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Searching for Juliet: The Lives and Deaths of Shakespeare's First Tragic Heroine
by Sophie Duncan'A thirteen-year-old girl is at a party. A boy, slightly older, sees her. Juliet. This book is about that girl.'A cultural, historical and literary exploration of the birth, death and legacy of the ultimate romantic heroine - Shakespeare's Juliet Capulet.Juliet Capulet is the heartbeat of the world's most famous love story. She is an enduring romantic icon. And she is a captivating, brilliant, passionate teenage girl who is read and interpreted afresh by each new generation.Searching for Juliet takes us from the Renaissance origin stories behind William Shakespeare's child bride to the boy actor who inspired her creation onstage. From enslaved people in the Caribbean to Italian fascists in Verona, and real-life lovers in Afghanistan. From the Victorian stage to 1960s cinema, Baz Luhrmann and beyond.Sophie Duncan draws on rich cultural and historical sources and new research to explore the legacy and reach of Romeo and Juliet far beyond the literary sphere. With warmth, wit and insight, she shows us why Juliet is for now, for ever, for everyone.(P)2023 Hodder & Stoughton Limited
Searching for Juliet: The Lives and Deaths of Shakespeare's First Tragic Heroine
by Sophie Duncan'Witty and scholarly'JONATHAN BATE, SUNDAY TELEGRAPH'Thrilling'GUARDIAN'Illuminating . . . as vital and provocative as the character herself'LITERARY REVIEW'Buoyant'TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT'An astonishing tour-de-force'MARION TURNER, author of The Wife of Bath: A BiographyWho is Juliet Capulet?Daughter of VeronaLovestruck TeenagerRomantic IconTragic HeroineRebelSearching for Juliet takes us from the Renaissance origin stories behind Shakespeare's child bride to enslaved people in the Caribbean, Italian fascists in Verona, and real-life lovers in Afghanistan. From the Victorian stage to 1960s cinema, Baz Luhrmann, and beyond. Drawing on rich cultural and historical sources and new research, Sophie Duncan shows us why Juliet is for now, for ever, for everyone.
Seascape
by Edward AlbeeDealing with an almost surreal Howard Hughes-like figure, a bearded recluse who is the richest man in the world, this often comic and brilliantly revealing allegory continues the playwright's preoccupation with the mythic aspects of American life. <P><P> Pulitzer Prize Winner
Seascape: The Entire Appalling Business
by Edward Albee“Hats off, and up in the air! A major dramatic event.” The New York Times On the heels of the success of Edward Albee’s The Collected Plays of Edward Albee, Overlook brings back—in a stand-alone volume—one of Albee’s most cherished plays, a fantastic story of what it means to be alive—winner of the 1975 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. On a deserted stretch of beach, a middle-aged couple relaxes after a picnic lunch and converse idly about home, family, and their life together. She sketches; he naps. Then, suddenly, they are joined by two sea creatures, a pair of lizards from the depths of the ocean, with whom they engage in a fascinating dialogue. The emotional and intellectual reverberations of this bizarre conversation will linger in the heart and the mind long after the curtain falls—or the last page is turned.
Seascape with Sharks and Dancer
by Don NigroDrama / Casting: 1m, 1f / Scenery: Interior This fine work in the Pendragon cycle of plays enjoyed a sold out, critically acclaimed production at the world famous Oregon Shakespeare Festival. The play is set in a beach bungalow. The young man who lives there has pulled a lost young woman from the ocean. Soon, she finds herself trapped in his life and torn between her need to come to rest somewhere and her certainty that all human relationships turn eventually into nightmares. The struggle between his tolerant and gently ironic approach to life and her strategy of suspicion and attack becomes a kind of war about love and creation which neither can afford to lose. This is an offbeat, wonderful love story. Note: The play contains a wealth of excellent monologue and scene material.
Second Chance Summer
by Sarah KapitBreaking up is hard to do, especially when it's with your best friend. Can these two ex-besties survive summer camp together? Maddie and Chloe have always been best friends, until last year, when Chloe’s popularity and budding fame as an actor left Maddie in the dust one too many times. Their friendship is over, and they’re both ready to move on.But when the girls arrive at summer camp, they discover that the universe isn’t ready to let go of this friendship just yet: They’re cabinmates, and each of them has to spend the summer with her ex–best friend. Is it time to try again, or are they doomed to drift apart for good?
