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Secret Life of a Mother
by Hannah MoscovitchThe raw and untold secrets of pregnancy, miscarriage, childbirth, and mothering are revealed in this true story of motherhood for the twenty-first century. A playwright writes an exposé of modern motherhood full of her own darkly funny confessions and taboo-breaking truths. One of her real-life friends, an actress, performs the piece, and through it her own experiences of motherhood start to surface. These mothers are not the butts of jokes, the villains, or the perfect angels of a household. This empowered and relatable play was written collaboratively between award-winning theatre artists Hannah Moscovitch, Maev Beaty, and Ann-Marie Kerr, with co-creator Marinda de Beer. Uplifting and full of love, Secret Life of a Mother is a generous and powerful act of truth-telling for anyone who has thought about, been, loved, known—or come from—a mother.
The Secret Life of The American Musical: How Broadway Shows Are Built
by Jack ViertelIn the process, he invites us to fall in love all over again by showing us how musicals happen, what makes them work, how they captivate audiences, and how one landmark show leads to the next--by design or by accident, by emulation or by rebellion--from Oklahoma! to Hamilton and onward.
The Secret Life of the American Musical: How Broadway Shows Are Built
by Jack ViertelA New York Times BestsellerFor almost a century, Americans have been losing their hearts and losing their minds in an insatiable love affair with the American musical. It often begins in childhood in a darkened theater, grows into something more serious for high school actors, and reaches its passionate zenith when it comes time for love, marriage, and children, who will start the cycle all over again. Americans love musicals. Americans invented musicals. Americans perfected musicals. But what, exactly, is a musical?In The Secret Life of the American Musical, Jack Viertel takes them apart, puts them back together, sings their praises, marvels at their unflagging inventiveness, and occasionally despairs over their more embarrassing shortcomings. In the process, he invites us to fall in love all over again by showing us how musicals happen, what makes them work, how they captivate audiences, and how one landmark show leads to the next—by design or by accident, by emulation or by rebellion—from Oklahoma! to Hamilton and onward.Structured like a musical, The Secret Life of the American Musical begins with an overture and concludes with a curtain call, with stops in between for “I Want” songs, “conditional” love songs, production numbers, star turns, and finales. The ultimate insider, Viertel has spent three decades on Broadway, working on dozens of shows old and new as a conceiver, producer, dramaturg, and general creative force; he has his own unique way of looking at the process and at the people who collaborate to make musicals a reality. He shows us patterns in the architecture of classic shows and charts the inevitable evolution that has taken place in musical theater as America itself has evolved socially and politically. The Secret Life of the American Musical makes you feel as though you’ve been there in the rehearsal room, in the front row of the theater, and in the working offices of theater owners and producers as they pursue their own love affair with that rare and elusive beast—the Broadway hit.
The Secret Life of Theater: On the Nature and Function of Theatrical Representation
by Brian KulickWhat is the secret DNA of theater? What makes it unique from its sister arts? Why was it invented? Why does it persist? And now, in such an advanced technological age, why do we still feel compelled to return to a mode of expression that was invented over two thousand years ago? These are some of the foundational questions that are asked in this study of theater from its inception to today. The Secret Life of Theater begins with a look at theater’s origins in Ancient Greece. Next, it moves on to examine the history and nature of theater, from Agamenon to Angels in America, through theater’s use of stage directions, revealing the many unspoken languages that are employed to communicate with its audiences. Finally, it looks at theater’s ever-shifting strategies of engendering fellow-feeling through the use of emotion, allowing the form to become a rare space where one can feel a thought and think a feeling. In an age when many studies are concerned with the "how" of theater, this work returns us to theatre’s essential "why." The Secret Life of Theater suggests that by reframing the question we can re-enchant this unique and ever-vital medium of expression.
