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For Actors Books

Light That Shines in the Darkness

(2004)

The Light That Shines in the Darkness – the last of Tolstoy’s plays, was left unfinished. In Russia it is prohibited on account of its allusions to the refusal of military service. Yet it is in some ways the most interesting of Tolstoy’s posthumous works. It is obviously not strictly autobiographical, for Tolstoy was not assassinated as the hero of the piece is, nor was his daughter engaged to be married to a young prince who refused military service. But like some of his other writings...

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

(1988)

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead is an absurdist, existentialist tragicomedy by Tom Stoppard, first staged at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1966. The play expands upon the exploits of two minor characters from Shakespeare's Hamlet, the courtiers Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. The action of Stoppard's play takes place mainly "in the wings" of Shakespeare's, with brief appearances of major characters from Hamlet who enact fragments of the original's scenes. Between these episodes the two ...

The Sophist

(2010)

The Sophist is one of the late Dialogues of Plato. This dialogue takes place a day after Plato's Theaetetus, and aims at defining the Sophist. The participants are Socrates, who plays a minor role, the highly promising young student Theaetetus, and a Visitor from Elea, who plays the major role in the conversation.

The Importance of Being Earnest

(2005)

Oscar Wilde's madcap farce about mistaken identities, secret engagements, and lovers' entanglements still delights readers more than a century after its 1895 publication and premiere performance. The rapid-fire wit and eccentric characters of The Importance of Being Earnest have made it a mainstay of the high school curriculum for decades. Cecily Cardew and Gwendolen Fairfax are both in love with the same mythical suitor. Jack Worthing has wooed Gewndolen as Ernest while Algernon has also pos...

The Power of Darkness

(2005)

Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (1828-1910) commonly referred to in English as Leo Tolstoy, was a Russian writer - novelist, essayist, dramatist and philosopher - as well as pacifist Christian anarchist and educational reformer. He was the most influential member of the aristocratic Tolstoy family. His first publications were three autobiographical novels, Childhood, Boyhood, and Youth (1852-1856). They tell of a rich landowner's son and his slow realization of the differences between him and his...

For colored girls who have considered suicide/When the rainbow is enuf

(2010)

From its inception in California in 1974 to its highly acclaimed critical success at Joseph Papp’s Public Theater and on Broadway, the Obie Award–winning for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf has excited, inspired, and transformed audiences all over the country. Passionate and fearless, Shange’s words reveal what it meant to be of color and female in the twentieth century. First published in 1975, when it was praised by The New Yorker for “encom passing ....

For colored girls who have considered suicide/When the rainbow is enuf

Free Shakespeare

(2000)

This expanded edition of Free Shakespeare is a tool to liberate the works of Shakespeare from directors and academics who seek to impose their ideas upon the plays. John Russell Brown empowers actors and readers to approach the plays freshly and boldly armed with the many different interpretations inherent in the plays. Recognized as a benchmark for the understanding of Shakespearean performance in the twentieth century, a new chapter explores the technological and funding challenges facing Shak...

My Breath in Art: Acting from Within

(2000)

Filled with invaluable advice for all actors and vocalists, this guidebook by Beatrice Manley addresses such topics as: how to clear the body of emotional debris * how to get feedback from your body * what to do with your hands * how to release habitual tension * the inner structure of feeling * avoiding overpreparation * and many more.

Bunny Bunny - A Sort of Love Story

(2000)

Subtitled "Gilda Radner: A Sort of Love Story," this autobiographical play tries to recapture the non-sexual, but deeply felt relationship between Radner, one of Saturday Night Live's original Not Ready-for-Prime-Time players, and Alan Zweibel, who was a writer for the show. Alternately comic and heartbreaking, the play follows these two overgrown kids as they ride their bumper-car lives right up to Radner's death from ovarian cancer. Their loyalty and love glows through every scene. The book is...

Dear: A New Play

(2000)

The script to "one of the most tender yet devastating plays of the Drexlerian oeuvre is the musical romance Dear. It takes place in the Eisenhower Fifties, the early years of television. There is an elegiac quality for the tragicomedy punctuated by the sentimental music of the era...The play is about Jessie Clup, a Queens housewife whose philandering husband has deserted her. Her only culpa is her fixation on Perry Como, the ex-barber, crooner kin, reigning TV star." - Rosette Lamont, StageView.

