Download or read book The Methuen Drama Book of 21st Century British Plays written by Joe Penhall and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2010-02-26 with total page 465 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection showcases the five best new plays from the first decade of the twenty-first century and perfectly reflects why British theatre is regarded as the epicenter of vitality, relevance and innovation in drama and the performing arts. Blue/Orange, Elmina's Kitchen, Neilson's Realism, Gone Too Far! and Pornography.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Book of Plays by Black British Writers written by Mustapha Matura and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2013-10-16 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Methuen Drama Book of Plays by Black British Writers provides an essential anthology of six of the key plays that have shaped the trajectory of British black theatre from the late-1970s to the present day. In doing so it charts the journey from specialist black theatre companies to the mainstream, including West End success, while providing a cultural and racial barometer for Britain during the last forty years. It opens with Mustapha Matura's 1979 play Welcome Home Jacko which in its depiction of a group of young unemployed West Indians was one of the first to explore issues of youth culture, identity and racial and cultural identification. Jackie Kay's Chiaroscuro examines debates about the politics of black, mixed race and lesbian identities in 1980s Britain, and from the 1990s Winsome Pinnock's Talking in Tongues engages with the politics of feminism to explore issues of black women's identity in Britian and Jamaica. From the first decade of the twenty-first century the three plays include Roy Williams' seminal pub-drama Sing Yer Hearts Out for the Lads, exploring racism and identity against the backdrop of the World Cup; Kwame Kwei-Armah's National Theatre play of 2004, Fix Up, about black cultural history and progress in modern Britain, and finally Bola Agbage's terrific 2007 debut, Gone Too Far!, which examines questions of identity and tensions between Africans and Caribbeans living in Britain. Edited by Lynnette Goddard, this important anthology provides an essential introduction to the last forty years of British black theatre.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Book of New American Plays written by David Adjmi and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2013-05-23 with total page 526 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Methuen Drama Book of New American Plays is an anthology of six outstanding plays from some of the most exciting playwrights currently receiving critical acclaim in the States. It showcases work produced at a number of the leading theatres during the last decade and charts something of the extraordinary range of current playwriting in America. It will be invaluable not only to readers and theatergoers in the U.S., but to those around the world seeking out new American plays and an insight into how U.S. playwrights are engaging with their current social and political environment. There is a rich collection of distinctive, diverse voices at work in the contemporary American theatre and this brings together six of the best, with work by David Adjmi, Marcus Gardley, Young Jean Lee, Katori Hall, Christopher Shinn and Dan LeFranc. The featured plays range from the intimate to the epic, the personal to the national and taken together explore a variety of cultural perspectives on life in America. The first play, David Adjmi's Stunning, is an excavation of ruptured identity set in modern day Midwood, Brooklyn, in the heart of the insular Syrian-Jewish community; Marcus Gardley's lyrical epic The Road Weeps, The Well Runs Dry deals with the migration of Black Seminoles, is set in mid-1800s Oklahoma and speaks directly to modern spirituality, relocation and cultural history; Young Jean Lee's Pullman, WA deals with self-hatred and the self-help culture in her formally inventive three-character play; Katori Hall's Hurt Village uses the real housing project of "Hurt Village" as a potent allegory for urban neglect set against the backdrop of the Iraq war; Christopher Shinn's Dying City melds the personal and political in a theatrical crucible that cracks open our response to 9/11 and Abu Graib, and finally Dan LeFranc's The Big Meal, an inter-generational play spanning eighty years, is set in the mid-west in a generic restaurant and considers family legacy and how some of the smallest events in life turn out to be the most significant.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Book of Suffrage Plays written by Naomi Paxton and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2013-03-28 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This anthology presents eight exciting comic pieces that arose from the the Suffrage Movement. Terrific for performance, it provides a variety of strong female parts, while also offering invaluable sources from the period, bringing history to life.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Guide to Contemporary British Playwrights written by Aleks Sierz and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2011-10-17 with total page 545 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Methuen Drama Guide to Contemporary British Playwrights is an authoritative guide to the work of twenty-five playwrights who have risen to prominence since the 1980s. Written by an international team of scholars, it will be invaluable to anyone interested in, studying or teaching contemporary drama. Among the many playwrights whose work is examined are Sarah Daniels, Terry Johnson, Martin Crimp, Sarah Kane, Anthony Neilson, Mark Ravenhill, Simon Stephens, Debbie Tucker Green, Tanika Gupta and Richard Bean. Each essay features: A biographical sketch and introduction to the playwright A discussion of their most important plays An analysis of their stylistic and thematic traits, the critical reception and their place in the discourses of British theatre A bibliography of texts and critical material
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Book of Trans Plays written by Azure D. Osborne-Lee and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2021-04-22 with total page 457 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Finalist in the 2022 Lambda Literary Awards for the LGBTQ Anthology category The Methuen Drama Book of Trans Plays for the Stage is the first play anthology to offer eight new plays by trans playwrights featuring trans characters. This edited collection establishes a canon of contemporary American trans theatre which represents a variety of performance modes and genres. From groundbreaking new work from across America's stages to unpublished work by new voices, these plays address themes such as gender identity and expression to racial and religious attitudes toward love and sex. Edited by Lindsey Mantoan, Angela Farr Schiller and Leanna Keyes, the plays selected explicitly call for trans characters as central protagonists in order to promote opportunities for trans performers, making this an original and necessary publication for both practical use and academic study. Sagittarius Ponderosa by MJ Kaufman The Betterment Society by Mashuq Mushtaq Deen how to clean your room by j. chavez She He Me by Raphaël Amahl Khouri The Devils Between Us by Sharifa Yasmin Doctor Voynich and Her Children by Leanna Keyes Firebird Tattoo by Ty Defoe Crooked Parts by Azure Osborne-Lee
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Book of Royal Court Plays 2000 2010 written by Ruth Little and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2010-07-02 with total page 465 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An essential anthology of five plays originally staged by what the New York Times described as "the most important theater in Europe"—The Royal Court.
