Showing results by narrator "Laura Benanti" in All Categories

Young playwright Melina Green has just written a new work inspired by the life of her Elizabethan ancestor Emilia Bassano. But seeing it performed is unlikely, in a theater world where the playing field isn’t level for women. As Melina wonders if she dares risk failure again, her best friend takes the decision out of her hands and submits the play to a festival under a male pseudonym.

In this incredible follow-up to the New York Times and USA Today best seller FaceOff, 22 of the world's most popular thriller writers come together for an unforgettable anthology. MatchUp takes the never-before-seen best seller pairings of FaceOff and adds a delicious new twist: gender. Eleven of the world's best female thriller writers, from Diana Gabaldon to Charlaine Harris, are paired with 11 of the world's best male thriller writers.

A young nanny who plunged to her death, or was she pushed? A nine-year-old girl who collects sharp objects and refuses to speak. A lawyer whose job it is to uncover who in the family is a victim and who is a murderer. But how can you find out the truth when everyone here is lying? Rose Barclay is a nine-year-old girl who witnessed the possible murder of her nanny—in the midst of her parent's bitter divorce—and immediately stopped speaking.

Six minutes after takeoff, Flight 1421 crashes into the Pacific Ocean. During the evacuation, an engine explodes and the plane is flooded. Those still alive are forced to close the doors—but it’s too late. The plane sinks to the bottom with twelve passengers trapped inside. More than two hundred feet below the surface, engineer Will Kent and his eleven-year-old daughter Shannon are waist-deep in water and fighting for their lives.

As a precocious kid who took Broadway by storm at the age of 18, Laura Benanti spent her formative years playing grown-ups onstage, but it took her a while to figure out how to be one in real life. With her razor-sharp wit and unapologetic candor, Benanti shares her hard-won insights on topics like marriage, motherhood, perimenopause, female friendship, and making peace with the younger versions of ourselves.

In Elizabethan London, young Emilia Bassano is a ward of English aristocrats. Her education has endowed her with a sharp wit and a gift for storytelling, but still she is allowed no voice of her own. Forced to become a mistress to the Lord Chamberlain, who oversees the theatre, Emilia discovers the power of stories to beguile audiences. Secretly, she forms a plan to bring a play of her own to the stage – by paying an actor named William Shakespeare to front her work.

In 1581, Emilia Bassano is allowed no voice of her own. But as the Lord Chamberlain’s mistress she has access to the theatre, and finds a way to bring her work to the stage secretly. And yet, creating some of the world’s greatest dramatic masterpieces comes at a great cost: by paying a man for the use of his name, she will write her own out of history. In modern day New York, playwright Melina Green is determined to see one of her shows make the stage. After years of struggle to be recognised she has finally written again, inspired by the life of her Elizabethan ancestor.

It’s 1927, and 18-year-old Mary Engle is hired to work as a secretary at a remote but scenic institution for mentally disabled women called the Nettleton State Village for Feebleminded Women of Childbearing Age. Soon after she’s hired, Mary learns that a girl from her childhood orphanage is one of the inmates. Mary remembers Lillian as a beautiful free spirit with a sometimes-tempestuous side. Could she be mentally disabled? When Lillian begs Mary to help her escape, Mary is faced with a terrible choice.

Welcome to Greenwich, CT, where the lawns are manicured, the Long Island iced teas are extra strong, and heads turn when an infamous new neighbor arrives for an extended long weekend. After Emily Charlton left Miranda Priestly and Runway magazine, she migrated to L.A with her husband, working as an image consultant to the stars. But recently Emily's lost a few clients. She's struggling. When the opportunity arrives to reinvent and relaunch a gorgeous former model whose mugshot graces the cover of the New York Post, Emily jumps at the chance. Relaunching Karolina is the big leagues.

A visit to the urologist has never been more hilarious - or revealing - than in Men’s Health, a new comedy written by Daniel Goldfarb and directed by Scott Ellis. Adam (Tony® winner Santino Fontana) is a TV writer in search of a diagnosis for a very personal problem. He ends up half naked and fully freaked out in the exam room of Dr. Szabo (Tony and Emmy® winner Tony Shalhoub), a physician with a unique bedside manner offering some truly unorthodox treatment options.

Vivian Parry likes the dark. A former actress, she now works as the junior theater critic at a major Manhattan magazine. Her nights are spent beyond the lights, in a reserved seat, giving herself over to the shows she loves. By day, she savages them, with words sharper than a knife. Angling for a promotion, she reluctantly agrees to an interview, a conversation that reveals secrets she thought she had long since buried. Then her interviewer disappears and she learns―from his devastated fiancée―that she was the last person to have seen him alive.

Emily Charlton does not do the suburbs. A successful stylist and image consultant to Hollywood stars, she cut her teeth as assistant to legendary fashion editor Miranda Priestly in New York. But with Snapchatting millennials stealing her clients, Emily needs to get back in the game and fast. She holes up at the home of her oldest friend, Miriam, in the upscale suburb of Greenwich. And when Miriam's friend, model Karolina Hartwell, is publicly dumped by her husband, Graham, a senator with presidential ambitions, Emily scents the client of a lifetime.

The Mueller Report is 2018’s most anticipated release that doesn’t involve Chris Pratt punching a dinosaur, and for good reason: The entire country is waiting to see what former FBI director and current special counsel Robert Mueller has dug up on former mail-order steak salesman and current US president Donald J. Trump. That wait is over - sort of - with the publication of The Mueller Report by Jason O. Gilbert.

The holidays are a time for family, friends, and celebration - but not all holiday parties run smoothly. When Tony Award winner Laura Benanti's party goes south, she's saved by a few uninvited guests...and the greatest improvised holiday musical of all time. This completely off-the-wall tribute to the holiday season features the improv troupe Vern (Matt Giroveanu, Julie Feltman, Rachel Bouton, Mikey Cakes, Daniel Tepper, Katie Hammond, and Kikki Mikkelson) and special guest Laura Benanti.

Six minutes after Flight 1421 takes off, it crashes into the ocean. The passengers who survive the crash think it's a miracle. They believe they're the lucky ones. Then the plane begins to sink to the ocean floor. The survivors are trapped inside. Against all odds, a massive rescue operation is launched to save them. There is not much time. There is even less air.

Emily Charlton does not do the suburbs. A successful stylist and image consultant to Hollywood stars, she cut her teeth as assistant to legendary fashion editor Miranda Priestly in New York. But with social media-obsessed millennials stealing her clients, Emily needs to get back in the game – and fast. She holes up at the home of her oldest friend Miriam in the upscale suburb of Greenwich. And when Miriam’s friend, model Karolina Hartwell, is publicly dumped by her husband Graham, a senator with presidential ambitions, Emily scents the client of a lifetime.

By night, Vivian Parry performs the role of Manhattan’s sharpest theatre critic, immersing herself fully in every show she sees. By day, she uses work, sex, and psychotropic drugs to keep her comfortably numb. Desperate for a promotion and at the urging of her editor, she agrees to an interview with David Adler, an enigmatic graduate student. When he later disappears, Vivian soon learns from his devastated fiancée that she was the last person to have seen him alive. The police refuse to investigate his disappearance and Vivian finds herself obsessed with what happened.

8-year-old Rose Barclay refuses to talk after the shocking death of her nanny in the midst of her parents' acrimonious divorce. Attorney Stella Hudson is determined to help Rose speak, and discover what really happened. As Stella unravels the secrets of the Barclay family, the past and present collide with shocking consequences. Everyone is a suspect in the nanny's murder. Even Rose. Is the person Stella's supposed to protect the one she may need protection from.