The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham: A Biography
by Selina HastingsHe was a brilliant teller of tales, one of the most widely read authors of the twentieth century, and at one time the most famous writer in the world, yet W. Somerset Maugham’s own true story has never been fully told. At last, the fascinating truth is revealed in a landmark biography by the award-winning writer Selina Hastings. Granted unprecedented access to Maugham’s personal correspondence and to newly uncovered interviews with his only child, Hastings portrays the secret loves, betrayals, integrity, and passion that inspired Maugham to create such classics as The Razor’s Edge and Of Human Bondage.Hastings vividly presents Maugham’s lonely childhood spent with unloving relatives after the death of his parents, a trauma that resulted in shyness, a stammer, and for the rest of his life an urgent need for physical tenderness. Here, too, are his adult triumphs on the stage and page, works that allowed him a glittering social life in which he befriended and sometimes fell out with such luminaries as Dorothy Parker, Charlie Chaplin, D. H. Lawrence, and Winston Churchill.The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham portrays in full for the first time Maugham’s disastrous marriage to Syrie Wellcome, a manipulative society woman of dubious morality who trapped Maugham with a pregnancy and an attempted suicide. Hastings also explores Maugham’s many affairs with men, including his great love, Gerald Haxton, an alcoholic charmer and a cad. Maugham’s courageous work in secret intelligence during two world wars is described in fascinating detail—experiences that provided the inspiration for the groundbreaking Ashenden stories. From the West End to Broadway, from China to the South Pacific, Maugham’s restless and remarkably productive life is thrillingly recounted as Hastings uncovers the real stories behind such classics as “Rain,” The Painted Veil, Cakes & Ale, and other well-known tales.An epic biography of a hugely talented and hugely conflicted man, The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham is the definitive account of Maugham’s extraordinary life.From the Hardcover edition.
The Secret Mask
by Rick ChafeThis heartwarming and often hilarious play tells the story of Ernie and George, an estranged father and son who are reunited when a debilitating stroke leaves Ernie with a speech disorder and memory loss. While George is undeniably hurt and betrayed by the man who abandoned him as a child, Ernie can't remember his words, or where he lives. Together they must find a way to make sense of their past and their future through fractured memories and muddled language.
The Secret Rapture and Other Plays: Fanshen - A Map Of The World - Saigon - The Bay At Nice (Books That Changed the World)
by David HareA collection of five plays fromthe Tony Award–winning playwright and screenwriter, &“the premiere political dramatist writing in English&” (The Washington Post). David Hare, &“Britain&’s leading contemporary playwright,&” has established a unique reputation for plays that are at once personal and political, deeply serious and incredibly funny (The Times). He is the author of seventeen plays, many of which have been presented on Broadway. Included in this collection are Fanshen; A Map of the World; Saigon: Year of the Cat; The Bay at Nice; and The Secret Rapture. Of the title play, Frank Rich of The New York Times said, &“The Secret Rapture has gone further than before in marrying political thought to the compelling drama of lives that refuse to conform to any ideology&’s utopian plan . . . Mr. Hare embraces the human, messy though it may be.&” Praise for David Hare Fanshen &“The nearest any English contemporary writer has come to emulating Brecht.&” —Financial Times A Map of the World &“Mr. Hare&’s A Map of the World, which passionately embraces utopia without arrogantly presuming to annex it, is original and provocative.&” —The New York Times Saigon &“An impressive new film which vividly captures the last desperate days in Vietnam as the Reds laid siege to the sweltering city.&” —Daily Express The Bay at Nice &“Witty, cerebral, and full of fine-spun ironies.&” —The Guardian The Secret Rapture &“His writing, as always, is smart, and this time, glorious. The characters are unhackneyed and complex; the insights are tough and hard to ignore.&” —New York Newsday
Secrets of a Soccer Mom
by Kathleen ClarkFull Length, Comedy / 3 f / Exterior / Formerly titled: Soccer Moms. Three engaging women reluctantly take the field in a mothers vs. sons soccer game. They intend to let the children win, but as the game unfolds they become intent on scoring. The competition ignites a fierce desire to recapture their youthful good-humor, independence and sexiness, paving the way toward a better understanding of themselves, their families and changes they need to make in their lives. "Let's hear it for Soccer Moms, a diverting comedy with a slick style and attention, holding crisp dialogue.''-The New York Times
Secrets of Acting Shakespeare: The Original Approach
by Patrick TuckerSecrets of Acting Shakespeare isn’t a book that gently instructs. It is a passionate, yes-you-can guide designed to prove that anybody can act Shakespeare. Patrick Tucker’s classic manual encourages trained and amateur actors alike to look to the original practices of the Elizabethan theatre for inspiration. He explores the ‘cue scripts’ used by actors, who knew only their own lines, to demonstrate the extraordinary way that these plays work by ear. This updated second edition includes: A section dedicated to the modes of address 'thee‘ and 'you‘ A brand new chapter on Original Practices and cue scripts An expanded genealogical chart, showing the interrelations of 92 different characters from the history plays A new discussion of Elizabethan acting spaces – balconies, gates, ramparts and even backstage areas Secrets of Acting Shakespeare is a must-read for actors intrigued by the ‘Original Approach’ to acting Shakespeare, or for anyone curious about how the Elizabethan theater worked.
