utterly distinctive all-singing, all-dancing show, like nothing else you'll ever see'.

    This was not the full play-text; it was not the publicperformance. It was the actor's part, consisting of the bare cues and speeches of each individual role. With group rehearsals rare or non-existent, the cued part alone had to furnish the actor with his character. But each such part-text was riddled with gaps and uncertainties. The actor knew what hewas going to say, but not necessarily when, or why, or to whom; he may have known next to nothing of any other part. It demanded the most sensitive attention to the opportunities inscribed in the script, and to the ongoing dramatic moment. Here is where the young actor Shakespeare learnt his trade;here is where his imagination, verbal and technical, learnt to roam.This is the story of Shakespeare in Parts. As Shakespeare developed his playwriting, the apparent limitations of the medium get transformed into expressive opportunities. Both cue and speech become promise-crammed repositories of meaning and movement, and of individually discoverable space and time.Writing always for the same core group of players, Shakespeare could take - and insist upon - unprecedented risks. The result is onstage drama of astonishing immediacy.Starting with a comprehensive history of the part in early modern theatre, Simon Palfrey and Tiffany Stern's mould-altering work of historical and imaginative recovery provides a unique keyhole onto hitherto forgotten practices and techniques. It not only discovers a newly active, choice-riddenactor, but a new Shakespeare.

    Gorgeous stage idols from the biggest shows strut their stuff as you’ve never seen them before. It’s burlesque naughtiness lit up by the razzle-dazzle of the Great White Way. They tease, they titillate, they tantalize. And boy, do they deliver the goods. By the end of each number they’re wearing little more than a smile. But at the end of the show comes the real payoff; hundreds of thousands of dollars have been raised for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, the theatre community’s unique fundraising and grantmaking organization.Backstage Pass peeks behind the curtain at the famous event called Broadway Bares– conceived by Tony Award®—winning director and choreographer Jerry Mitchell–which sets New York City ablaze each summer. The hottest dancers in show business come together for this one-night-only sold-out “Strip-A-Thon”–a fundraising, eye-popping spectacle the likes of which Gypsy Rose Lee could never have dreamed. Now for the first time this luxurious keepsake album brings together all the sizzling posters, scintillating backstage shots, and scorching on-stage photographs from the past seventeen years of Broadway Bares. Sit back and enjoy the show.

    The top working theatre professionals offer hard, factual information to those interested in producing for Broadway, Off-Broadway, Off-Off-Broadway, anywhere in North America, as well as in the United Kingdom. The Commercial Theater Institute Guide to Producing Plays and Musicals now collects for the first time the cream of the crop of that advice, from the noted theatre professionals who participate in the program, in their own words. Interviews, contributions, and a resource directory are included from 30 theatre professionals who have won a total of 45 Tony Awards. Agents, directors, production designers, general managers, fundraisers, marketing directors, producers, and theatrical attorneys all offer invaluable advice in a book that will be the definitive resource in its field.

    Author Kenn Adams presents a step-by-step method for long-form improvisation, covering plot structure, storytelling, character development, symbolism, and advanced scene work. Games and exercises throughout the book help actors and directors focus on and succeed with cause-and-effect storytelling, raising the dramatic stakes, creating dramatic conflict, building the dramatic arc, defining characters, creating environments, establishing relationships, and more. How to Improvise a Full-Length Play is the essential tool for anyone who wantsto create exceptional theater.• An innovative approach to creating compellingdramatic work• Take improv to the next level• Involve actors, directors, everyone in thecreative process

    Calling upon decades of experience from having worked on both sides of the camera, this study provides a behind-the-scenes glimpse of a child-actor’s life in Hollywood during the Golden Age of motion pictures while chronicling the development of two ground-breaking workshops for teaching dramatic art. A brief but comprehensive survey of the history of acting in the Western theater is also included.

    

    Moliere's farcical, tragic, anarchic Don Juan (1665) is the inspiration for Patrick Marber's new play in which the action of the original is relocated to present day Soho, London.Whereas Moliere condemned his anti-hero to a literal Hell, Marber condemns him to a hell of his own making.Don Juan in Soho premiered at the Donmar Warehouse in December 2006.

    Conte's vast expansion of the Langley classic delivers a broad, comprehensive view of theatre and performing arts management based on the premise that all the performing arts share the same core issues. Mr. Conte addresses the needs and concerns confronting 21st Century managers.

    Drama on courage, heroism, and despair exploring the long public shadow that private family violence casts.

    Heddon's engaging style seamlessly blends the theoretical and the personal, raising and pursuing provactive questions around issues of 'truth', 'identity', personal history and political agency, confession, voyeurism and ethics. The book provides case studies of key international practitioners, including Tim Miller, Lisa Kron, Bobby Baker and Curious.

    Sections include improvisation, mime, ice-breakers, group dynamics, rehearsal, story-telling, voice and warm-ups. This unique book has been developed over a thirty year career in education and theatre, through workshops with actors, teachers and children around the world. The pages are packed with tried and tested ideas for a whole range of activities useful for drama lessons, workshops or rehearsals. This ground-breaking book will equip you with the following knowledge and skills:Quickly create scenes and starters for improvisationLearn to develop movement and mime skills through fun and enjoyable activitiesHelp new groups get to know each other with tried and tested ice-breakersDevelop group awareness and trust through group dynamics gamesSpice up rehearsal sessions with activities to develop characters and new approachesExplore the use of physical theatreFind new ways of using story-telling in dramaHelp your students to develop their voice through games, activities and tongue-twistersHave fun with dozens of warm-up games!