Second Lady
by Jack SharkeyComedy / 3m, 4f / Interior / Thanks to an idiotic childhood promise, Presidential candidate Andrew Wright is engaged to Bertha Desiree Sprock a lady as lovely as her name. His unscrupulous campaign manager convinces Bertha she is the target of assassins and he cajoles Veronica Parkhurst, an absolute doll, to stand in for Bertha at the convention. Veronica so captivates the delegates that they want her as Andrew's running mate and Andrew and Veronica fall in love. Will Bertha spill the beans and destroy Andrew's career if he doesn't marry her? What is the codeword that causes the Secret Service to blast anyone who leaves the hotel suite? Why would the Queen of England audition for the Dallas cheerleaders? Where do you find a hotel chef who can provide hemlock? This is one of the most hyperactive political satires ever to romp across a stage.
The Second Part of King Henry IV (The New Cambridge Shakespeare)
by William Shakespeare Giorgio MelchioriMelchiori offers a fresh approach to the text of The Second Part of King Henry IV, which he sees as an unplanned sequel to the First Part, itself a 'remake' of an old, non-Shakespearean play. The Second Part deliberately exploits the popular success of Sir John Falstaff, introduced in Part One; the resulting rich humour gives a comic dimension to the play which makes it a unique blend of history, morality play and comedy. Among modern editions of the play this is the one most firmly based on the quarto. It presents an eminently actable text, by showing how Shakespeare's own choices are superior for practical purposes to suggested emendations, and by keeping interference in the original stage directions to a minimum, in order to respect, as Shakespeare did, the players' freedom. This updated edition includes a new introductory section by Adam Hansen describing recent stage, film and critical interpretations.
The Second Part of King Henry the Fourth
by William ShakespearePicking up where Henry IV, Part One left off after the Battle of Shrewsbury, Henry IV, Part Two is the story of England's King Henry IV during his final months of life, his reconciliation with his wayward heir, and his eventual death.
The Second Part of King Henry the Sixth
by William ShakespeareShakespeare's Henry VI plays dramatize contemporary as much as Elizabethan issues: the struggle for power, the manoeuvres of politicians, social unrest, and civil war.
Second Summer
by Gary RichardsComedy / 2m, 3f / Interiors / A good natured, affable man embittered by the death of his beloved wife reluctantly sells his business and home in Brooklyn and moves to Florida. In what he thought would be "God's waiting room," he finds a world of new possibilities as single women his age flock to charm the new, available man. This play by the author of Dividends is about the rebirth of an elderly man who finds that the long dormant teenager in himself still exists. It celebrates the richness of the mature life experience in a warmhearted comedy that clearly demonstrates it's not how old you are, it's how your are old!
The Second Wave: British Drama for the Seventies (Routledge Revivals)
by John Russell TaylorIn the 1970s the revolution that had swept the British theatre in the 1950s had already become accepted as the new establishment. Areas that had been previously regarded as remote ideals - including permanent repertory companies, a lively provincial theatre and an extensive spread of avant-garde and fringe theatrical activities - were now considered commonplace. In this title, first published in 1971, John Russell Taylor assesses the prospects of the British theatre at the start of the 1970s and indicates its points of weakness and its strengths. In this context are placed the key figures among the Second Wave of dramatists, and detailed critical commentaries on the work of writers such as David Mercer, Tom Stoppard and Peter Terson. This is an indispensable introduction for any student with an interest in the history and development of the British theatre and the people who have played instrumental roles in this.
The Secret History of Magic: The True Story of the Deceptive Art
by Peter Lamont Jim SteinmeyerPull back the curtain on the real history of magic – and discover why magic really matters If you read a standard history of magic, you learn that it begins in ancient Egypt, with the resurrection of a goose in front of the Pharaoh. You discover how magicians were tortured and killed during the age of witchcraft. You are told how conjuring tricks were used to quell rebellious colonial natives. The history of magic is full of such stories, which turn out not to be true. Behind the smoke and mirrors, however, lies the real story of magic. It is a history of people from humble roots, who made and lost fortunes, and who deceived kings and queens. In order to survive, they concealed many secrets, yet they revealed some and they stole others. They engaged in deception, exposure, and betrayal, in a quest to make the impossible happen. They managed to survive in a world in which a series of technological wonders appeared, which previous generations would have considered magical. Even today, when we now take the most sophisticated technology for granted, we can still be astonished by tricks that were performed hundreds of years ago. The Secret History of Magic reveals how this was done. It is about why magic matters in a world that no longer seems to have a place for it, but which desperately needs a sense of wonder.
The Secret History of the Future
by James StillComedy \ 5m, 3f \ Unit set \ Originally produced at The Kennedy Center, this humorous journey into history sends three modern teens to 15th Century Spain. They befriend the heir to the throne, Mona Lisa and Leonardo da Vinci, confront the Inquisition and turn history on its ear. This ninety minute play has been successfully cast with both teens and adults and is popular with school and family audiences. \ "Shows a past which contains the future, and offers all the characters a wider, deeper world view."-- USA Today.
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.