Secrets of Screen Acting
by Patrick TuckerWhen it was first published in 1993, Secrets of Screen Acting broke new ground in explaining how acting for the camera is different from acting on stage. Reaction time is altered, physical timing and placement are reconceived, and the proportions of the digital frame itself become the measure of all things, so the director must conceptualize each image in terms of this new rectangle and actors must 'fit' into the frame. Based on a revolutionary non-Method approach to acting, this book shows what actually works: how an actor, an announcer--anyone working in front of the cameras--gives excellent performances on screen.Instead of starting with what is real and trying to wrestle that onto the screen, Patrick Tucker explains how to work with the realities of a shoot and work from there towards the real. His step-by-step guide to the elements of effective screen acting is an extension and explanation of a lifetime of work in the field, containing over 50 acting exercises and the tried-and-tested Screen Acting Checklist. As well as being completely updated to cover new techniques, film references and insights, this third edition now includes a set of Film Clip Time Codes for each film. These not only itemise the films discussed in each chapter, but also pinpoint the precise moments where each example can be found so that students, teachers, and professional actors can refer to them quickly and easily.
Secrets of Screen Acting Third Edition
by Patrick TuckerWhen it was first published in 1993, Secrets of Screen Acting broke new ground in explaining how acting for the camera is different from acting on stage. Reaction time is altered, physical timing and placement are reconceived, and the proportions of the digital frame itself become the measure of all things, so the director must conceptualize each image in terms of this new rectangle and actors must 'fit' into the frame. Based on a revolutionary non-Method approach to acting, this book shows what actually works: how an actor, an announcer--anyone working in front of the cameras--gives excellent performances on screen.
See Bob Run & Wild Abandon
by Daniel MacivorBob is on the road. Bob is on the run. But from what, or whom, is she running? Follow Bob as she hops from car to car telling her story to unsuspecting drivers as she tries to put her life in the rear-view mirror. Will she make it to her destination? And what will she find when she gets there? Find out in the critically adored See Bob Run."...the ironic name stands in sharp contrast to this perceptive and thoroughly engrossing one-woman show." —Toronto StarIn Wild Abandon we are introduced to Steve, a man alone in the world. Steve is acerbic, opinionated, and desperate to figure himself out. As he recounts his life story, we follow Steve out the door of his strict Catholic home, through diners and bars and parks as we hear the tales that made the man. Wild Abandon is a story about running away, and about how to find your way home again."...a one-man show without valleys. It's a wonderful piece—honest, imaginative, profound, moving and very funny." —Carole Corbeil
See You In Bells
by Edie ClaireThe mother of the bride has every reason to panic. Three generations of Bower family weddings - three inexplicable disasters. Now, with the church building falling down, half the wedding party AWOL, and the bride's sisters still fighting over what happened at the last family wedding, daughter Jenna's nuptials seem hopelessly doomed. But peacemaking brother Brian is determined to end the sisters' feud - and the family curse. All he needs is to stage a rip-roaring intervention - and pray it turns divine!
Seeds
by Annabel SoutarPart courtroom drama and part social satire, Seeds presents an intelligent portrait of farming and scientific communities in conflict and at the same time penetrates the complex science of genetically modified crops. The play documents the 2004 Supreme Court of Canada showdown between Saskatchewan farmer Percy Schmeiser and biotech multinational Monsanto Inc., a David-and-Goliath struggle that cast Schmeiser as the small-farmer underdog fighting the unscrupulous major corporation. Monsanto accused him of growing their genetically patented Round-up Ready canola seeds on his property without paying the licensing fee they require. Through a suspenseful labyrinth of legal conflicts regarding patent rights, scientific showdowns about GM food and property clashes between farmers and the biotechnology industry, Seeds asks the essential question: "Can you patent a living thing?" Or as Schmeiser famously asked, "Who owns life?"A most interesting aspect of the play is the ambiguity around the hero Percy Schmeiser. Is he a victim or an opportunist and self-publicist? Certainly, he's no innocent; as he keeps telling us, he's an experienced politician, in fact an ex-mayor. He's a believer who knows how to frame his beliefs to advantage. He can be grand and he can be petty - and as such he is antihero as much as hero.Named the top play of the decade by Rover Arts in its review of English theatre in Montreal between 2000 and 2010, Seeds takes us back to the seminal moment when a single farmer stood up to international agribusiness and almost won.Cast of 4 women and 3 men.
