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Broadway Bookshelf

Biographies, show books, musical scores, history, and must-read theatre books.
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The World of Theatre: Tradition and Innovation (11/29/2005)

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...
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New York Then/New York Now (2/21/2005)

New York Then/New York Now—a collection of essays, memoirs, interviews, commentary, and plays—contemplates New York City’s history and future as a center for groundbreaking theatrical forms and ideas. Featuring the work of theater artists, producers, and critics, this special issue of Theater is concerned with the ideas and practicalities of making theater in and for New York within specific historical, political, and economic contexts. The first section, “New York Then,” reflects on ...
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The Complete Annotated Gilbert & Sullivan (1/1/2005)

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 ...
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The Wadsworth Anthology of Drama (6/25/2003)

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.
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Theatre World 1994-1995, Vol. 51 (1/1/2000)

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 1994-1995, Vol. 51 Cover
Theatre World 1993-1994, Vol. 50 (1/1/2000)

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 1993-1994, Vol. 50 Cover
The Social Significance of Modern Drama (1/1/2000)

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 ...
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Polaroid Stories (1/1/1999)

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 g...
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Miss Julie and The Stronger: Two Plays (2002)

Frank McGuinness presents scintillating new versions of two of August Strindberg's plays -- one a major work, the other less well known. Miss Julie is Strindberg's examination of power, sex, and class, set on a midsummer's eve in a nobleman's house and focusing on the shifting relationship between Miss Julie, the daughter of the house, and Jean, her father's manservant. The Stronger is a short play that explores the complex range of emotions felt by Madame X when she encounters Mademoiselle Y, ...
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A Dream Play (2005)

Following the logic of a dream—in which characters merge, locations change in an instant, and a locked door recurs obsessively—Strindberg’s 1902 A Dream Play is a potent mix of Freud plus Alice in Wonderland. Caryl Churchill, perhaps the most fascinating and respected female dramatist in the English-speaking world, has taken on Strindberg’s Dream in this spare and resonant adaptation.
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Married (2002)

He had just completed his thirteenth year when his mother died. He felt that he had lost a real friend for during the twelve months of her illness he had come to know her personally as it were and established a relationship between them which is rare between parents and children. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
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Captain's Tiger (1999)

The newest work by the acclaimed South African playwright. The New Yorker has said of Athol Fugard, "A rare playwright, who could be a primary candidate for either the Nobel Prize in Literature or the Nobel Peace Prize." His major works for the stage include: Blood Knot; "Master Harold"...and the boys; My Children! My Africa!; A Lesson from Aloes; The Road to Mecca; Valley Song; and The Captain's Tiger.
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Exits And Entrances (2005)

"A thought-provoking, elegant, and engrossing new play by Athol Fugard."-The Hollywood Reporter "A rare playwright, who could be a primary candidate for either the Nobel Prize in Literature or the Nobel Peace Prize."-The New Yorker "Athol Fugard can say more with a single line than most playwrights convey in an entire script. One phrase from his new play, 'He's dying of unimportance,' relates to an offstage character, but it also strikingly sums up the slow, painful decline of its fading ...
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A Lesson from Aloes (1993)

The New Yorker has said of Athol Fugard, "A rare playwright, who could be a primary candidate for either the Nobel Prize in Literature or the Nobel Peace Prize." His major works for the stage include: Blood Knot; "Master Harold"...and the boys; My Children! My Africa!; A Lesson from Aloes; The Road to Mecca; Valley Song; and The Captain's Tiger.
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After the Fall: A Play in Two Acts (1980)

A lost character draws upon events in his past as he searches for life's meaning in Miller's powerful play.
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On Politics and the Art of Acting (2001)

Ronald Reagan might have been the first professional actor elected president, but as Arthur Miller reminds us in his delightfully acerbic, On Politics and the Art of Acting, Reagan was by no means the only actor to occupy the White House in modern times. Beginning with our latest farcical election, Miller considers the twin arts of acting and politics in our brave new Age of Entertainment and contrasts the relatively poor thespian skills of presidential candidates Bush and Gore with the con...
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Conversations with Miller (2002)

CONVERSATIONS WITH MILLER offers a personal and revealing account of one of the major playwrights of our time. Arthur Miller is revealed in deep and candid conversation with the highly regarded dramatic critic, Mel Gussow. In this series of interviews, which took place over 40 years, Miller is astonishingly forthcoming about his creative sources, his accomplishments and his disappointment; about his staunch resistance to the McCarthy witch hunts of the 1950's; about his private life including h...
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Salesman in Beijing (1984)

" In 1983 Arthur Miller was invited to direct a Chinese version of his play, "Death of a Salesman." "Salesman in Beijing" is his day by day account of his experience. Most of the book focuses on the problems of communication with the Chinese actors as a result of linguistic and cultural differences. He feels that he was able to overcome these difficulties because of the dedication of the actors and the fact that the play itself deals with universal qualities that transcend local culture. He ...
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The Theater Essays Of Arthur Miller (1996)

Arthur Miller is one of the most important and enduring playwrights of the last fifty years. This new edition of The Theater Essays has been expanded by nearly fifty percent to include his most significant articles and interviews since the book's initial publication in 1978. Within these pages Miller discusses the roots of modern drama, the nature of tragedy, and the state of contemporary theater; offers illuminating observations on Ibsen, Strindberg, Chekhov, O'Neill, and Williams; probes the ...
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The Eleven Comedies (2006)

