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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...

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.

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 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...

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 ...

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...

Frost/Nixon: A Play (2007) By 1972 Richard Nixon had ended the Vietnam war, achieved diplomatic breakthroughs with Russia and China, presided over a period of economic stability at home, and was on the verge of a landslide re-election . . . until he decided to cover up a third-rate burglary. Watergate was one of the largest scandals in American history and two years later Nixon would resign the presidency--but with neither an admission of guilt nor any sign of remorse. In a drama "as thought-provoking as it is grippi...

Performance Studies: An Introduction (2006) The second edition of an important introductory textbook by a prime mover in the field of Performance Studies, which was a defining moment for the discipline. It provides a lively and accessible overview of the full range of performance for undergraduates at all levels and beginning graduate students in performance studies, theatre, performing arts and cultural studies. It includes discussion of the performing arts and popular entertainment, rituals, play and games as well as the performances o...

Why is That So Funny?: A Practical Exploration of Physical Comedy (2007) This unique exploration of the principles and practice of physical comedy starts with a discussion of the various types of laughter that can be provoked by performance. It then presents graduated sequences of over a hundred games and exercises devised to demonstrate and investigate the whole range of comic possibilities open to a performer. The result is an intensely practical and thoroughly stimulating investigation of how comedy works in physical terms.

Guys and Dolls: Vocal Selections (1982) 12 vocal selections from the Broadway staple, including: Adelaide's Lament * A Bushel and a Peck * Fugue for Tinhorns * Guys and Dolls * I've Never Been in Love Before * If I Were a Bell * Luck Be a Lady * Sit down You're Rockin' the Boat * and more.

Grey Gardens: The Complete Book and Lyrics of the Broadway Musical (2007) Grey Gardens is based on the 1975 Albert and David Maysles film about Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis's eccentric aunt and cousin. The touching - and sometimes heart-wrenching - musical adaptation explores the dysfunctional relationship between former socialite Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter, Little Edie, as they languish in a derelict East Hampton manor, Grey Gardens. Propelled by Christine Ebersole's tour-de-force performance, the gorgeous score, and intricate lyrics, the Broadway musical ha...

Introduction to Theatre Arts Teacher's Guide: A 36-Week Action Workbook for Middle Grade and High School Students and Teachers (2004) This companion guide to the student's action workbook makes teaching this class easy and fun. It includes the answers to all questions. It provides lesson plans, a weekly calendar, a survival guide for a substitute, poster ideas, evaluation forms, hand-outs, planning materials for fundraising events, and awards. More teaching-assists than you will ever need.

The Musical Theatre Writer's Survival Guide (2005) David Spencer has written a book full of truths a young writer will not find articulated anywhere else. Most of us in the theatre gained our "experience" by making mistakes and learning from them. David's book lets you gain the "experience" and skip the mistakes part. Anyone maneuvering the treacherous waters of musicals will find it not nearly so lonely or baffling with this remarkable volume as a companion. - Richard Maltby, Jr., Director/Lyricist, Miss Saigon, Ain't Misbehavin', Baby Con...

The Physicists (1994) The world’s greatest physicist, Johann Wilhelm Möbius, is in a madhouse, haunted by recurring visions of King Solomon. He is kept company by two other equally deluded scientists: one who thinks he is Einstein, another who believes he is Newton. It soon becomes evident, however, that these three are not as harmlessly lunatic as they appear. Are they, in fact, really mad? Or are they playing some murderous game, with the world as the stake? For Möbius has uncovered the mystery of the universe...

Young Women's Monologs From Contemporary Plays: Professional Auditions For Aspiring Actresses (2004) A collection of 94 monologues for women from recently produced contemporary plays for auditions, contests, workshops and acting classes.

Not Since Carrie: Forty Years of Broadway Musical Flops (1992) While ample material on hit Broadway musicals is readily available, detailed critical information on musical flops has been difficult to come by. Mandelbaum's ( "A Chorus Line" and the Musicals of Michael Bennett , LJ 6/15/89) informative and entertaining survey of almost 200 musical flops from 1950 to 1990 fills the void admirably. Framed by the 1988 megaflop Carrie , which theater buffs still speak of in hushed tones, the shows are presented thematically rather than chronologically, thus bett...

