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First Published in 2000. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
Theatre in Crisis? Performance Manifestos for a New Century is a wide-ranging look at the state of contemporary theater practice, economics, and issues related to identity, politics, and technology. The volume offers a snapshot dissection of where theater is, where it has been and where it might be going through the voices of established and emerging theater artists and scholars from the UK, US, and elsewhere. Contributors: Maria M. Delgado & Caridad Svich • Oliver Mayer, Jorge Cortiñas, Neena Beber, & Craig Lucas • Jim Carmody • Roberta Levitow • Peter Lichtenfels & Lynette Hunter • Michael Billington • Claire H. Macdonald • Anna Furse • Phyllis Nagy • Max Stafford-Clark • Len Berkman • DD Kugler • Tori Haring-Smith • John London • Kia Corthron • Alice Tuan • Ricardo Szwarcer • Peter Sellars • Dragan Klaic • Lisa D’Amour • Paul Heritage • Matthew Causey • Andy Lavender • Jon Fosse • Erik Ehn • Matthew Maguire • Shelley Berc • Ruth Margraff • Martin Epstein • Mac Wellman • Goat Island
Women are at the center of American theatre and have the potential to shape the cultural imagination of theatre-goers as a complex new era unfolds. Sarah Ruhl, one of the twenty-first century's most honored playwrights, is read in concert with her contemporaries whose writing also wrestles with the vexing issues facing Americans in the new century.
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In tracing black feminism in contemporary drama by black women playwrights, Lisa M. Anderson reviews the history of black feminism through analysis of plays by Pearl Cleage, Glenda Dickerson, Breena Clarke, Kia Corthron, Suzan-Lori Parks, Sharon Bridgforth, and Shirlene Holmes.Black Feminism in Contemporary Dramarepresents a cross section of women who have diverse writing and performance styles and generational differences that highlight the artistic and political breadth of black feminist theater. Anderson closely investigates each play's construction and the context of its production, including how the play critiques, shifts, or alters dominant culture stereotypes; how it positions goals of the "community"; and how it engages with the concept of art's function. She not only discusses what shapes the black feminism of these writers but also points out how the meaning of the term black feminism shifts among them.
American Political Plays after 9/11 is a diverse collection of bold, urgent, and provocative plays that respond to the highly charged, post 9/11 political landscape. Sparked by the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and subsequently fueled by a series of controversial events—the Iraq war, the passing and enforcement of the U.S.A. Patriot Act, and the revelation of torture and other scandals at the Abu Ghraib prison—American political theater is currently experiencing a surge in activity. The plays in this collection include The Guys by Anne Nelson, At the Vanishing Point by Naomi Iizuka, The Venus de Milo Is Armed by Kia Corthron, Back of the Throat by Yusseff El Guindi, Three Nigh...
Far from the glittering lights of Broadway, in a city known more for its horse racing than its artistic endeavors, an annual festival in Louisville, Kentucky, has transformed the landscape of the American theater. The Actors Theatre of Louisville—the Tony Award–winning state theater of Kentucky—in 1976 successfully created what became the nation's most respected new-play festival, the Humana Festival of New American Plays. The Humana Festival: The History of New Plays at Actors Theatre of Louisville examines the success of the festival and theater’s Pulitzer Prize–winning productions that for decades have reflected new-play trends in regional theaters and on Broadway—the result o...
This original account is based on the author’s experiences with incarcerated girls participating in Girl Time, a program created by a theatre company that conducts playwriting and performance workshops in youth detention centers. In addition to examining the lives of these and other formerly incarcerated girls, Girl Time shares the stories of educators who dare to teach children who have been “thrown away” by their schools and society. The girls, primarily African American teens, write their own plays, learn ensemble-building techniques, explore societal themes, and engage in self analysis as they prepare for a final performance. The book describes some of the girls and their experienc...
In the first century of the coveted Pulitzer Prizes, only 11 women have won the prize for drama: Zona Gale (1921), Susan Glaspell (1931), Zoe Akins (1935), Mary Coyle Chase (1945), Ketti Frings (1958), Beth Henley (1981), Marsha Norma (1983), Wendy Wasserstein (1989), Paula Vogel (1998), Margaret Edson (1999), and Suzan-Lori Parks (2002). This book is about them and their landmark plays, beginning with Gale's Miss Lulu Bett, which championed the unmarried woman forced to work in the home of a married relative, and closing with Parks' controversial Topdog/Underdog, which made her the first black woman to win the prize. Drawn from personal interviews with the playwrights and research from arch...
Despite their significant contributions to the American theater, African American dramatists have received less critical attention than novelists and poets. This reference offers thorough critical assessments of the lives and works of African American playwrights from the 19th century to the present. The book alphabetically arranges entries on more than 60 dramatists, including James Baldwin, Arna Bontemps, Ossie Davis, Zora Neale Hurston, and Richard Wright. Each entry is written by an expert contributor and includes a biography, a discussion of major works and themes, a summary of the playwright's critical reception, and primary and secondary bibliographies. The volume closes with a select...