The World of Theatre is the first introduction to theatre book to truly focus on diversity and globalism, integrating coverage of multicultural, international and experimental theatre throughout. Theatre is presented as a global and multicultural form that reflects both traditional and evolving world views. While the American commercial theatre and European forms are central to the text, alternative theatres are placed side by side for comparison and contrast in each chapter, thus avoiding the s...
Lovers of Gilbert and Sullivan will be in heaven with the publication of these two books, which nicely complement each other. Stedman (English, Roosevelt Univ., Chicago) offers an outstanding study of this playwright and his often overlooked works, with much of its value deriving from its study of Gilbert without Sullivan. The author is a recognized expert on Gilbert as well as the Victorian time period, and she shows him to be a complex and interesting man who often found himself at odds with ...
Known through three editions as the boldest and most distinguished introduction to drama, William Worthen's pace-setting text continues to provide exciting plays usefully situated within their historical and cultural contexts.
Theatre World, the statistical and pictorial record of the Broadway and off-Broadway season, touring companies, and professional regional companies throughout the United States, has become a classic in its field. The book is complete with cast listings, replacement producers, directors, authors, composers, opening and closing dates, song titles, and much, much more. There are special sections with biographical data, obituary information, listings of annual Shakespeare festivals and major drama a...
Theatre World, the statistical and pictorial record of the Broadway and off-Broadway season, touring companies, and professional regional companies throughout the United States, has become a classic in its field. The book is complete with cast listings, replacement producers, directors, authors, composers, opening and closing dates, song titles, and much, much more. There are special sections with biographical data, obituary information, listings of annual Shakespeare festivals and major drama a...
Out of print virtually since its completion in 1914, Emma Goldman's pioneer work Social Significance in Modern Drama bridges modern drama and political philosophy, pointing out the road that remains to be travelled toward a theatre of social empowerment. Activist, feminist, philosopher and anarchist, Emma Goldman was a passionate thinker about all things modern when the 20th century was still raw and new. The emergence of her treatise on the theatre after years of obscurity is certain to arouse ...
Naomi Iizuka’s 1997 play, Polaroid Stories, consciously uses stories, characters and themes from Ovid’s Metamorphoses to tell the stories of street kids living on the edge in a desolate, urban landscape. Because these characters are named after Orpheus and Eurydice, and Echo and Narcissus, or based on stories of Dionysus, and Ariadne and Theseus, and because scenes are entitled “The Story of Semele” or “Theseus in the Labyrinth,” Iizuka creates a world that has two dimensions: the gritty realm ...
Adrienne Kennedy has been a force in American theatre since the early 1960s, influencing generations of playwrights with her hauntingly fragmentary lyrical dramas. Exploring the violence racism visits upon people's lives, Kennedy's plays express poetic alienation, transcending the particulars of character and plot through ritualistic repetition and radical structural experimentation. Frequently produced, read, and taught, they continue to hold a significant place among the most exciting dramas ...
It's totally familiar but dreamlike at the same time," observes one American of Amsterdam's notorious Red Light District in the stunning new work from Adam Rapp. Escaping their lives in Manhattan, former college buddies Matt and Davis take off to the Netherlands and find themselves thrown into a bizarre love triangle with a beautiful young prostitute named Christina. But the romance they find in Europe is eventually overshadowed by the truth they discover at home. Written with an unflinching po...
Preparing for an audition and unsure of what you want to do? The Ultimate Scene and Monologue Sourcebook is the book you've been waiting for.
Unlike “scene books” that reprint 50 to 75 monologues excerpted from plays but don't include any background information, this annotated guide tells you what you really need to know about audition material from more than 300 contemporary plays.
Here is how the book works. Suppose that you're looking for a dramatic male/female scene. When you scan “...
A scandal-loving biographer's dream, Marlon Brando has led a tumultuous life, complete with unhappy childhood, an active and varied sex life, troubled children of his own (son Christian is now in prison for killing daughter Cheyenne's lover), and a long history of eccentric behavior on and off the set. Surprisingly, Brando hasn't caught Kitty Kelley's eye, but journalist Manso (Mailer: His Life and Times, LJ 4/15/85) corrects that oversight with this massive tome. Based on seven years' research...
