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Aeschylus: Libation Bearers (Companions to Greek and Roman Tragedy)
by C. W. MarshallLibation Bearers is the 'middle' play in the only extant tragic trilogy to survive from antiquity, Aeschylus' Oresteia, first produced in 458 BCE. This introduction to the play will be useful for anyone reading it in Greek or in translation. Drawing on his wide experience teaching about performance in the ancient world, C. W. Marshall helps readers understand how the play was experienced by its ancient audience. His discussion explores the impact of the chorus, the characters, theology, and the play's apparent affinities with comedy. The architecture of choral songs is described in detail. The book also investigates the role of revenge in Athenian society and the problematic nature of Orestes' matricide. Libation Bearers immediately entered the Athenian visual imagination, influencing artistic depictions on red-figured vases, and inspiring plays by Euripides and Sophocles. This study looks to the later plays to show how 5th-century audiences understood Libation Bearers. Modern reception of the play is integrated into the analysis. The volume includes a full range of ancillary material, providing a list of relevant red-figure vase illustrations, a glossary of technical terms, and a chronology of ancient and modern theatrical versions.
Lovesong of the Electric Bear (Modern Plays)
by Snoo WilsonNothing is stronger than this love, for I am nothing indeed without you, MasterAwoken from his deathbed by his favourite childhood teddy bear, Turing is led by the hand through the journey of his life, from glowing academia to New York drag bars, from triumph to disgrace. Snoo Wilson's Lovesong of the Electric Bear is an epic, psychedelic and electrifying trip through the life of Alan Turing, the computer visionary and maths genius whose gifts made him the code-breaking hero of World War II, but whose homosexuality led him to betrayal and vilification by the very establishment who had depended on him for victory. Lovesong of the Electric Bear is a wonderfully imaginative, comic and moving play from one of British theatre's great voices. The edition publishes to coincide with the European premiere at the Hope Theatre, London, on 24 February 2015.
Beyond Caring (Modern Plays)
by Alexander ZeldinI'm a hard worker. I don't push him to the . . . You know I don't go out for breaks when I'm not supposed to. I don't stay in the loo when I'm not supposed to. If I was that kind of person I could have him done for discrimination . . . I just get on with things you know.Four people arrive to work the night shift in a meat factory. They meet for the first time. They are employed as cleaners by a temp agency. They are all on zero-hours contracts.Every shift, they clean. Every four hours, they take a break. They drink tea or coffee together. They read magazines. They chat. As it gets light, they go home or to another job. The cycle goes on. And on. Strangers. Until something stirs, until isolated people get too close to one another, too fast.Alexander Zeldin's brutally honest and darkly humorous play, written through devising with the ensemble of the premiere production, exposes stories of an invisible class. It received its world premiere at The Yard on 1 July 2014 and transferred to the National Theatre's Temporary Theatre on 28 April 2015.
Pioneer (Modern Plays)
by Curious DirectiveWe have all stared up at the stars and desperately tried to put into words what it is that we are feeling. This mission is an articulation of that wonder. It's 2029: the first human mission to Mars has disappeared without a trace; a reclusive Indian billionaire has funded Ghara I, a new attempt to achieve this dream; in Siberia, two Russian brothers reconnect by driving a Lada Sputnik 1.3 in search of the birth of space travel; at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, Maartje holds on to a secret about her sister;and on Mars, Imke and Oskar, a young Dutch couple, are mysteriously separated.Pioneer shuttles you from the Garden of Eden to mission control, and on to the surface of Mars.A sci-fi thriller, this edition was published to coincide with curious directive's national tour, which opened in March 2015.
The Armour (Modern Plays)
by Ben EllisBecause power is fragile, it requires you naked. That is why the most powerful people in the world have sex in hotels. In fact, having sex in the best hotels makes you powerful. It doesn't matter how good the sex is, only how good the hotel is.Featuring three duologues, set in 2015, 1970 and 1981, all within the walls of London's Langham Hotel, The Armour is a site-specific drama about the lasting and changing effects of empire. The play received its world premiere at The Langham Hotel, in a promenade production, on 3 March 2015.