Seeing Cinderella
by Jenny LundquistMagical realism and a modern Cinderella story makes for a fun and relatable M!X read.Sixth grade is not going well for Calliope Meadow Anderson. Callie's hair is frizzy, her best friend, Ellen, is acting weird, and to top things off, she has to get glasses. And her new specs aren't even cute, trendy glasses--more like hideously large and geeky. But Callie soon discovers that her glasses have a special, magical perk: When she wears them, she can read people's thoughts. Crazy glasses aside, Callie has more drama to face when she's cast as the lead in the school play--and instead opts to be an understudy, giving the role of Cinderella to Ellen. Can Callie's magic glasses help her see her way to leading lady, or is she destined to stay in the background forever?
Seeing Cinderella
by Jenny LundquistMagical realism and a modern Cinderella story makes for a fun and relatable M!X read.Sixth grade is not going well for Calliope Meadow Anderson. Callie's hair is frizzy, her best friend, Ellen, is acting weird, and to top things off, she has to get glasses. And her new specs aren't even cute, trendy glasses--more like hideously large and geeky. But Callie soon discovers that her glasses have a special, magical perk: When she wears them, she can read people's thoughts. Crazy glasses aside, Callie has more drama to face when she's cast as the lead in the school play--and instead opts to be an understudy, giving the role of Cinderella to Ellen. Can Callie's magic glasses help her see her way to leading lady, or is she destined to stay in the background forever?
Seeing Shakespeare’s Style (Routledge Studies in Early Modern Authorship)
by Douglas BrusterSeeing Shakespeare’s Style offers new ways for readers to perceive Shakespeare and, by extension, literary texts generally. Organized as a series of studies of Shakespeare’s plays and poems, poetry and prose, it looks at the inner functioning of language and form in works from all phases of this writer’s career. Because the very concept of literary style has dropped out of so many of our conversations about writing, we need new ways to understand how words, phrases, speeches, and genres in literature work. Responding to this need, this book shows how visual representations of writing can lead to a deeper understanding of language’s textures and effects. Beginning with chapters that a beginning reader of Shakespeare can benefit from, its second half puts these tools to use in more in-depth examinations of Shakespeare’s language and style. Although focused on Shakespeare’s works, and the works of his contemporaries, this book provides tools for all readers of literature by defining style as material, graphic, and shaped by the various media in which all writers work.
Seeing Stars in Dixie
by Ron OsborneComedic Drama / 1m, 4f / It's 1956 and Hollywood has arrived in Natchez, Mississippi with its brightest stars to film Raintree County . Meanwhile at Clemmie's, a Natchez tea room, the widowed proprietor who has a fascination with movies and a secret admirer, oversees her own cast of characters: Tootie, her take charge friend; Jo Beth, a former beauty queen; Glease, a man more comfortable with women than macho men, and Marjorie, an unethical social climber. Competition for a small role in the movie brings out the best and worst of these memorable characters. Twists, turns and revelations lead Clemmie to trade a moment of fame for love and the chance to impact the lives of people dear to her. Originally produced at the Sonoma County Repertory Theatre in Sebastopol, CA.
Seeing Theater: The Phenomenology of Classical Greek Drama
by Naomi WeissThis is the first book to approach the visuality of ancient Greek drama through the lens of theater phenomenology. Gathering evidence from tragedy, comedy, satyr play, and vase painting, Naomi Weiss argues that, from its very beginnings, Greek theater in the fifth century BCE was understood as a complex interplay of actuality and virtuality. Classical drama frequently exposes and interrogates potential viewing experiences within the theatron—literally, "the place for seeing." Weiss shows how, in so doing, it demands distinctive modes of engagement from its audiences. Examining plays and pottery with attention to the instability and ambiguity inherent in visual perception, Seeing Theater provides an entirely new model for understanding this ancient art form.