Jesus Christ Superstar: A Rock Opera (Vocal Selections) (1985) Highly acclaimed show by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. Songs include: HEAVEN ON THEIR MINDS . EVERYTHING'S ALRIGHT . HOSANNA . PILATE'S DREAM . I DON'T KNOW HOW TO LOVE HIM . THE LAST SUPPER ;. I ONLY WANT TO SAY (GETHSEMANE) . KING HEROD'S SONG . SUPERSTAR

Bash Latterday Plays (2001) A trio of brilliantly scathing plays by the renowned writer-director of In the Company of Men and Your Friends and Neighbors. With the success of his first two films, In The Company of Men and Your Friends and Neighbors, writer-director Neil LaBute has been hailed as a first-rate dramatic talent with a caustic wit reminiscent of Stanley Kubrick. bash--a collection of three stunning one-act plays that mark LaBute's return to the New York stage after ten years--forms a trio of unforgettable p...

The Little Dog Laughed (2007) The Little Dog Laughed is a play by Douglas Carter Beane. The four characters are an actor, Mitchell, his acerbic agent Diane, a hustler named Alex, and Alex's girlfriend Ellen. When Mitchell and Alex become involved in a physical relationship, Diane is concerned that what she describes as Mitchell's "slight recurring case of homosexuality" will derail his career before it gets started. The play originally was produced off-Broadway at the Second Stage Theatre. It opened on 10 January 2006 and...

99 Film Scenes for Actors (1999) Looking for a great piece to work on in your scene study class? For an audition? You want something fresh, juicy, well-written-something you haven't seen in every scene book. Give Chekov a rest and turn to memorable characters and scenes from the silver screen. This remarkable anthology offers an incredible range of contemporary dialogues from the pens of the industry's finest talents-scenes that pulsate with emotional life, scenes that live on their own, out of context. Blistering drama and c...

The Good Woman of Setzuan (1999) The Good Woman of Setzuan is a play written by the German theatre practitioner Bertolt Brecht, in collaboration with Margarete Steffin and Ruth Berlau. The play was begun in 1938 but not completed until 1943, while the author was in exile in the United States. It was first performed in 1943 at the Zürich Schauspielhaus in Switzerland, with a musical score and songs by Swiss composer Huldreich Georg Früh. Today, Paul Dessau's composition of the songs from 1947–48, also authorized by Brecht, i...

An Enemy of the People (2003) This series presents a wide choice of 20th-century drama. The books offer scene-by-scene analysis, structured questions and assignment suggestions for GCSE. This play deals with political and environmental issues which still have relevance today.

Speaking Shakespeare (2004) Although Shakespeare is the most famous-and lauded-writer in English, most adult readers, theatergoers and students would be hard pressed to admit they fully understand the complexity or complete meaning of his language. Rodenburg, the director of voice at London's National Theater, has written an excellent training guide for actors tackling the Bard, methodically escorting the amateur or professional thespian from understanding individual words to reading lines to performing entire speeches, e...

Jersey Boys: The Story of Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons (2007) How did four blue-collar kids become one of the greatest successes in pop music history? You ask four guys, you get four different answers. Have we got a story for you! Everyone knows their songs. Few know their story. Named for a bowling alley that refused to book them, The Four Seasons—Frankie, Tommy, Bob, and Nick—were four high school dropouts who emerged from New Jersey to become true American Idols: one of the biggest American pop music sensations of all time. With a shiny doo-wop so...

Women Laid Bare (2006) 7 Revealing New Plays about Women: Audience of One Dancing In The Dark The Disintegration of Della Longstreet I Went To A Marvelous Party Kingdom By The Sea The Liberation of Linda Dworkin Lulu In Babylon

Improvisation Starters (1992) Includes 900 situations for improvisation which use character conflict, contrasts, obstacles in solo improvisation, physical positions for one or two actors, props, the environment, and lines of dialogue.

The Perfect Stage Crew: The Compleat Technical Guide for High School, College, and Community Theater (2003) Here is an indispensable, nuts-and-bolts guide to putting on a stunning, low-budget show in less than 40 days! The Perfect Stage Crew explains the pitfalls to avoid and provides solutions to the most common as well as most complex stage performance problems. Readers without Broadway-size budgets and resources will learn the low-cost, low-tech approaches to painting scenery, building sets, hanging lights, setting cues, and operating sound. They'll also find crucial guidance for generating public...

How Sondheim Found His Sound (2007) There have been so many books written about Stephen Sondheim and his revolutionary scores that it's hard to believe anything's left to analyze. But Swayne has found a new angle, and in this scholarly tome, he examines the impact other artists and mediums have had on Sondheim's work. The Dartmouth music professor offers some fascinating and fresh insights into possible inspirations behind characters and musical moments in shows including Follies, A Little Night Music, Sunday in the Park with Geo...