A Director's Guide to Stanislavsky's Active Analysis: Including the Formative Essay on Active Analysis by Maria Knebel
by James ThomasA Director's Guide to Stanislavsky's Active Analysis describes Active Analysis, the innovative rehearsal method Stanislavsky formulated in his final years. By uniting 'mental analysis' and 'études', Active Analysis puts an end to the problem of mind-body dualism and formalized text memorization that traditional rehearsal methods foster. The book describes Active Analysis both practically and conceptually; Part One guides the reader through the entire process of Active Analysis, using A Midsummer Night's Dream as a practical reference point. The inspiration here is the work of the Russian director Anatoly Efros, whose pioneering work led the way for a reawakening of theatre in post-Soviet Russia. Part Two is the first English translation of Maria Knebel's foundational article about Active Analysis. Knebel was hand-selected by Stanislavsky to carry his final work forward in unadulterated form for succeeding generations of directors and actors. A Director's Guide to Stanislavsky's Active Analysis provides the first detailed explanation of Active Analysis from the director's perspective, while also meeting the needs of actors who seek to enhance their creative involvement in the process of play production.
In Place of a Show: What Happens Inside Theatres When Nothing Is Happening
by Augusto CorrieriIn Place of a Show is a compelling account of Western theatre buildings in the 21st century: theatres stripped of their primary purpose, lying empty, preserved as museums, or demolished. Playfully combining first-person narratives, scholarly research and visual documents, Augusto Corrieri explores the material and imaginative potentials of these places, charting interconnections between humans, birds, vegetation, and the beguiling animations of inanimate things, such as walls, curtains and seats. Across four chapters we learn of the uncanny dismantling and reconstitution of a German Baroque auditorium during the Second World War; the phantasmal remains of a demolished music hall in London's East End; a Renaissance Italian theatre, fleetingly transformed into an aviary by the appearance of a swallow; and a lavish opera house emerging from the Amazon rainforest. In these pages we are invited to discover theatres as sites of anomalous encounters and surprising coincidences: places that might reveal the performative entanglement of human and nonhuman worlds.
Chicken Dust (Modern Plays)
by Ben WeatherillOh this ain't a farm. This is a loading dock. No such things as farms anymore, not around here.A chicken farm in rural England. New boy Tim has just arrived for his first shift. The job is pretty simple: grab chickens seven at a time by their legs and ram them into cages for shipping. All of this in the dark, stomping around in ankle-deep chicken shit, muck and mud. Tim's teammates are old-timers, with cigarettes dangling from their lips and pantyhose up their arms to protect their skin. Feathers cling to clothes. This band of survivors doesn't want much: just to stay in the countryside, catch the chickens, and earn the best living they can.But the chickens are dying, rotting from the inside-out like hot fruit just hours after they arrive. As disease spreads and pressure mounts, enter Oscar, the meticulous poultry inspector . . .A hard-hitting exploration of the human cost of our enormous appetite for cheap meat.Winner of the Curve Leicester's Playwriting Competition and first seen as a staged reading at the Finborough Theatre's annual Vibrant: A Festival of Finborough Playwrights, Chicken Dust marks the full-length debut of a new playwright. It received its world premiere at the Finborough Theatre on 1 March 2015.
Stage Directions and Shakespearean Theatre
by Gillian Woods Sarah DustagheerWhat do 'stage directions' do in early modern drama? Who or what are they directing: action on the stage, or imagination via the page? Is the label 'stage direction' helpful or misleading? Do these 'directions' provide evidence of Renaissance playhouse practice? What happens when we put them at the centre of literary close readings of early modern plays? Stage Directions and Shakespearean Theatre investigates these problems through innovative research by a range of international experts. This collection of essays examines the creative possibilities of stage directions and and their implications for actors and audiences, readers and editors, historians and contemporary critics. Looking at the different ways stage directions make meaning, this volume provides new insights into a range of Renaissance plays.