A Chekhov Concert Duets & Arias Conceived & Composed by Sharon Gans & Jordan Charney

(2000)

"A tapestry of plays, stories, and letters artistically woven together to form a beautiful new work worthy of Chekhov's own heart and hand. The American artists Sharon Gans and Jordan Charney have reconceived Chekhov in their duets and arias with sensitivity and passion of the finest dramatic caliber. The true wonder and character of Chekhov shines through...enlightening!" - Moscow Contemporary Theater

A Chekhov Concert Duets & Arias Conceived & Composed by Sharon Gans & Jordan Charney

The Best American Short Plays 1995-1996

(1999)

The latest edition of this useful series offers 12 one-acts reflecting the wide range of contemporary American theater. For those who prefer their theater comic, there is David Ives' humorous meditation on identity, Degas, C'est Moi, and Susan Cinoman's slice-of-life look at shopping rituals, Fitting Rooms. Those who think drama should be made of sterner stuff should sample Cassandra Medley's moving Dearborn Heights, about discrimination in the North, and Jonathan Levy's Old Blues, a touching p...

Spring's Awakening

(2000)

Spring's Awakening is a tragi-comedy of teenage sex. 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.

The Scarlet Letter

(2011)

The Scarlet Letter is an 1850 romantic work of fiction in a historical setting, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It is considered to be his magnum opus.[1] Set in 17th-century Puritan Boston during the years 1642 to 1649, it tells the story of Hester Prynne, who conceives a daughter through an adulterous affair and struggles to create a new life of repentance and dignity. Throughout the book, Hawthorne explores themes of legalism, sin, and guilt.

Script into Performance: A Structuralist Approach

(2000)

An analysis of script interpretation for the theater. The text includes theories on performance as well as examples from the works of Shelley, Ibsen and Pinter.In his new preface, Hornby laments the modernization of classic plays which he believes subverts the original text. - From Library Journal

Script into Performance: A Structuralist Approach

The Best American Short Plays 1994-1995

(2000)

Christopher Durang ¥ Craig Fols ¥ J.E. Franklin ¥ David Mamet ¥ Steve Martin ¥ Elaine May ¥ Max Mitchell ¥ Rich Orloff ¥ Jacquelyn Reingold ¥ Ronald Ribman ¥ Murray Schisgal ¥ Jules Tasca ¥ Thornton Wilder ¥ Doug Wright.

Cyrano de Bergerac

(2003)

Rostand's masterpiece-and the ultimate triumph of the great French romantic tradition-is the magnificent hero-for-all-seasons, Cyrano de Bergerac.

The Day the Bronx Died

(2000)

This engrossing drama by Michael Henry Brown had its world premiere in 1992. This book features the complete script of the story of two childhood friends, one black, the other white, and their struggle to live in a racist world.

Ghost in the Machine

(2000)

The playscript to Ghost in the Machine by David Gilman begins with a common situation - that of a missing fifty dollar bill - and spins it into intriguing questions of probability, chance and the complexities of musical composition: illusion and reality.

The National Black Drama Anthology: Eleven Plays from America's Leading African-American Theaters

(2000)

"Though New York remains the de facto capital of American theater, much of the most daring and interesting work today is done by regional theaters. This is doubly true of plays by African American authors, who, despite a few notable exceptions (August Wilson, George C. Wolfe), suffer under a commercial apartheid that keeps black plays off Broadway. Of necessity, African American theater artists have to create their own venues from the ground up. This wide-ranging anthology edited by the founder ...

The National Black Drama Anthology: Eleven Plays from America's Leading African-Ameri

A Theater Workbook

(2000)

"This wonderful, wonderful book, beautifully edited and staged (and I do mean that word) is four achievements in one: a record of a life's work presented brilliantly; a theatre workbook of practical value to every theatre design course in the country; an example to be followed of personal integrity, professionalism, and respect for the text; a model in publishing of how to link the written word and visual image creatively on the page." - The Royal Arts Society Journal. Includes 525 photographs, ...

The Actor's Eye: Seeing and Being Seen

(2000)

With this landmark compilation of classes and exercises, anyone can afford to be coached by the man whose students are propelled from his legendary classes at Northwestern University to Broadway and Hollywood. "Acting is as simple as brick-laying and as great as Leonardo da Vinci's art," writes Downs. The Downs approach coaches the actor to make the essential connections between his character and the forces that govern him so that "craft is inevitable and art is made possible."

