Book picks similar to
Shakespeare on Stage: Thirteen Leading Actors on Thirteen Key Roles by Julian Curry
shakespeare
plays
genre-non-fiction
theatre
How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare
Ken Ludwig - 2013
Many of the best novels, plays, poetry, and films in the English language produced since Shakespeare’s death in 1616—from Jane Austen to The Godfather—are heavily influenced by Shakespeare’s stories, characters, language, and themes. In a sense, his works are a kind of Bible for the modern world, bringing us together intellectually and spiritually. Hamlet, Juliet, Macbeth, Ophelia, and a vast array of other singular Shakespearean characters have become the archetypes of our consciousness. To know some Shakespeare provides a head start in life. In How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare, acclaimed playwright Ken Ludwig provides the tools you need to instill an understanding, and a love, of Shakespeare’s works in your children, and to have fun together along the way.Ken Ludwig devised his methods while teaching his own children, and his approach is friendly and easy to master. Beginning with memorizing short specific passages from Shakespeare's plays, this method then instills children with cultural references they will utilize for years to come. Ludwig’s approach includes understanding of the time period and implications of Shakespeare’s diction as well as the invaluable lessons behind his words and stories. Colorfully incorporating the history of Shakespearean theater and society, How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare guides readers on an informed and adventurous journey through the world in which the Bard wrote.This book’s simple process allows anyone to impart to children the wisdom of plays like A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Twelfth Night, Macbeth, and Romeo and Juliet. And there’s fun to be had along the way. Shakespeare novices and experts, and readers of all ages, will each find something delightfully irresistible in How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare.
Elizabeth Rex
Timothy Findley - 2000
In this daring and original production of Timothy Findley's Governor-General Award winning play, William Shakespeare and the formidable Virgin Queen, Elizabeth I, are brought together in a remarkable encounter on the night of April 22, 1616. The night the Queen's Lover will be executed, by the Queen's decree.
Hamletmachine
Heiner Müller - 1977
Failed ideals and human disillusionment give way in Hamletmachine to the youth clamoring in reaction against the past in order to change the present. To break free of the continual cycle of violence within history the past is questioned and deconstructed. Moving away from psychological narrative, Hamletmachine creates a landscape of the betrayed revolution. Brown's production challenges and provides resistance to this complicated text, inciting spectators to do the same. This performance is an exploration into the place of theatre as a sight of revolutionary change. In Müller's words, "the slogan of the Napoleonic era still applies: Theater is the Revolution on the march."
The Son
Florian Zeller - 2018
Believe me. I don't know what's happened, but something has. He's changed. He . . . And I'm wondering if . . . To be absolutely honest with you . . . I'm even wondering if . . . Nicolas, just two years ago a smiling boy, is going through a difficult phase after his parents' divorce. He's listless, skipping classes, lying. He believes moving in with his father and his new family may help. And a different school, a fresh start. When he doesn't feel comfortable there, when he senses he isn't wanted, he decides that going back to his mother's may be the answer. But at some point, options are going to dry up. And then what?I'm telling you. I don't understand what's happening to me. Florian Zeller's The Son forms the final part in a trilogy with The Mother and The Father, all of which are translated by Christopher Hampton. The Son premieres at the Kiln Theatre, London, in February 2019.
The Metal Children: A Play
Adam Rapp - 2010
Its directionless New York City author arrives in town to defend the book and finds that it has inspired a group of local teens to rebel in strange and unexpected ways. A timely and unforgettable drama about the failure of urban and heartland America to understand each other, The Metal Children explores what happens when fiction becomes a matter of life and death.
An Oresteia
Anne Carson - 2009
After the murder of her daughter Iphegenia by her husband Agamemnon, Klytaimestra exacts a mother’s revenge, murdering Agamemnon and his mistress, Kassandra. Displeased with Klytaimestra’s actions, Apollo calls on her son, Orestes, to avenge his father’s death with the help of his sister Elektra. In the end, Orestes, driven mad by the Furies for his bloody betrayal of family, and Elektra are condemned to death by the people of Argos, and must justify their actions—signaling a call to change in society, a shift from the capricious governing of the gods to the rule of manmade law.Carson’s accomplished rendering combines elements of contemporary vernacular with the traditional structures and rhetoric of Greek tragedy, opening up the plays to a modern audience. In addition to its accessibility, the wit and dazzling morbidity of her prose sheds new light on the saga for scholars. Anne Carson’s Oresteia is a watershed translation, a death-dance of vengeance and passion not to be missed.