    Drawing and Rendering for Theatre starts with the fundamentals of drawing, moves to the types of media, and finishes with specific exercises in each section that will make you more proficient. By the end of this book, you will be versatile enough to be able to create renderings in all areas of theatrical design!Drawing and Rendering will teach you: .How to develop good drawing habits from the start.About composition.How to draw in one, two, and three point perspective.About color.Techniques for different types of media including colored pencils, pastels, watercolor, and more.How to draw digitallyThis gorgeous full-color book is loaded with color examples of both student drawings that are analyzed and critiqued for areas that need improvement, and design renderings by professional theatrical designers.

    The machines that drive these effects range from small pneumatic cylinders pushing loads of a few pounds an inch or two, to 40 horsepower winches running multi-ton scenery at speeds 6 feet per second or more. Usually this machinery is designed by theatre technicians specifically for a particular show's effect. Compared to general industry, this design process is short, often only a few days long, it is done by one person, design teams are rare, and it is done in the absence of reference material specifically addressing the issues involved. The main goal of this book is to remedy this last situation.Mechanical Design for the Stage will be a reference for you that will: * provide the basic engineering formulas needed to predict the forces, torques, speeds, and power required by a given move* give a technician a design process to follow which will direct their work from general concepts to specific detail as a design evolves, and* show many examples of traditional stage machinery designs.The book's emphasis will be on following standard engineering design and construction practices, and developing machines that are functional, efficient to build, easily maintained, and safe to use.

    The catchy soundtrack to the Broadway version of Adam Sandler's hit movie features an all-original set of songs (except for "Somebody Kill Me" and "Grow Old With You" which are from the movie) by Chad Beguelin and Matthew Sklar. Our folio features 15 of the show songs, including: Come Out of the Dumpster * Grow Old with You * It's Your Wedding Day * Let Me Come Home * A Note from Linda * Right in Front of Your Eyes * Somebody Kill Me * Someday * and more. This souvenir folio also includes full-color photos from the stage production.

    Librarian note: Uploaded Cover photo for ISBN 0973073616.

    She explores how the opera participated in the patronage culture and urban sociability of the British elite prior to the Reform Act of 1832 when the opera served as the central meeting place for the ruling class during parliamentary session. The vertical tiers of boxes at the opera highlighted not only the gendered nature of elite political culture, but also those features of aristocratic society most vulnerable to critique by political and moral reformers. Hall-Witt shows how the elite adjusted its behavior in public venues, like the opera,

    Focusing on six performance pieces, Frank Dell's the Temptation of St. Antony (1987), Brace Up! (1990), Fish Story (1994), House/Lights (1999) and To You, the Birdie! (Phedre) (2002), this new volume gathers together an astonishing range of archival material to produce a vivid and personal account of how the company makes its work.This book's intricate layering of journal extracts, actors' notes, stage designs, drawings, performance texts, rehearsal transcriptions, stage-managers' logs and stunning photographs traces a unique documentary path across the practice of the Wooster Group, one that will be an indispensable resource for all those with an interest in contemporary performance and its impact on contemporary culture.Highly accessible to the student, scholar, theatre-goer and practitioner, and including three contextualizing essays by Andrew Quick, this book offers a series of remarkable insights into the working practices of one of the world's leading performance companies.

    Minstrelsy, burlesque, revue, dance, and choreographers, the "texts" of musical theater so often overlooked by its historians, finally receive due consideration in this thorough and thoroughly entertaining book about how American musical theater came to be and developed into what it is today. Patinkin writes about the infancy of the musical--the revues, operettas, and early musical comedies, as well as the groundbreaking shows like Oklahoma!, and Show Boat that brought the form to its "golden age" during World War II. With insightful references to how history, literature, theater, fashion, popular music, and movies influenced musical theater generally and certain shows in particular, he traces a direct lineage from older forms to contemporary musicals. The result is a broad, clear, and detailed picture of American musicals within both an aesthetic and a historical context. Patinkin conveys the pleasure of the ever-changing forms of musical theater even as he gives readers the analytical tools and terms to understand and better appreciate this uniquely American art. The book features a selection of black and white photographs from historical musical productions, and each chapter includes suggestions for materials to watch and listen to at home or in the classroom.

    A series of scenes that gradually tell the story of how the financial collapse affects a British couple and how fiscal worry, stress, and fear can strain mankind's greatest emotion.

    It gathers texts by a variety of eminent writers working in different disciplines (theater and performance studies, comparative literature, philosophy, cultural sociology) who take up the artistic, aesthetic and philosophical questions raised by Needcompany s post-dramatic theater. With contributions by such authorities as Hans-Thies Lehmann, Marvin Carlson, Martin Harries, Jurgen Pieters, Rudi Laermans, George Banu and many others, this attractively illustrated collection should prove invaluable to everyone interested in Needcompany, its artistic context and the performing arts in general."

    Theatre then was mass entertainment and these forgotten plays, hastily written, surviving only as hand-written manuscripts or cheap pamphlets, are a rich seam for the cultural historian. Mining them to discover how 'race' was viewed and how the stereotype of the black developed and degraded, sheds a fascinating light on the development of racism in English culture. In the process, this book helps to explain how a certain flexibility in attitudes towards skin colour, observable at the end of the eighteenth century, changed into the hardened jingoism of the late nineteenth. Concentrating on the period 1830 to 1860, its detailed excavation of some seventy plays makes it invaluable to the theatre historian and black studies scholar.

    Writing about himself in the third person and in the past tense, the result is a unique exercise in self-description.

    The latest in the series 'The National Theatre at Work' follows the production of War Horse from early concept workshops, through the design and development of the magnificent life-size horse puppets, research of the play's languages and wartime setting, the exploratory process of making the adaptation, rehearsals with the ensemble, and onto the Olivier stage.Mervin Millar's unique perspective as a member of the creative team and a puppeteer gives an extraordinary insight into the way this stage version of Michael Morpurgo's novel takes audiences on a journey through history.