Theater Works

Beloved author Elizabeth Gilbert returns to fiction with a unique love story set in the New York City theater world during the 1940s. Told from the perspective of an older woman as she looks back on her youth with both pleasure and regret (but mostly pleasure), City of Girls explores themes of female sexuality and promiscuity, as well as the idiosyncrasies of true love. In 1940, nineteen-year-old Vivian Morris has just been kicked out of Vassar College, owing to her lackluster freshman-year performance.

Since it first opened on Broadway in September 1964, Fiddler on the Roof has constantly been onstage somewhere, including five Broadway revivals, four productions on London's West End, and thousands of schools, army bases, and countries from Argentina to Japan. Barbara Isenberg interviewed the men and women behind the original production, the film, and significant revivals.

It’s 1960, and the world teeters on the edge of cultural, political, sexual, and artistic revolution. On the Greek island of Hydra, a proto-commune of poets, painters, and musicians revel in dreams at the feet of their unofficial leaders, the writers Charmian Clift and George Johnston, troubled queen and king of bohemia. At the center of this circle of misfit artists are the captivating and inscrutable Axel Jensen, his magnetic wife Marianne Ihlen, and a young Canadian ingenue poet named Leonard Cohen.

When orphans Sorrel, Mark, and Holly are sent to live with their grandmother, a famous English actress, she enrolls them in the Children's Academy of Dancing and Stage Training, the same academy that made the orphans from Ballet Shoes famous so long ago. It's the chance of a lifetime, but the academy won't give the children the "proper" education their parents would have wanted. However, the children learn to love the academy when they find out that Sorrel has dramatic flair, Mark can sing, and Holly charms everyone with her adorable, impish ways.

In 2004, in a small, windowless theater in then-desolate Williamsburg, Brooklyn, an eccentric family of broke art-school survivors staged an experimental, four-hour adaptation of William Faulkner’s novel As I Lay Dying inside an enormous wooden coffin that could barely fit the cast, much less an audience. The production’s cast and crew—including its sweetly monomaniacal director—poured their hearts and paychecks into a messy spectacle doomed to fail by any conventional measure. It ran for only eight performances.

Four original, full-length plays: The King of Infinite Space In the ruins of an old prison at the edge of a landscape blasted by war, teenagers enact the story of the previous generation’s struggle for survival. Scenes from a Broken Hand A young man inherits an old car from his activist parents and drags his best friend on a cross-country journey in search of meaning and understanding. Motherland A teacher in a small Slovak town tries to free herself from old ways of thinking and living in the wake of the Velvet Revolution and the fall of Communism. The Wind on the Water A Jewish ...

A Scottish meteorologist locks horns with his American counterpart as both men try to convince General Dwight D. Eisenhower that they can accurately predict the atmospheric conditions needed to launch the greatest amphibious assault in the history of mankind - the D-Day invasion.

A work of gripping nonfiction, North by Shakespeare presents the twinning narratives of rogue scholar Dennis McCarthy, called "the Steve Jobs of the Shakespeare community", and Sir Thomas North, an Elizabethan courtier whom McCarthy believes to be the undiscovered source for Shakespeare's plays.

Henrik Ibsen, the renowned Norwegian playwright, is celebrated for his influential contributions to modern theater. Born in 1828, Ibsen's early life was marked by financial struggles and personal hardships. However, his unwavering determination and artistic talent propelled him to become one of the most prominent figures in the world of drama. Ibsen's works, including "A Doll's House," "Hedda Gabler," and "Ghosts," challenged societal conventions, delving into themes of individuality, morality, and the consequences of societal expectations.

Chelsea’s backstage crush on her older brother’s best friend was an epic, embarrassing fiasco. She'd thought that Dean Riley was the man of her dreams back then. But she was wrong. Now, she'd rather break a leg than risk handing him her heart again.

With his ongoing exploration into actor behavior and an ever-innovative body of work, Richard Maxwell has written a study guide to the art of making theater. This illuminating volume provides a deeper understanding of his work, aesthetic philosophy, and process for creating theater.

Theatre Royal. The very name summons up something of grandeur and eloquence. And it was. Hosted by Ralph Richardson, these big-name productions also included the creme de la creme of acting talents from John Gielgud, Robert Morley and Orson Welles to Trevor Howard, Michael Redgrave and Laurence Olivier. They were based on works by the world's leading authors, among them Charles Dickens, Henry James, Oscar Wilde and Anton Chekhov. These are but a few of whose company we shall be keeping as we raise the curtain on our first instalment of theatrical history.