A fun and exciting workbook for actors to use in establishing a daily work schedule. Designed to help the actor integrate the two parts of the process, THE INSTRUMENT AND THE CRAFT. Which gives spontaneity, dimension, and authenticity to his performance. The numerous daily exercises deal with every aspect of acting including the actor's relationship to the business. Blank pages provide the actor with space to document his or her own involvement and progress. Being a workbook, every page is fill...
Period productions on stage, television and film are increasingly popular. Part of the success of these productions is authentic make-up. In this text, basic stage make-up for men and women is described and illustrated clearly for white, Hispanic, Chinese, black and Asian skins. Step-by-step instructions are given on how to create each look, from Ancient Egyptian, to the Punk-look of the 1970s."
El burlador de Sevilla is a play by Tirso de Molina, first published in Spain around 1630, though it may have been performed as early as 1616. Set in the 14th century, the play is the earliest fully-developed dramatisation of the Don Juan legend.
This majestic reference fully chronicles the shows, songs, and careers of all the major composers of the American musical theater, from Jerome Kern's earliest interpolations to the latest hits on Broadway. Gershwin, Rodgers, Porter, Berlin, Bernstein, Loesser, Sondheim, Kander, Finn, Flaherty, and more--this book covers their works, their innovations, their successes, and their failures. Show Tunes is simply the most comprehensive volume of its kind ever produced, and this newly revised and upda...
Robert Lewis was an American actor, director, teacher, author and founder of the influential Actors Studio in New York in 1947.
In addition to his accomplishments on Broadway and in Hollywood, Lewis' greatest and longest lasting contribution to American theater may be the role he played as one of the foremost acting and directing teachers of his day. He was an early proponent of the Stanislavski System of acting technique and a founding member of New York's revolutionary Group Theatre in the 1...
A mother from New Jersey roams the hills of Lockerbie Scotland, looking for her son’s remains which were lost in the crash of Pan Am 103. She meets the Women of Lockerbie, who are fighting the US 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 ...
A diverse selection of original texts on theatre by its most creative practitioners - actors, writers, directors and designers. Contributors include Jarry, Ionescu, Shaw, Brecht, Strindberg, Stanislawski, Lorca, Brook, Soyinka, Boal, Barba.
A richly illustrated book that re-creates the making of one of Broadway’s biggest hits, based on Eliot’s Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats. Color photographs and drawings by John Napier.
One of America's most provocative dramatists conquers new territory with this droll comedy of errors set in a Victorian drawing room.
Anna and Claire are two bantering, scheming "women of fashion" who live together on the fringes of society. Anna has just become the mistress of a wealthy man, from whom she has received an enormous emerald. Claire, meanwhile, is infatuated with a young girl and wants to enlist the jealous Anna's help for an assignation. As the two women exchange barbs and ...
In the United States, there are 300,000 actors; 100,000 hold union cards. 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, unde...
Opera lovers are notoriously argumentative, so anyone drawing up a list of the "most important" works in the medium should expect to generate plenty of debate. Tommasini, chief music critic for the New York Times, recognizes that some of the selections in this opinionated, and admittedly quirky, guidebook will prompt second-guessing, but he makes the case for each of them with passion and conviction. The result is a collection of original essays that should prove both illuminating to opera novi...
One part of a five-part series designed to help the amateur and student to develop their theatre skills. The author looks at drama as it is now and offers imaginative approaches to classical and less conventional theatre - mime, spectacle, musicals, outdoor shows and productions in unusual settings.. He stresses the importance of teamwork and planning and shows how with a creative use of resources outstanding results can be achieved.
This the second English language edition of the classic text, A Dictionary of Theatre Anthropology subtly juxtaposes the visual demonstrations of the performers craft, from a wealth of Oriental and Occidental sources. Whereas most Western research is concerned with naturalism and psychological realism in acting, the Dictionary focuses on the performer's arduous and eclectic craft.
More than just a dictionary, however, this is a handbook for theatre practitioners and a guide for students and sc...