Jekyll and Hyde The Musical - Vocal Selections (1997) Ten songs from the Wildhorn/Bricusse Broadway smash, arranged for big-note: In His Eyes * It's a Dangerous Game * Lost in the Darkness * A New Life * No One Knows Who I Am * Once Upon a Dream * Someone Like You * Sympathy, Tenderness * Take Me as I Am * This Is the Moment.

The Commercial Theater Institute Guide to Producing Plays and Musicals (2007) Now in its 25th year, the Commercial Theater Institute sponsors an annual intensive program in New York for individuals interested in producing or investing in the theatre that attracts people from all over the world. The top working theatre professionals offer hard, factual information to those interested in producing for Broadway, Off-Broadway, Off-Off-Broadway, anywhere in North America, as well as in the United Kingdom. The Commercial Theater Institute Guide to Producing Plays and Musicals ...

Shakespeare's Wordcraft (2007) Written for readers who have a passion for Shakespeare, Shakespeare's Wordcraft takes a comprehensive look at Shakespeare's stellar use of language devices throughout his plays, devices he used to ink memorable lines like these: * I must be cruel only to be kind * Fair is foul, and foul is fair * Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more! * Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears! In a clear, accessible, non-academic style - using plain terms, modern quotes, and several thousand...

Molly Sweeney. (1998) Molly Sweeney, by the great Irish playwright Brian Friel, tells the story of married couple Molly and Frank, who live in a remote Irish village. Molly has been blind since birth, but now a surgeon Mr. Rice believes he may be able to restore her sight. In a series of interwoven monologues, Molly Sweeney takes us into the minds of three people with very different expectations of what will happen when Molly regains her vision.

Cabaret: The Illustrated Book and Lyrics (1999) One of the hottest tickets on Broadway last season was the breathtaking revival of the musical Cabaret, which featured incomparable--and Tony-awarded--performances by Alan Cumming as the master of ceremonies and Natasha Richardson as Sally Bowles. Cabaret is rooted in Christopher Isherwood's wonderful book The Berlin Stories, in which the late British writer immaculately captured Weimar Germany of the 1930s. After several stage and movie permutations, voila!--the current revival that set the Ne...

Our Musicals, Ourselves: A Social History of the American Musical Theatre (2004) Our Musicals, Ourselves is the first full-scale social history of the American musical theater from the imported Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas of the late nineteenth century to such recent musicals as The Producers and Urinetown. While many aficionados of the Broadway musical associate it with wonderful, diversionary shows like The Music Man or My Fair Lady, John Bush Jones instead selects musicals for their social relevance and the extent to which they engage, directly or metaphorically, c...

The Real Inspector Hound and Other Plays (1998) Culled from nearly 20 years of the playwright's career, a showcase for Tom Stoppard's dazzling range and virtuosic talent, The Real Inspector Hound and Other Plays is essential reading for fans of modern drama. The plays in this collection reveal Stoppard's sense of fun, his sense of theater, his sense of the absurd, and his gifts for parody and satire. They include The Real Inspector Hound, After Margritte, Dirty Linen, New-Found-Land, Dogg's Hamlet, and Cahoot's Macbeth.

The Second City Almanac of Improvisation (2004) The Second City Almanac of Improvisation is not so much a narrative or how-to book as a collection of essays and advice from Second City's more prestigious alumni. Throughout its seven chapters, author Anne Libera addresses the guidelines and goals of courses taught through Second City's Training Center, of which she is the artistic director.

Audition Success (2001) Audition Success presents a groundbreaking method that has already made Don Greene one of the country's leading audition trainers. Combining specially designed self-tests and real-life examples from the careers of two performers, Audition Success will help performers understand what prevents them from nailing an audition and give them the tools to reach their goals.

Speak the Speech!: Shakespeare's Monologues Illuminated (2002) Over 150 of the Bard's monologues are reprinted and explained for the aspiring actor or director in Speak the Speech! Shakespeare's Monologues Illuminated. The knowledgeable and breezy commentary ("Dial Lady M for Murder," reads one section heading) by acting coach Rhona Silverbush and playwright Sami Plotkin offers a brief context for each monologue, explains unfamiliar vocabulary and expressions, examines the relationship between mood and meter and even reminds readers what words to elide or ...

Avenue Q: The Book (2006) With its cast of furry puppets, its shockingly politically incorrect lyrics, and its hilarious upending of children’s television,Avenue Q took Broadway by storm. The New York Times declared it "a breakthrough musical," and after a two-year run, the Golden Theater is still selling out eight shows a week. Its success is not limited to the Great White Way, however: This summer, the cast will be swearing, drinking, and ennui-ing their way across the country. As smart, risqué, and downright en...