I Am a Man: A New Play

(2000)

"...a play about power, leadership, and the rough-and tumble process of social change. In its multifaceted search for the meaning behind the headline-grabbing events in Memphis, and in its depiction of the roots of black-vs.-black power struggles, it offers both food for thought and an emotional punch." - Hedy Weiss Chicago Sun Times

The Collected Works of Paddy Chayefsky: The Stage Plays

(2000)

A collection of five stage plays from this brilliant writer: Middle of the Night, The Tenth Man, Gideon, The Passion of Josef D., and The Latent Heterosexual. Includes an introduction by Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.

The Collected Works of Paddy Chayefsky: The Stage Plays

The Best Burlesque Sketches

(2000)

Here is the first-ever collection of classic comic sketches from the bawdy, rowdy world of our slum music halls! Habitues of Burlesque (and sons of habitues) will revel in the boisterous stock scenes and blackouts of this uniquely American form of popular entertainment. Features a foreword by Dick Martin.

The Best Short Plays of 1988-1989

(2000)

Lose yourself in a universe of forces familiar and frightening in the 21 plays presented in this exclusive volume. The playwrights included here succeed in pushing back the boundaries of conventional dramatic expression. Among them, Lanford Wilson dissects a survivor's anguish after his lover's death in A Poster of the Cosmos and Deborah Pryor spins an eerie tale of spellbinding romance in The Love Talker. Richard Greenberg plots a battle of wills between a young writer and his elusive muse, whi...

Julius Caesar

(2000)

These popular editions allow the reader and student to look beyond the scholarly reading text to the more sensuous, more collaborative, more malleable performance text which emerges in conjunction with the commentary and notes. Each note, each gloss, each commentary reflects the stage life of the play with constant reference to the challenge of the text in performance. Readers will not only discover an enlivened Shakespeare, they will be empowered to rehearse and direct their own productions of ...

The Tempest

(2000)

The Applause edition of Shakespeare's The Tempest allows the reader and student to look beyond the scholarly reading text to the more sensuous, more collaborative, more malleable performance text which emerges in conjunction with the commentary and notes. Readers and students are faced with real theatrical choices in each speech as the editors point out the challenges and opportunities to the actor and director at each juncture. Readers will not only discover an enlivened Shakespeare, they will ...

A Midsummer Night's Dream

(2009)

A Midsummer Night's Dream is a comedy play that was written by William Shakespeare. It is believed to have been written between 1590 to 1596. It portrays the events surrounding the marriage of the Duke of Athens, Theseus, and the Queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta. These include the adventures of four young Athenian lovers and a group of amateur actors, who are manipulated by the fairies who inhabit the forest in which most of the play is set. The play is one of Shakespeare's most popular works fo...

King Lear

(2000)

Mastergate and Power Failure: 2 Political Satires for the Stage

(2000)

The complete scripts to two of Larry Gelbart's most popular and powerful political satires. Review of Mastergate: "If George Orwell were a gag writer, he could have written Mastergate. Larry Gelbart's scathingly funny takeoff on the Iran-Contra hearings is a spiky cactus flower in the desert of American political theatre." - Jack Kroll, Newsweek. Review of Power Failure: "There is in his broad etching all the ethical outrage of an Arthur Miller kvetching. And, oh, so much more fun!" - Carolyn Cl...

Mastergate and Power Failure: 2 Political Satires for the Stage

The First Lulu

(2000)

"The complete script to Frank Wedekind's symphony - or rather a cacophony - of deotic sexual rhetorics. Eric Bentley's achievement here as translator is a beautifully playable and juicy English; his larger gift is the opening to us of what must be ranked as among the supreme masterpieces of nineteenth-century theater." - Donald Lyons, The New Criterion

A Flea in Her Rear (or Ants in Her Pants) and Other Vintage French Farces

(2000)

Ten French farces as translated by Norman R. Shapiro, including the title play by Feydeau and: The Poor Beggar and the Fairy Godmother (Allais) * Boubouroche, or She Dupes to Conquer (Courteline) * It's All Relative (Labiche) * Mardis Gras (Meilhac and Halevy) * and more.