• Clear how-tos for writing unique material, form monologues to onel-person shows
• Empowering, enlightening, easy to use
In the second edition of this popular guide, actors learn to use their skills to write monologues, performance art pieces, and one-person plays. Updated to include exclusive interviews and tips on marketing, this guide helps actors create their own exciting performance opportunities and follow in the footsteps of Elaine Stritch, Billy Crystal, John Leguizamo, and other s...
For the potential, as well as the professional, producer and for writers, actors, directors, and investors, this book is for anyone wanting or needing to understand the process of producing Off Broadway plays from start to finish. Written in crisp, clear, nonlegal language that the layman can easily understand, every page reflects the experience and expertise of Farber, a well-known and highly respected theatrical attorney. The book contains detailed information on how to: option a property, rai...
Based on a story in The Weekly World News, BAT BOY: THE MUSICAL is a musical comedy/horror show about a half boy/half bat creature who is discovered in a cave near Hope Falls, West Virginia. For lack of a better solution, the local sheriff brings Bat Boy to the home of the town veterinarian, Dr. Parker, where he is eventually accepted as a member of the family and taught to act like a "normal" boy by the veterinarian's wife, Meredith, and teenage daughter, Shelley. Bat Boy is happy with his new...
Gr. 5-8. This large-format "book" folds out into three sections. The first displays a pop-up model of the Globe Theatre. On the next is an excellent booklet about the famous playhouse, written in the person of Richard Burbage. Glued into the third are pockets holding tiny, stick-puppet players on stiff, glossy paper and two actors' copies of a playbook reprinting and introducing a number of short scenes from Shakespeare's plays. Beautifully painted, the detailed and fairly sturdy pop-up model i...
Based on 14 years of research and experiment with plastics and various non-traditional materials, this book supplies information to designers and interpreters on specialized techniques for use in costumes for theatre, film and TV. Also included are charts detailing the effects of dry cleaning and laundering on adhesives, coatings, colourings and metallisers, allowing the designer to make appropriate choices for specific needs and longevity. This reference delivers many exciting new choices to d...
From The Ideas Library this book contains how-to ideas for youth promotion, publicity, advertising, fundraising, announcements, administration, bulletin boards, flyers, and all kinds of tricks of the trade.
Callow was told by master performer Michael MacLiammoir that he was "a born writer, perhaps, but not a born actor." He went on to become not only a most versatile actor, but with this book becomes an accomplished commentator on the theater. What makes Callow's memoir of the familiar uncertainties of an actor's life pleasurable is this actor's eccentricity. He revels in spinning tales of failed shows, arrogant directors, Oscar Wilde reincarnations such as MacLiammoir, who became Callow's first m...
A selection from over fifty sources including published and unpublished plays, blockbuster movie hits, independent films, foreign films, teleplays, poetry, and diaries.
At age two in 1922, Joe Yule Jr. joined his parents on the vaudeville circuit in an act that was disbanded when Joe Sr. decamped. On their own, mother and son went looking for work in Hollywood, where little Joe metamorphosed into Mickey Rooney. His racy, comic, poignant autobiography recalls the highs and lows during the years he made more than 200 films, including the hugely popular Andy Hardy series and musicals with Judy Garland. Rooney is candid on the subjects of his eight marriages (the f...
Daughter of Lena Horne, Buckley here tells a vital story, made even more appealing by her gracefully understated writing and objective viewpoint. Spanning the history of six generations of an American family, the book is based on voluminous papers kept by the Hornes since the mid-19th century. The author sheds light on an area of black society unrecognized for the most part. After the Civil War, the "old Hornes" settled in Brooklyn as part of a minority elite, an upper-middle class with enclave...
Designed to provide a head-start on the task of organizing and recording production information, "State Management Forms & Formats" contains 112 full-size, blank forms which can be used in the book or removed and added to a separate production log. Cast and scene breakdowns, expense sheets, rehearsal and performance reports, sign-in sheets, and property plots are just a few of the forms included. (Performing Arts)
Gordon explicates the works of Sondheim to repudiate the common perception of musical theater as mere escapist entertainment, showing how Sondheim tackles real, complex subjects, without fear of introducing pain, trauma, and difficult ideas onto the Broadway stage.
42 training exercises and projects for stage directing are included in this guide, which provides seven chapters filled with exercises for student stage directors. The basic directing concepts are included in a text which encourages hands-on experience.