The Clouds, Lysistrata, Peace, The Acharnians, The Knights
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The Knights (2006)

In many respects 'The Knights' may be reckoned the great Comedian's masterpiece, the direct personal attack on the then all-powerful Cleon, with its scathing satire and tremendous invective, being one of the most vigorous and startling things in literature. Already in 'The Acharnians' he had threatened to "cut up Cleon the Tanner into shoe-leather for the Knights," and he now proceeds to carry his menace into execution, "concentrating the whole force of his wit in the most unscrupulous and merc...
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Plutus (2006)

The story of 'Plutus' concerns Chremylus, a poor but just man, who accompanied by his body-servant Cario, consults the Delphic Oracle concerning his son, whether he ought not to be instructed in injustice and knavery and the other arts whereby worldly men acquire riches. By way of answer the god only tells him that he is to follow whomsoever he first meets upon leaving the temple, who proves to be a blind and ragged old man.
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Artaud on Theatre (2001)

All of Artaud's theatrical ideas collected in one volume Artaud's cherished dream was to found a new kind of theatre in France that would not be an artistic spectacle, but a communion between spectators and actors. This volume contains all of Artaud's key writings on theatre and cinema from 1921 to his death in 1948, together with a definitive commentary on the key texts of this 20th-century theatre visionary. Although his potent theories were never successfully realised during his own tortured...
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Tatyana Repina (1999)

The sensational onstage suicide of Russian actress and opera singer Kadmina in 1881 led Alexei Suvorin to memorialize her in his 1888 four-act play Tatyana Repina. One year later, his friend Anton Chekhov, himself fascinated by Kadmina, sent Suvorin a one-act play, which was in fact a fifth act continuation of Tatyana Repina, with instructions to show it to no one. When the play was finally made public years later by Chekhov's brother Mikhail, it presented a mystery: Was it, as the brother clai...
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7 Short Farces by Anton Chekhov (1998)

Includes: The Bear, a Reluctant Tragic Hero, Swan Song, the Proposal, the Dangers of Tobacco, the Festivities, the Wedding Reception
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Plays by Anton Chekhov, Second Series (2006)

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was a Russian short-story writer, playwright and physician, considered to be one of the greatest short-story writers in the history of world literature. His career as a dramatist produced four classics and his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics. Chekhov practiced as a doctor throughout most of his literary career: "Medicine is my lawful wife", he once said, "and literature is my mistress." Chekhov renounced the theatre after the disastrou...
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Belle Moral: A Natural History (2006)

Premiered at the Shaw Festival one of the largest classical repertory theatres
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Twelve Plays (2001)

This work contains all Alfred de Musset's best known plays, providing a standard reference work for students, an acting text for performers and a lively introduction to this French playwright.
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Henceforward (1988)

Starring Anne Heche and Jared Harris, the hilarious Henceforward... is one of Alan Ayckbourn s most unusual works. In the not-so-distant future a composer is building a female robot to act as his fiancée, so that he can convince his ex-wife that their daughter should come live with him. Thus, he hopes to overcome his writers block and redress the pain of his past. A full-cast performance featuring: Jack Davenport, Jared Harris, Anne Heche, Paula Jane Newman, Moira Quirk and Darren Richardson...
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Agamemnon (1995)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: And wept; while visioned in the light Of her own loveliness, more bright Than pictured breathing form that is but mute, She looked as though she wished, with that pure voice, That oft her father's halls along, Had made full many a chieftain there rejoice, To speak to that assembled throng. STROPHE IV. Yes! at those...
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Adrienne Kennedy Reader (2001)

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 ...
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Red Light Winter: A Play (2005)

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...
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The Ultimate Scene and Monologue Sourcebook: An Actor's Guide to over 1000 Monologues and Dialogues from More Than 300 Contemporary Plays (1994)

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 sc...
The Ultimate Scene and Monologue Sourcebook: An Actor's Guide to over 1000 Monologues Cover
Brando: The Biography (1994)

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...
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Being and Doing: A Workbook for Actors (1990)

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...
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Period Make-up for the Stage: Step-by-step (1997)

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."
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El Burlador De Sevilla (1990)

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.
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Show Tunes: The Songs, Shows, and Careers of Broadway's Major Composers (1999)

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...
Show Tunes: The Songs, Shows, and Careers of Broadway's Major Composers Cover
Advice to the Players (1993)

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...
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The Women of Lockerbie (2005)

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, althoug...
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Twentieth Century Theatre: A Sourcebook (1995)

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.
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Cats: The Book of the Musical (1983)

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.
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Boston Marriage (2003)

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 ...
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The Complete Professional Audition: A Commonsense Guide To Auditioning For Musicals and Plays (2005)

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...
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The New York Times Essential Library: Opera: A Critic's Guide to the 100 Most Important Works and the Best Recordings (2004)

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...
The New York Times Essential Library: Opera: A Critic's Guide to the 100 Most Importa Cover
Costume and Makeup (1994)

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.
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Dictionary of Theatre Anthropology: The Secret Art of the Performer (2005)

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...
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Creating Your Own Monologue (2005)

• 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 oth...
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From Option to Opening : a guide to Producing Plays Off Broadway - Revised and Updated (2005)

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...
From Option to Opening : a guide to Producing Plays Off Broadway - Revised and Update Cover
Bat Boy: The Musical (2002)

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...
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