The Art of Theatrical Sound Design: A Practical Guide (Backstage)
by Victoria DeiorioEmphasising the artistry behind the decisions made by theatrical sound designers, this guide is for anyone seeking to understand the nature of sound and how to apply it to the stage. Through tried-and-tested advice and lessons in practical application, The Art of Theatrical Sound Design allows developing artists to apply psychology, physiology, sociology, anthropology and all aspects of sound phenomenology to theatrical sound design. Structured in three parts, the book explores, theoretically, how human beings perceive the vibration of sound; offers exercises to develop support for storytelling by creating an emotional journey for the audience; considers how to collaborate and communicate as a theatre artist; and discusses how to create a cohesive sound design for the stage.
The Rolling Stone (Modern Plays)
by Chris UrchOne day you're you. The next you're – I can't even say the word. Dembe and Sam have been seeing each other for a while. They should be wondering where this is going and when to introduce each other to their families. But they're gay and this is Uganda. The consequences of their relationship being discovered will be violent and explosive. Especially for Dembe, whose brother goes into the pulpit each week to denounce the evils of one man loving another.A Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting winner in 2013, The Rolling Stone received its world premiere at the Royal Exchange, Manchester, on 21 April 2015.
The Flannelettes (Modern Plays)
by Richard CameronShe could teach more folk round 'ere about what's bloody well important in their lives - when it comes down to it. What matters . . . That precious bit of you that gets buried in shit, and she's there clearin' it all away.Delie is special and she's won a trophy for picking up litter from the mayor. Every summer she goes on her holidays to her Aunty Brenda who runs a women's domestic abuse refuge in a Yorkshire mining village. Delie and her Aunty Brenda and a pawnbroker called George who wears a dress are The Flannelettes - a Motown tribute band. Delie is in her twenties but with a mental age of ten; when she meets Roma - who used to live on the streets in Rotherham - the two become best friends, sharing each others' secrets. By the award-winning writer of The Glee Club, The Flanelettes is a tough, uncompromising play which looks at love and violence in a shattered community, all playing to a bittersweet soundtrack of Sixties soul.
Parallel Lines (Modern Plays)
by Katherine ChandlerI think it's sad. A sad place. Full of sad people with fucked-up lives. And I thinks, how? How did they get there? How did they get to this? What was it? What happened that got them there? Cos you're not just born into it, are you. You're not born into being fucked up?Steph is fifteen years old. Simon is her teacher. Both live in Cardiff but their parallel lives couldn't be more different. When an accusation is made and their worlds collide, things aren't as simple as they might seem.Award-winning playwright Katherine Chandler explores truth, class and power in contemporary Wales in this gripping, uncompromising play. It received its world premiere on 20 November 2013 at Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff, and won the inaugural Wales Drama Award.
Writing Dialogue for Scripts (Writing Handbooks)
by Rib DavisA good story can easily be ruined by bad dialogue. Now in its 4th edition, Rib Davis's bestselling Writing Dialogue for Scripts provides expert insight into how dialogue works, what to look out for in everyday speech and how to use dialogue effectively in scripts. Examining practical examples from film, TV, theatre and radio, this book will help aspiring and professional writers alike perfect their skills. The 4th edition of Writing Dialogue for Scripts includes: a look at recent films, such as American Hustle and Blue Jasmine; TV shows such as Mad Men and Peaky Blinders; and the award winning play, Ruined. Extended material on use of narration within scripts (for example in Peep Show) and dialogue in verbatim scripts (Alecky Blythe's London Road) also features.