Light: Science and Magic: An Introduction to Photographic Lighting
Fil Hunter - 1997
This highly respected guide has been thoroughly updated and revised for content and design - it is now produced in full color! It introduces a logical theory of photographic lighting so if you are starting out in photography you will learn how to predict results before setting up lights. This is not primarily a how-to book with only set examples for you to copy. Rather, Light: Science and Magic provides you with a comprehensive theory of the nature and principles of light to allow you to use lighting to express your own creativity.Numerous photographs and illustrations provide clear examples of the theories, while sidebars highlight special lighting questions. Expanded chapters on available light in portraiture, as well as new information on digital equipment and terminology make this a must have update!
alterNatives
Drew Hayden Taylor - 2000
The guests at this little “sitcom” soirée are couples that represent what by now have become the clichéd extremes of both societies: Angel’s former radical Native activist buddies and Colleen’s environmentally concerned vegetarian / veterinarian friends. The menu is, of course, the hosts’ respectful attempt at shorthand for the irreconcilable cultural differences about to come to a head during the evening: moose roast and vegetarian lasagna.Like all of Drew Hayden Taylor’s work, alterNatives manages to say things about “Whites and Indians” that one is not supposed to talk about—it digs up the carefully buried, raw and pulsing nerve-endings of the unspeakable and exposes them to the hot bright lights of the stage. That he does so with a humour that the politically correct among his audiences continue to miss entirely beneath the sound and fury of their own self-righteous indignation is a measure of his immense talent as a dramatist. In the end, the play is not about cultural differences at all, but instead constitutes a full frontal attack on the personal qualities the sitcom holds most dear and pushes hardest at its audiences: Taylor actually has the temerity to suggest that neither “attitude” nor “sincerity” are enough to address basic human issues, no matter which side of the cultural fence the characters are on. And that’s hard for the pushers of what is considered a globally enlightened culture to take.Cast of 3 women and 3 men.
Sanford Meisner on Acting
Sanford Meisner - 1987
Throughout these pages Meisner is delight--always empathizing with his students and urging them onward, provoking emotion, laughter, and growing technical mastery from his charges. With an introduction by Sydney Pollack, director of "Out of Africa" and "Tootsie," who worked with Meisner for five years."This book should be read by anyone who wants to act or even appreciate what acting involves. Like Meisner's way of teaching, it is the straight goods."--Arthur Miller"If there is a key to good acting, this one is it, above all others. Actors, young and not so young, will find inspiration and excitement in this book."--Gregory Peck
Spring's Awakening
Frank Wedekind - 1891
Its fourteen-year-old heroine Wendla is killed by abortion pills. The young Moritz terrorized by the world around him and especially by his teachers shoots himself. The ending seems likely to be the suicide of Moritz's friend Melchior but in a confrontation with a mysterious stranger (the famous Masked Man) he finally manages to shed his illusions and face the consequences.
Ways of Seeing
John Berger - 1972
First published in 1972, it was based on the BBC television series about which the (London) Sunday Times critic commented: "This is an eye-opener in more ways than one: by concentrating on how we look at paintings . . . he will almost certainly change the way you look at pictures." By now he has."Berger has the ability to cut right through the mystification of the professional art critics . . . He is a liberator of images: and once we have allowed the paintings to work on us directly, we are in a much better position to make a meaningful evaluation" —Peter Fuller, Arts Review"The influence of the series and the book . . . was enormous . . . It opened up for general attention to areas of cultural study that are now commonplace" —Geoff Dyer in Ways of TellingWinner of the 1972 Booker Prize for his novel, G., John Peter Berger (born November 5th, 1926) is an art critic, painter and author of many novels including A Painter of Our Time, From A to X and Bento’s Sketchbook.
Dealer's Choice
Patrick Marber - 1995
It won the 1995 Evening Standard Award for Best Comedy and, the Writers' Guild for Best West End Play."An exceptionally accomplished first play . . . though I know nothing about poker, I testify to the compulsive grip this play exerts and to the accumulation of meanings it ignites in your head."—Financial Times"Patrick Marber's enthralling close-up of the demons which drive compulsive gamblers is among the finest new plays in many a year."—Daily Mail