Download or read book Elmina s Kitchen written by Kwame Kwei-Armah and published by Methuen Drama. This book was released on 2019-11-04 with total page 112 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: You can't just walk into dis bad man t'ing, you gotta learn the whole science of it. You step into that arena and you better be able to dance wid death til it mek you dizzy. Kwame Kwei-Armah's ground-breaking play about British black male identity and gang culture premiered at the National Theatre in 2003 to unanimous critical praise. It later transferred to the West End, making Kwei-Armah only the second black British playwright to have a play staged there and the winner of the Evening Standard's Most Promising Playwright Award. On Hackney's Murder Mile, Deli is trying to make a living as an honest man and revive the fortunes of his mother's West Indian takeaway. His 19-year-old son Ashley has different plans and longs to follow in the footsteps of family friend and local gangster Digger. As Deli finds himself and his business pulled further into the world he so desperately wants to leave behind questions of family and gang loyalty rise to the surface, leading to a shocking and conflicted conclusion. Elmina's Kitchen is a thrilling, engaging portrait of a one-parent family struggling to stay within the law that takes readers behind the headlines and shows how easy it is to make the wrong choices when you're struggling to survive. Elmina's Kitchen premiered at the National Theatre, London, in May 2003. Methuen Drama's iconic Modern Plays series began in 1959 with the publication of Shelagh Delaney's A Taste of Honey and has grown over six decades to now include more than 1000 plays by some of the best writers from around the world. This new special edition hardback of Elmina's Kitchen was published to celebrate 60 years of Methuen Drama's Modern Plays in 2019, chosen by a public vote and features a brand new foreword by Paterson Joseph.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Guide to Contemporary American Playwrights written by Christopher Innes and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2013-12-19 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Unrivalled in its coverage of recent work and writers, The Methuen Drama Guide to Contemporary American Playwrights surveys and analyses the breadth, vitality and development of theatrical work to emerge from America over the last fifty years. This authoritative guide leads you through the work of 25 major contemporary American playwrights, discussing more than 140 plays in detail. Written by a team of 25 eminent international scholars, each chapter provides: · a biographical introduction to the playwright's work; · a survey and concise analysis of the writer's most important plays; · a discussion of their style, dramaturgical concerns and critical reception; · a bibliography of published plays and a select list of critical works. Among the many Tony, Obie and Pulitzer prize-winning playwrights included are Sam Shepard, Tony Kushner, Suzan-Lori Parks, August Wilson, Paula Vogel and Neil LaBute. The abundance of work analysed enables fresh, illuminating conclusions to be drawn about the development of contemporary American playwriting.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Book of Naturalist Plays written by Henrik Ibsen and published by Methuen Drama. This book was released on 2010-10-01 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The study of Naturalist theatre remains a staple and often foundational part of the curriculum at all levels of drama education. This anthology of six of the most commonly studied and revived Naturalist plays from the European repertoire offers a unique compendium that will serve as required reading for drama courses and is ideal for theatre practitioners and fans. The selected plays perfectly reflect the formal and geographical diversity of Naturalist theatre as well as its major philosophical, political and theatrical preoccupations. A critical introduction by Dr Chris Megson contextualises the emergence of Naturalist theatre in the late nineteenth century, identifying its principal aims and methods; provides an analysis of the selected plays, mapping their key preoccupations, and ends by considering Naturalism's enduring legacy and resonance today.