Stephens Plays: Three Kingdoms; The Trial of Ubu; Morning; Carmen Disruption (Contemporary Dramatists)
by Simon StephensFour plays inspired by and originating on the European stage from one of Britain's most important playwrights.Three Kingdoms was presented at Teater NO99 in Tallinn, Estonia on 17 September 2011, before opening at the Munich Kammerspiele, Germany, on 15 October 2011. 'An inconsolable mood of dread, abandon, violence and suspicion lurks beneath the show's skin of arty insouciance, and at times the script attains a lyrical pitch of accusation against the West that quite overrides the flippancy. There's something of value here.' Daily Telegraph;The Trial of Ubu premiered at the Schauspielhaus Essen in a co-production with the Toneelgroep Amsterdam. 'The play certainly gets at the banality of evil, and evokes the slow, sometimes dull, often uncertain slog of justice.' Sunday Times.Subtitled 'A Play For Young People', Morning was developed in partnership between the Lyric Hammersmith, London, and the Junges Theater, Göttingen. The Financial Times described it as 'theatrically daring and uncompromising'; Carmen Disruption, a reimagining of Bizet's opera, premiered at the Deutsche Spielhaus in spring, 2014, before its UK premiere at the Almeida, London, in April 2015. 'You can't help but be moved by the circumstances facing the five main characters. There's an understanding and a compassion amid the bleakness. And a fierce sense that something needs to change.' Guardian;
Creating Compelling Characters for Film, TV, Theatre and Radio
by Rib DavisStrong characters – characters we love and hate, those we despair for at their low moments and egg on to their triumphs – are the foundation of any successful script. Written by award-winning writer Rib Davis and now fully updated for its second edition, Creating Compelling Characters for Film, TV, Theatre and Radio is an authoritative practical guide to developing characters for professional and aspiring writers alike.As well as exploring character motivation, the interplay between character and plot, comic characters, heroes and villains, the new edition also includes a more in-depth look at character psychology, writing ensemble and multi-narrative dramas and the balance between character development and character revelation. The book also includes a wide range of contemporary examples from scripts ranging from films such as The Wolf of Wall Street and The Grand Budapest Hotel, award-winning plays such as Jerusalem and acclaimed TV shows such as Game of Thrones and True Detective.
How to Keep an Alien: A Story about Falling in Love and Proving It to the Government (Modern Plays)
by Sonya KellyHow to Keep an Alien is a funny and tender autobiographical tale in which Irish Sonya and Australian Kate meet and fall in love, but Kate's visa is up and she must leave the country. Together they must find a way to prove to the Department of Immigration that they have the right to live together in Ireland. The paper trail of evidence for 'the visa people' takes them on a global odyssey from County Offaly to the Queensland Bush. It's a tricky business coming from opposite ends of the earth. It takes an Olympian will and the heart of a whale, but above all else, paperwork. How to Keep an Alien is written and performed by Sonya Kelly, with Justin Murphy. Sonya Kelly's debut show, The Wheelchair on My Face, won a Scotsman Fringe First Award in 2012 and was the New York Times Critics' Pick. This edition was published to coincide with a revival of the original production, including performances at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh.
McQueen: or Lee and Beauty (Modern Plays)
by James PhillipsYou look otherworldly. Like all my girls. This will make you a queen. Like years ago and people wore clothes like weapons, like weapons against poor people, because even is you were hungry how could you raise your fist against what looked like a god? But I can make things that are weapons against day to day stuff.A girl has watched McQueen's Mayfair house for eleven consecutive days. Tonight, she climbs down from her watching tree and breaks into his house, to steal a dress, to become someone special. He catches her, but, instead of calling the police, they embark together on a journey through London and into his heart. The play captures the fairy-story landscape of McQueen's mind - the landscape seen in his immortal shows - where, with a dress, an urchin can become an Amazon and where beauty might just help us survive the night. McQueen is a journey into the visionary imagination and dark dream world of Alexander McQueen, fashion's greatest contemporary artist.James Phillips's play received its world premiere at St James Theatre, London, on 12 May 2015.