Seeing Things
by Alan AckermanA technological revolution has changed the way we see things. The storytelling media employed by Pixar Animation Studios, Samuel Beckett, and William Shakespeare differ greatly, yet these creators share a collective fascination with the nebulous boundary between material objects and our imaginative selves. How do the acts of seeing and believing remain linked? Alan Ackerman charts the dynamic history of interactions between showing and knowing in Seeing Things, a richly interdisciplinary study which illuminates changing modes of perception and modern representational media.Seeing Things demonstrates that the airy nothings of A Midsummer Night's Dream, the Ghost in Hamlet, and soulless bodies in Beckett's media experiments, alongside Toy Story's digitally animated toys, all serve to illustrate the modern problem of visualizing, as Hamlet put it, 'that within which passes show.' Ackerman carefully analyses such ghostly appearances and disappearances across cultural forms and contexts from the early modern period to the present, investigating the tension between our distrust of shadows and our abiding desire to believe in invisible realities. Seeing Things provides a fresh and surprising cultural history through theatrical, verbal, pictorial, and cinematic representations.
Seidman & Son
by Elick MollComedy \ 9 m., 10 f. \ 5 Ints. \ Morris Seidman is a lovable guy who has come up the hard way. His daughter is boy crazy and his son is a militant idealist. Morris has problems at work, too, due to hiring his son. Morris not only loses one of his biggest buyers, but loses some of his most valuable workers. But he did not get to his present position without resources, and in his genial way he concludes about his son that every generation has to learn from its own experiences.
Seite A und Seite B - Patchwork einer Liebesgeschichte
by Cesar Rodrigo Mendonca da CostaRobert entdeckt die Leidenschaft seines Lebens nachdem Jennifer in das Haus gegenüber zieht. Eine unschuldige Liebesgeschichte entfaltet sich zwischen ihnen, voller Begegnungen, Missverständnissen, Freuden und Trauer. Als die Beziehung des Paares sich endlich zum Guten wendet, ist dann plötzlich doch nicht mehr alles so, wie es scheint, denn jede Geschichte hat nicht nur eine Seite. Dieses Buch von Cesar Costa bringt eine dramatische Handlung mit überraschender Wendung und unerwartetem Ausgang mit sich. Wie weit kann eine bedingungslose Liebe gehen? Genre: Romantik, Drama Schlüsselwörter: Cesar Costa, Romantik, Drama, Seite A und Seite B, überraschende Wendung, Überraschunge
Selected Plays: George Shiels
by Christopher MurrayContains The Retrievers (hitherto unpublished), Professor Tim, The New Gossoon, The Passing Day, The Rugged Path, and The Summit, bibliographical checklist. George Shiels (1886-1949) was one of the most prolific and most successful playwrights in the history of the Abbey Theatre. Before his debut at the Abbey, Shiels's early work was staged by the Ulster Literary Theatre in Belfast and later on his work was taken up by the dynamic Group Theatre, also in Belfast. As a Northerner, Shiels embraced the whole island in his work, his use of dialect and his characterisation. Moreover, while his plays were broadly popular and wonderfully well suited to the acting talents of theatre companies North and South, his all-Ireland perspective lent his work a keen critical edge masked by easy realism and hilarious comedy. Nowadays, we turn to the dark comedy of a play like The Passing Day to re-adjust our view of Shiels and to see his plays as seriously concerned with the land question and issues of identity, gender and the law in post-colonial Ireland. From that perspective, The New Gossoon and in particular The Rugged Path (which in 1940 broke all previous box-office receipts at the Abbey, when the production played for an unprecedented twelve weeks, all previous plays having been limited to two) challenge us to look again at Shiels and see him as public commentator as well as consummate entertainer.
Selected Plays (Penguin Modern Classics)
by William YeatsThe 18 plays are: The Shadowy Waters; Cathleen in Houlihan; The Hour Glass; On Baile's Strabd; The Green Helmet; Deirdre; At the Hawk's Well; The Dreaming of the Bones; The Cat and the Moon; The Only Jealousy of Emer; Calvary; Sophocles' King Oedipus; The Resurrection; The Words Upon the Windwo-FPane; The King of the Great Clock Tower; The herne's Egg; Purgatory; The Death of Cuchulain.
The Selected Plays of Hélène Cixous
by Hélène CixousCixous' work as a playwright - working mainly with Theatre du Soleil and their director Ariane Mnouchkine - establishes her as a participant in some of the most adventurous European theatre making of the last 40 years.This collection brings together for the first time, four translations into English of Helene Cixous' plays. It is a unique and extraordinary resource for scholars, students and theatre-makers. The collection includes: *The Perjured City, translated by Bernadette Fort*Black Sail, White Sail, translated by Donald Watson*Portrait of Dora, translated by Ann Liddle*Drums on the Dam, translated by Judith G. Miller and Brian J. MalletThis exciting new anthology will disseminate her work to a wide and receptive English-speaking audience.