A Flea in Her Rear (or Ants in Her Pants) and Other Vintage French Farces

Telling Moments: Fifteen Gay Monologues

(2000)

Seventeen men are caught in the limelight of defining moments that range from poignant to crazily funny. Among this vivid cast are a priest sliding towards heresy, a self-styled aristocrat, a hustler looking for security, an enraged abandoned lover, and an overwrought porno director.

Chekhov: The Major Plays

(2006)

"What makes his work great is that it can be felt and understood...by anybody," said Leo Tolstoy of Chekhov's plays, which express life through subtle construction, everyday dialogue, and an electrically charged atmosphere.

Complete Works of William Shakespeare

(1997)

This complete and unabridged edition contains every word that Shakespeare wrote — all 37 tragedies, comedies, and histories, plus the sonnets. You'll find such classics as The Tempest, Much Ado About Nothing and The Taming of the Shrew. This Library of Literary Classics edition is bound in padded leather with luxurious gold-stamping on the front and spine, satin ribbon marker and gilded edges. Other titles in this series include: Charlotte & Emily Bronte: The Complete Novels; Edgar Allan Poe: ...

One on One: The Best Women's Monologues for the Nineties

(2007)

Three editors, each associated with theatre, collaborated on this book of monologues for actresses. What they discovered, besides bravura pieces for auditions, acting classes, and study, was the pulse of the millennial theatrical scene. A follow-up to the popular previous edition from the 1990s, One on One: The Best Women's Monologues for the 21st Century includes the work of over 70 playwrights, spotlighting the best of Broadway, Off-Broadway, regional, and experimental writings since 2000. A s...

One on One: The Best Women's Monologues for the Nineties

One on One: The Best Men's Monologues for the Nineties

(2008)

Covering the best of Broadway, Off-Broadway, regional, and experimental theatre since 2000, One on One challenges actors to explore the inner self, develop skill and artistry for auditions, and deliver a knockout onstage performance. These monologues - sometimes comic, sometimes serious, and often both - tackle issues ranging from race, class, gender, relationships and romance to coming of age, mortality, 9/11, and the Iraq war.

One on One: The Best Men's Monologues for the Nineties

Women on the Verge: Seven Avant Garde Plays

(2000)

This anthology gathers together recent work by the finest and most controversial contemporary American women dramatists. Collectively, this magnificent seven seeks to break the mold of the well-wrought psychological play and its rigid emphasis on realisticsocio-political drama. Includes: Occupational Hazard (Rosalyn Drexler) ¥ Us (Karen Malpede) ¥ What of the Night? (Maria Irene Forne) ¥ Birth and After Birth (Tina Howe) ¥ and more.

Women on the Verge: Seven Avant Garde Plays

The Actor and the Text

(2000)

These words of Cicely Berry, the voice director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, speak to anyone who needs to speak his or her piece - in any arena, at sales meetings or religious revivals. Berry's book will insure that the speaker and the text gets heard - accurately and with true emotional range. Never again will one be accused of simply "reading a prepared statement." Berry's exercises to develop relaxation, breathing and muscular control will literally help everyone breathe easier when conf...

On the Open Road: New York Shakespeare Edition

(2000)

Set in a landscape stripped bare by civil war, two "independents" forge an alliance of convenience in order to buy their way into the land of the free, the one safe haven in an otherwise lawless landscape. Hiding from marauding armies, they travel the country, gathering great art treasures from crumbling museums. But with the border to freedom in sight, they're captured by forces from the new coalition government. They can still buy their freedom - if they agree to do one little job for the new ...

On the Open Road: New York Shakespeare Edition

The Best American Short Plays 1991-1992

(2000)

Scripts for 13 short plays, including: Patricia BosworthÕs "Making Contact," Terrence McNallyÕs "Prelude and Liebestod," Arthur MillerÕs "The Last Yankee," Joyce Carol OatesÕ "Tone Clusters," Shel SilversteinÕs "The Devil and Billy Markham," Migdalia CruzÕ "Dreams of Home," Frank D. GilroyÕs "A Way with Words," A.R. GurneyÕs "The Open Meeting," Arthur KopitÕs "Success," Randy NoojinÕs "You CanÕt Trust the Male," Suzan-Lori ParkÕs "Snails," Murray SchisgalÕs "Extensions," and Jean-Cl...