The Ultimate Broadway Fake Book (1993) Over 720 songs from over 240 Broadway shows! Recently revised to include hits from Martin Guerre, Rent, Smokey Joe's Cafe, Sunset Boulevard, Victor/Victoria, and more! This is the definitive collection of Broadway music, featuring: * Song title index * Show title index * Composer and lyricist index * Synopses of each show. Song highlights include: Ain't Misbehavin' * All I Ask of You * Another Op'nin' Another Show * As Long As He Needs Me * At The Ballet * Bali Ha'i * Beauty and the Beast * Bew...

Irreverent Acting (1992) IRREVERENT ACTING is a CRAFT HANDBOOK offering a practical, applicable approach to acting, with very specific techniques used to create the emotional life of the character. The craftual process of "Obligation/Choice/Choice approach" is fully explained in terms of the actor's responsibilities to a piece of material whether it be a monologue, scene, play or film. This book contains 22 of Eric's 27 "choice approaches" and score of other techniques which make it possible for the actor to fulfill al...

Tips : Ideas for Actors (2000) Until recent times, acting wisdom was passed on through an oral tradition called "tips". Presented here are 250 tips, including the way to set a laugh, the use of opposites, a clear definition of "actions", how to use a "breath score", and even how to react if you're fired.

Writing The Broadway Musical [Paperback] (2000) A classic updated to include the developments of the 1990s-the first book to explore in detail how to create a Broadway musical Brimming with advice and techniques, this essential reference for book and song writers clearly explains the fundamentals of the three crafts of a musical-book, music, and lyrics. Using copious examples from classic shows, Frankel has created the quintessential musical writers' how-to. Among the topics: - Definitions of musical theater - Differences between musica...

Blackbird (2007) Fifteen years ago Una and Ray had a relationship. They haven't set eyes on each other since. Now, years later, she's found him again... --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

The Moving Body: Teaching Creative Theatre [Paperback] (2002) In The Moving Body, translated into English for the first time, Lecoq shares his unique philosophy of performance, improvisation, masks, movement, and gesture. Neutral mask, character masks and counter-masks, bouffons, acrobatics, commedia, clowns: all the famous Lecoq techniques are include here. The Moving Body is the written legacy of a great theatrical imagination.

Frozen (2004) One evening, ten-year-old Rhona goes missing. Her mother, Nancy, retreats into a state of frozen hope. Agnetha, an academic, comes to England to research a thesis entitled "Serial Killings: A Forgivable Act?" Then there's Ralph, a loner with a bit of a record who's looking for some distraction . . . Drawn together by horrific circumstances, these three embark upon a long, dark journey that finally curves upward into the light.

Freeing Shakespeare's Voice: The Actor's Guide to Talking the Text (1993) A practical approach to breaking through the barriers of restraint and incomprehension when faced with Shakespeare. Pre-eminent voice teacher, actor and director Kristin Linklater goes beyond the techniques in her classic text, Freeing the Natural Voice, to a passionate exploration of the words of Shakespeare. Beginning with exercises designed to break long-held habits and allow the development of a visceral, Elizabethan relationship to language, she analyses Shakespeare's strategies for ...

Truth: Personas, Needs, and Flaws in The Art of Building Actors and Creating Characters (2007) Stanislavski, Strasberg, Meisner, Adler, Berghoff, Hagen, Mamet...now Batson. Like all great performers, Nicole Kidman approached her role in The Hours as a creative collaboration. Kidman knew that portraying Virginia Woolf on screen required a truth that she as the actor and Woolf as the character shared. Enter acting "alchemist" and "technician of the spirit" (The New Yorker) Susan Batson. Batson's process gave Kidman the tools to find that truth and honed her performance from the inside out...

Tips: Ideas for Directors (2002) Until very recently, directing wisdom was passed on in the form of "tips". Continuing this tradition, you will find them ranging from the way set a scene to directing the actor on the way to laugh. The tips are clear, concise, evocative, and constructed to give you a better day in rehearsal and performance. A buffet of ways to improve immediately that you'll refer to over and over again!

My Name Is Rachel Corrie (2007) I have been in Palestine for two weeks and one hour now, and I still have very few words to describe what I see. I don’t know if many of the children here have ever existed without tank-shell holes in their walls. You just can’t imagine it unless you see it. And even then your experience is not at all the reality . . . [due to] the fact that I have money to buy water when the army destroys wells, and of course, the fact that I have the option of leaving. I am allowed to see the ocean.—Rac...

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