Includes eight full-length, award-winning plays:
* Streamers by David Rabe
* Marco Polo Sings a Solo by John Guare
* Wings by Arthur Kopit
* Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You by Christopher Durang
* Crimes of the Heart by Beth Henley
* The Dining Room by A.R. Gurney
* Painting Churches by Tina Howe * Ma Rainey's Black Bottom by August Wilson
Edited and with an introduction by Brooks McNamara.
Can a theatre class textbook be both inspirational and informative? Yes! This holistic book on directing and acting does it all. Students will keep it as a lifelong career reference on how to make things work. Written subjectively, it's based on nearly a half-century of teaching and directing. A text that compels involvement in all layers of creating memorable theatre. Thirty-five chapters in seven sections with assignments and convenient section summaries make a complete semester course. This ...
Upon hitting Broadway in 1955 Bus Stop was an immediate commercial & critical success. During a winter storm a busload of weary travelers are forced to shack up at a roadside diner until morning. Inge was renowned for his in-depth character studies, Bus Stop is no exception and offers a warm play about the intersecting lives of eight ordinary people.
A L.A. Theatre Works full-cast performance featuring: Megan Anderson, Terrence Currier, Rachel Miner, Anson Mount, Kyle Prue, Lynnie Raybuck, Jef...
Once upon a time Broadway was just another street. In Gangsters & Gold Diggers, Jerome Charyn transports readers back to a swaggering, golden era in American life—the Roaring Twenties—when Broadway suddenly exploded into Broadway.
Damon Runyon was the first chronicler of the Big Street. He created the myth of Broadway, invented the "slanguage." The Ziegfeld Follies became its most important institution—everybody, including Zelda Fitzgerald, wanted to be a Follies Girl. Then came Lindy’s, a del...
Directing plays in schools requires knowledge and talents far different than directing for community or professional theatre. In ten comprehensive chapters the author explains the "real world" of producing effective theatricals in the school environment. He details the pitfalls and the problems while providing ideas for consistently successful shows. He covers budgeting, scheduling, faculty politics, motivating and disciplining students and many other school-life realities beyond a director or t...
16 beautiful solo arrangements of Broadway standards from 14 great shows. Includes: All I Ask of You * And All That Jazz * Beauty and the Beast * Bring Him Home * Cabaret * Edelweiss * If I Loved You * It Might as Well Be Spring * Seasons of Love * September Song * Some Enchanted Evening * Where Is Love? * With One Look * and more.
Eastern Standard is a play by Richard Greenberg. Set in 1987, it focuses on yuppies, AIDS, the stock market and insider trading scandals, homelessness, and urban malaise.
Boal is a Brazilian activist who has devoted his career to effecting social change through theater. This book is an account of his most recent efforts, especially during his term as a legislator. Growing out of his Theatre of the Oppressed, an international theater movement giving artistic and social voice to the otherwise voiceless, Legislative Theatre is an interactive dramaturgy. Working locally, Boal gets citizens to articulate their concerns by developing plays that are then presented loca...
When first published in 1947, A Short History of Opera immediately achieved international status as a classic in the field. Now, more than five decades later, this thoroughly revised and expanded fourth edition informs and entertains opera lovers just as its predecessors have.
The fourth edition incorporates new scholarship that traces the most important developments in the evolution of musical drama. After surveying anticipations of the operatic form in the lyric theater of the Greeks, medi...
Performance: A Critical Introduction was the first textbook to provide an overview of the modern concept of performance and its development in various related fields. This comprehensively revised, illustrated edition discusses recent performance work and takes into consideration changes that have taken place in the study of performance since the book's original publication in 1996. Marvin Carlson guides the reader through the contested definition of performance as a theatrical activity and the ...
This is an insight into 1930s Hollywood and an epic of laughter. David O. Selznick is determined to rewrite Gone with the Wind. He engages the services of “script doctor” Ben Hecht, who has never read the book, and director Victor Fleming, poached straight from the set of The Wizard of Oz.
Karen Kondazian has compiled inside information from talking to the premier casting directors in film, television, and commercials from New York to Los Angeles.