Download or read book Social and Political Theatre in 21st Century Britain written by Vicky Angelaki and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2017-02-23 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In a context of financial crisis that has often produced a feeling of identity crisis for the individual, the theatre has provided a unifying forum, treating spectators as citizens. This book critically deals with representative plays and playwrights who have stood out in the UK and internationally in the post-recession era, delivering theatre that in the process of being truthful to the contemporary experience has also redefined theatrical form and content. Built around a series of case-studies of seminal contemporary plays exploring issues of social and political crisis, the volume is augmented by interviews with UK and international directors, artistic directors and the playwrights whose work is examined. As well as considering UK stage productions, Angelaki analyses European, North American and Australian productions, of post-2000 plays by writers including: Caryl Churchill, Mike Bartlett, Dennis Kelly, Simon Stephens, Martin Crimp, debbie tucker green, Duncan Macmillan, Nick Payne and Lucy Prebble. At the heart of the analysis and of the plays discussed is an appreciation of what interconnects artists and audiences, enabling the kind of mutual recognition that fosters the feeling of collectivity. As the book argues, this is the state whereby the theatre meets its social imperative by eradicating the distance between stage and spectator and creating a genuinely shared space of ideas and dialogue, taking on topics including the economy, materialism, debt culture, the environment, urban protest, social media and mental health. Social and Political Theatre in 21st-Century Britain demonstrates that such contemporary playwriting invests in and engenders moments of performative reciprocity and spirituality so as to present the audience with a cohesive collective experience.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Guide to Contemporary Irish Playwrights written by Martin Middeke and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2010-05-28 with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A thorough and insightful study of the work of twenty-five important Irish playwrights.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Book of Plays from the Sixties written by Arnold Wesker and published by Methuen Drama. This book was released on 2008 with total page 548 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection contains major works by some of the most important playwrights to emerge during the late fifties and early sixties, many of them collectively labelled "Angry Young Men", most of them associated with the Royal Court Theatre.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Book of Post Black Plays written by Eisa Davis and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2012-12-20 with total page 512 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Post-black' refers to an emerging trend within black arts to find new and multiple expressions of blackness, unburdened by the social and cultural expectations of blackness of the past and moving beyond the conventional binary of black and white. Reflecting this multiplicity of perspectives, the plays in this collection explode the traditional ways of representing black families on the American stage, and create new means to consider the interplay of race, with questions of class, gender, and sexuality. They engage and critique current definitions of black and African-American identity, as well as previous limitations placed on what constitutes blackness and black theatre. Written by the emerging stars of American theatre such as Eisa Davis and Marcus Gardley, the plays explore themes as varied as family and individuality, alienation and gentrification, and reconciliation and belonging. They demonstrate a wide-range of formal and structural innovations for the American theatre, and reflect the important ways in which contemporary playwrights are expanding the American dramatic canon with new and diverse means of representation. Edited by two leading US scholars in black drama, Harry J. Elam Jr (Stanford) and Douglas A. Jones Jr (Princeton), this cutting edge anthology gathers together some of the most exciting new American plays, selected by a rigorous academic backbone and explored in depth by supporting critical material.
Download or read book The Methuen Drama Anthology of Modern Asian Plays written by Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr. and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2014-05-22 with total page 528 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A companion volume to Modern Asian Theatre and Performance 1900–2000, this anthology contains nine emblematic scripts from twentieth and twenty-first century Asian theatre. Opening with a history of modern Asian drama and a summary of the plays and their contexts, it features nine works written between 1912 and 2009 in Japan, China, Korea, India, Indonesia and Vietnam. Showcasing fresh contemporary writing alongside plays central to the established canon, the collection surveys each playwright's work, and includes: Father Returns by Kikuchi Kan Hot Pepper, Air Conditioner and the Farewell Speech by Okada Toshiki Sunrise by Cao Yu I Love XXX by Meng Jinghui, Huang Jingang, Wang Xiaoli, Shi Hang Bicycle by O Tae-sok The Post Office by Rabindranath Tagore Hayavadana by Girish Karnad The Struggle of the Naga Tribe by W. S. Rendra Truong Ba's Soul in the Butcher's Skin by Luu Quang Vu The chronological and geographical breadth of the anthology provides a unique insight into modern Asian theatre and is essential to any understanding of its relation to Western drama and indigenous performance.
Download or read book Audition Speeches for 6 16 Year Olds written by Jean Marlow and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2009-10-26 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Intended for students and children taking part in speech and drama competitions and exams, this book contains a range of audition speeches. It includes female, male and unisex speeches selected from both plays and children's books. Where relevant the author has indicated how a speech could be shortened for younger children. There is also an introductory section with contributions from Alan Ayckbourn, Carol Schroder (teacher and examiner for the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art), Richard Carpenter (TV writer) and Ed Wilson (Director of the National Youth Theatre) and senior casting directors for the RSC, TV and film. This edition has been freshly revised to include 10 new speeches from well known recent productions as well as children's books including Harry Potter. 'A superb compilation' Amateur Stage
Download or read book Theatre Games written by Clive Barker and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2010-05-01 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A practical guide to using theatre games for actor training which includes a DVD with original footage of the author putting the techniques into action.