One-Act Comedies of Moliere: Seven Plays

(2000)

These are the best of Moli?ere's masterful one-acts, blending broad farce and pointed wit to express his never-ending delight in human foibles. But Moli?re is more than just the "master of the laugh", for behind the comic gestures of these matchless rogues, tight-fisted masters, possessive lovers and elegant ladies lurk fears, insecurities and their consequences.

One-Act Comedies of Moliere: Seven Plays

Theater Yearbook 1990-1991: The Complete Broadway and Off-Broadway Sourcebook

(2000)

The Applause Best Plays Yearbook was started by Burns Mantle in 1919 and has appeared every year since then, becoming the standard reference book for American Theater. This volume features synposes and excerpts for the ten best plays of the 1990-1991 season, including: The American Plan ¥ Falsettoland ¥ The Good Times Are Killing Me ¥ Lost in Younkers ¥ Miss Saigon ¥ Our CountryÕs Good ¥ Shadowlands ¥ Six Degrees of Separation ¥ The Substance of Fire ¥ The Sum of Us ¥ and a special ci...

Theater Yearbook 1990-1991: The Complete Broadway and Off-Broadway Sourcebook

13 by Shanley

(2000)

Thirteen plays by the Oscar-winning author of Moonstruck. Includes: "The Big Funk," "Savage in Limbo," "Danny and The Deep Blue Sea," "Welcome to the Moon," "The Red Coat," "Down and Out," "Let Us Go Out Into the Starry Night," "Out West," "A Lonely Impulse of Delight," "Women of Manhattan," "The Dreamer Examines His Pillow," "Italian-American Reconciliation," and "Beggars in the House of Plenty." Also includes an introduction by the author.

Recycling Shakespeare

(2000)

In the same way that Shakespeare himself continued to meditate and transform his own ideas and the shape they took, Marowitz gives us license to continue that meditation in productions extrapolated from ShakespeareÕs work. Shakespeare becomes the greatest of all catalysts who stimulates a constant re-formulation of the fundamental questions of philosophy, history and meaning. Marowitz introduces us to Shakespeare as an active contemporary collaborator who strives with us to yield a vibrant cont...

The Best American Short Plays 1990

(2000)

A collection of 12 short plays from 1990. Includes: "Salaam, Huey Newton, Salaam" - Ed Bullins; "Naomi in the Living Room" - Christopher Durang; "The Man Who Climbed the Pecan Trees" - Horton Foote; "Teeth" - Tina Howe; "Sure Thing" - David Ives; "Christmas Eve on Orchard Street" - Allan Knee; "Akhmatova" - Romulus Linney; "Unprogrammed" - Carol Mack; "The Cherry Orchard" - Richard Nelson; "Hidden in This Picture" - Aaron Sorkin; "Boy Meets Girl" - Wendy Wasserstein; "Abstinence" - Lanford Wilso...

I Am a Woman: The Journey of One Woman and Many Women

(2000)

I Am A Woman is a journey, not through time so much as through realms of consciousness expressed in the haunting voices of some of literatureÕs most powerful women. Together, on the page or in performance, these voices weave a powerful and haunting tapestry. Each womanÕs struggle permeates anotherÕs triumph, and each triumph rings with the irony of its passing. Here is a repertoire of the heart. Among the selections: Pentimento ¥ Diary of Anne Frank ¥ Lady ChatterlyÕs Lover ¥ A Conversati...

I Am a Woman: The Journey of One Woman and Many Women

Speak with Distinction: The Classic Skinner Method to Speech on the Stage

(2000)

Widely recognized as the most complete and rigorous text of its kind since it was first published in 1942, Speak With Distinction is an invaluable resource. It presents a comprehensive study of the sounds of Spoken English in their most important phonetic environments. This most recent revision also adds much material for comparisons of speech sounds; suggestions for accurate, efficient and conversational ways of combining the sounds into connected utterance; indications that foster a working kn...

Speak with Distinction: The Classic Skinner Method to Speech on the Stage

Classical Tragedy - Greek and Roman Eight Plays with Critical Essays

(2000)

A collection of eight plays along with accompanying critical essays. Includes: "The Oresteia" - Aeschylus; "Prometheus Bound" - Aeschylus; "Oedipus the King" - Sophocles; "Antigone" - Sophocles; "Medea" - Euripides; "The Bakkhai" - Euripides; "Oedipus" - Seneca; "Medea" - Seneca.

Classical Tragedy - Greek and Roman Eight Plays with Critical Essays

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