Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike

Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service, Inc.
ISBN: 0822228637
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 86

Book Description
Middle-aged siblings Vanya and Sonia share a home in Bucks County, PA, where they bicker and complain about the circumstances of their lives. Suddenly, their movie-star sister, Masha, swoops in with her new boy toy, Spike. Old resentments flare up, eventually leading to threats to sell the house. Also on the scene are sassy maid Cassandra, who can predict the future, and a lovely young aspiring actress named Nina, whose prettiness somewhat worries the imperious Masha.

Laughing Wild

Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service Inc
ISBN: 9780822215288
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 92

Book Description
THE STORY: In the first section of the play, a Woman enters and embarks on an increasingly frenetic (and funny) recital of the perils and frustrations of daily life in urban America--waiting in line, rude taxi drivers, inane talk shows and the selfi

The Marriage of Bette and Boo

Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Grove Press
ISBN: 0802188915
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 91

Book Description
A painfully funny, Obie Award-winning play about the tragedy and comedy of family life. Never have marriage and the family been more scathingly or hilariously savaged than in this brilliant black comedy. The Marriage of Bette and Boo brings together two of the maddest families in creation in a portrait album of life’s uncertainties and confusion. Bereaved by miscarriages, undermined by their families, separated by alcoholism, assaulted by disease, and mystified by their priest, Bette and Boo, in their bewildered attempts to provide a semblance of hearth and home, are portrayed with a poignant compassion that enriches and enlarges the play, and makes clear why Christopher Durang has become one of the great names in American theater. “One of the most explosively funny American dramatists.”—Newsweek

Golden Child

Author: David Henry Hwang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service, Inc.
ISBN: 9780822216827
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 60

Book Description
THE STORY: In the winter of 1918, progressive Chinese landowner Eng Tieng-Bin's interest in Westernization and Christianity sets off a power struggle among his three wives, which will determine the future of his daughter, Ahn, Tieng-Bin's favorite,

Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them

Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Open Road + Grove/Atlantic
ISBN: 0802194419
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 230

Book Description
“[A] hilarious and disturbing new comedy about all-American violence” and other whip-smart political satires by the Tony Award-winning playwright (Ben Branley, The New York Times). Christopher Durang, who The New York Observer called “Jonathan Swift’s nicer, younger brother,” became one of America’s most beloved and acclaimed playwrights by marrying gonzo farce with incisive social critique. Now collected in Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them and Other Political Plays are Durang’s most revealing satirical plays. Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them is the story of a young woman in crisis: Is her new husband, whom she married when drunk, a terrorist? Or just crazy? Or both? Is her father’s hobby of butterfly collecting really a cover for his involvement in a shadow government? Does her mother frequent the theater for mental escape, or is she just insane? Add in a minister who directs porno, and a ladylike operative whose underwear just won’t stay up, and this black comedy will make us laugh all the way to the waterboarding room. Also included in this volume are: Excerpts from Sex and Longing Cardinal O’Connor The Book of Leviticus Show Entertaining Mr. Helms The Doctor Will See You Now Under Duress: Words on Fire An Alter Boy Talks to God The Hardy Boys and the Mystery of Where Babies Come From

Betty's Summer Vacation

Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service Inc
ISBN: 9780822217664
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 92

Book Description
THE STORY: Betty is looking forward to her summer share at the ocean. But Trudy, whom she knows only slightly, chatters incessantly; and then there are the other housemates--sexy lout Buck, who's pathologically on the make with women all the time, a

Baby with the Bathwater

Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service Inc
ISBN: 9780822200840
Category : American drama
Languages : en
Pages : 68

Book Description
THE STORY: As the play begins Helen and John gaze proudly at their new offspring, a bit disappointed that it doesn't speak English and too polite to check its sex. So they decide that the child is a girl and name it Daisy--which leads to all manner

Christopher Durang Explains it All for You

Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Grove Press
ISBN: 9780802132321
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 326

Book Description
Few playwrights have explored as relentlessly as Christopher Durang the pain and confusion of everyday life--or made us laugh so uproariously at the results. Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You, the center of a storm of controversy for its satire of misplaced trust in religious authority," remains as powerful today as when it was originally produced. The excruciatingly funny The Nature and Purpose of the Universe asks whether Eleanor Mann's Job-like suffering is really her fault, while Titanic takes us into the heart of children's anger with their parents and parents' manipula-tion of their children. In Beyond Therapy, two horrifyingly human therapists pursue their own needs at the expense of the most mismatched couple ever to meet through a personal ad. Also including 'Dentity Crisis and The Actor's Nightmare, this collection demonstrates that laughter is the best surgery, slicing through prejudice and hypocrisy, cutting out dead beliefs and inflamed opinions. These dark comedies, lit by lightning bolts of truth and humor, are among the most illuminating in American drama, by "one of the most explosively funny American dramatists" (Newsweek). Includes: The Nature and Purpose of the Universe 'Dentity Crisis Titanic The Actor's Nightmare Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You Beyond Therapy

Durang/Durang

Author: Christopher Durang
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service, Inc.
ISBN: 9780822214601
Category : Theater
Languages : en
Pages : 148

Book Description
...eloquently dramatizes questions of responsibility, guilt and pathology...the complex moral issues are translated into challenging story theater, like a cubist portrait of grief...Homage must be paid, this grieving mother cries to the stars, and Medoff answe The mysteries of life, death and survival in the city, of friendships among women and relationships between the sexes are explored...in Jacquelyn Reingold's GIRL GONE...the playwright display[s] admirable talent and generate[s] plenty of interest, tension an

Fish in the Dark

Author: Larry David
Publisher: Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
ISBN: 0802191282
Category : Humor
Languages : en
Pages : 82

Book Description
From the comic genius behind Curb Your Enthusiasm—a play with “a perfect second-act twist, and a solid last-minute kicker” (Vulture). Fish in the Dark marked Seinfeld co-creator Larry David’s playwriting debut, his Broadway debut—and his first time acting on stage since eighth grade. David starred as Norman Drexel, a man in his fifties who is average in most respects, except for his hyperactive libido. As Norman, his more successful brother Arthur, their elderly mother, and a host of other characters try to navigate the death of a loved one, old acquaintances and unsettled arguments resurface—with hilarious consequences.