Book picks similar to
The Laramie Project by Moisés Kaufman
plays
non-fiction
theatre
drama
Take Me Out
Richard Greenberg - 2002
An extraordinary athlete, he fills both his fans and his teammates with awe at his abilities and his presence on the field and off. When he makes the matter-of-fact announcement that he's gay, he throws his team into turmoil and confusion, while he also emboldens his closeted accountant, Mason Marzac, to come to terms with his own sexuality and to fully experience the pure joy of watching great athletes play a sport as well as it can be played. But Darren's announcement brings to the fore the confused and twisted hostilities of the Empires' brilliantly talented but deeply racist and homophobic pitcher, Shane Mungitt from whose rage tragic consequences ensue.The American premiere of Take Me Out took place at the Public Theater in New York City in September 2002. It will move to the Walter Kerr Theatre on Broadway in February 2003.
'night, Mother
Marsha Norman - 1983
By one of America's most talented playwrights, this play won the Dramatists Guild's prestigious Hull-Warriner Award, four Tony nominations, the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, and the Pulitzer Prize in 1983. 'night, Mother had its world premiere at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in December 1982. It opened on Broadway in March 1983, directed by Tom Moore and starring Anne Pitoniak and Kathy Bates; a film, starring Anne Bancroft and Sissy Spacek, was released in 1986.
Arcadia
Tom Stoppard - 1993
Focusing on the mysteries--romantic, scientific, literary--that engage the minds and hearts of characters whose passions and lives intersect across scientific planes and centuries, it is "Stoppard's richest, most ravishing comedy to date, a play of wit, intellect, language, brio and... emotion. It's like a dream of levitation: you're instantaneously aloft, soaring, banking, doing loop-the-loops and then, when you think you're about to plummet to earth, swooping to a gentle touchdown of not easily described sweetness and sorrow... Exhilarating" (Vincent Canby, The New York Times).
Oleanna
David Mamet - 1993
Innocuous remarks suddenly turn damning. Socratic dialogue gives way to heated assault. And the relationship between a somewhat fatuous teacher and his seemingly hapless pupil turns into a fiendishly accurate X ray of the mechanisms of power, censorship and abuse.
August: Osage County
Tracy Letts - 2008
When the patriarch of the Weston clan disappears one hot summer night, the family reunites at the Oklahoma homestead, where long-held secrets are unflinchingly and uproariously revealed. The three-act, three-and-a-half-hour mammoth of a play combines epic tragedy with black comedy, dramatizing three generations of unfulfilled dreams and leaving not one of its thirteen characters unscathed.
West Side Story
Irving Shulman - 1961
Maria was young and innocent and had never known love—until Tony. And he, who had been seeking something beyond the savagery of the streets, discovered it with her. But Maria’s brother was leader of the Sharks and Tony had once led the rival Jets. Now both gangs were claiming the same turf. Tony promised Maria that he would stay out of it. Would he be able to keep his word? Or would their newfound love be destroyed by sudden death?
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.
Topdog/Underdog
Suzan-Lori Parks - 2001
The play tells the story of Lincoln and Booth, two brothers whose names were given to them as a joke, foretelling a lifetime of sibling rivalry and resentment. Haunted by the past, the brothers are forced to confront the shattering reality of their future.
Master Harold...and the boys
Athol Fugard - 1982
A white teen who has grown up in the affectionate company of the two black waiters who work in his mother's tea room in Port Elizabeth learns that his viciously racist alcoholic father is on his way home from the hospital. An ensuing rage unwittingly triggers his inevitable passage into the culture of hatred fostered by apartheid."One of those depth charge plays [that] has lasting relevance [and] can triumphantly survive any test of time...The story is simple, but the resonance that Fugard brings to it lets it reach beyond the narrative, to touch so many nerves connected to betrayal and guilt. An exhilarating play...It is a triumph of playmaking, and unforgettable."-New York Post"Fugard creates a blistering fusion of the personal and the political."-The New York Times"This revival brings out [the play's] considerable strengths."-New York Daily News
Fun Home
Lisa Kron - 2015
Moving between past and present, Alison relives her unique childhood playing at the family's Bechdel Funeral Home, her growing understanding of her own sexuality, and the looming, unanswerable questions about her father's hidden desires. Fun Home is a refreshingly honest, wholly original musical about seeing your parents through grown-up eyes.
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.
A Man for All Seasons
Robert Bolt - 1960
The classic play about Sir Thomas More, the Lord chancellor who refused to compromise and was executed by Henry VIII.