Before Monsters Were Made (Modern Plays)
by Ross DunganYou see, people forever say history is written by the victors. It's not. It's written by those who can shape the simplest narrative.David is a man struggling to hold together his marriage when the small town he lives in is rocked by the sudden, untimely death of a local girl. As details are uncovered, rumours and talk take hold of the town, and start to force David to revisit old memories.Set in 1960s Ireland, Before Monsters Were Made tells the story of how a few small words can have a very big impact. When suspicion and old stories start to spread like a virus, how well do we know the people we trust the most? Can we ever know what goes on inside other people's lives? And do we really want to?Before Monsters Were Made is an unnerving and moving thriller about loyalty, lies and love.
Chef (Modern Plays)
by Sabrina MahfouzI cook here, create here,make here be as much of life as I canbecause outside of thisI'm not safe,I don't know the way.Chef tells the gripping story of how one woman went from being a haute-cuisine head chef to a convicted inmate running a prison kitchen. Leading us through her world of mouth-watering dishes and heart-breaking memories, Chef questions our attitudes to food, prisoners, violence, love and hope. Inspired by an interview Mahfouz conducted with celebrity chef Ollie Dabbous, Chef studies food as the ultimate art form taking stimulus from Dabbous's obsession with simplicity and making something the best it can be. Featuring Sabrina Mahfouz's distinct, lyrical style in abundance, Chef received its premiere at the Underbelly, Cowgate, during the 2014 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, winning a Fringe First, and was produced at the Soho Theatre, London, in June 2015.
Is Shylock Jewish?: Citing Scripture and the Moral Agency of Shakespeare's Jews (Edinburgh Critical Studies in Shakespeare and Philosophy)
by Sara CoodinWhat happens when we consider Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice as a play with ‘real’ Jewish characters who are not mere ciphers for anti-Semitic Elizabethan stereotypes? Is Shylock Jewish studies Shakespeare’s extensive use of stories from the Hebrew Bible in The Merchant of Venice, and argues that Shylock and his daughter Jessica draw on recognizably Jewish ways of engaging with those narratives throughout the play. By examining the legacy of Jewish exegesis and cultural lore surrounding these biblical episodes, this book traces the complexity and richness of Merchant’s Jewish aspect, spanning encounters with Jews and the Hebrew Bible in the early modern world as well as modern adaptations of Shakespeare’s play on the Yiddish stage.
Critical Fashion Practice: From Westwood to Van Beirendonck
by Adam Geczy Vicki KaraminasThere is a new form of design practice within the contemporary fashion industry which is active in complex forms of social commentary and critique. While fashion in the modernist era has shown signs of criticism and subversion, these were either in the form of subcultures or perversions, such as punk or BDSM styling. Today, however, these genres have been absorbed into the fashion industry itself, meaning that "critical fashion†? is now far from limited to the subcultures from which it came. This book explores this new space for criticism within the popular fashion sphere to demonstrate how designers are disrupting conventions, challenging beliefs and stirring change from within the system itself.Critical Fashion Practice considers a range of contemporary designers across the globe, from the US to Japan, whose conceptual designs embody this critical language, including case studies such as Rei Kawakubo's deconstructive silhouettes for Comme des Garçons and Walter Van Beirendonck's sadomasochistic menswear collections, amongst other key players such as Miuccia Prada, Vivienne Westwood and Viktor & Rolf. Arguing that the rise of critical fashion coincides with a noticeable decline in the criticality of art, Geczy and Karaminas go beyond slotting fashion into previously established art theories. Conceiving a new cultural role for fashion that affords insight into identity, class, race, sexuality and gender, this book shows how fashion can not only reflect and comment on, but can also be a part of social change.
Klippies (Modern Plays)
by Jessica SiânI slip into Thandi's bed in the night.I crack her ribs and climb deep inside her chestSo I never have to leave.Johannesburg. 2014. Summer.Yolandi is listening to rap-rave music and helping her brother bust parts from her teacher's car. Thandi is swotting for her exams and keeping well away from any distractions.In the stifling heat, two teenagers collide. Downing Klipdrift brandy, they create an alliance away from everything else. But scars take time to heal and, as the thunder threatens to strike, the real world crashes in.Set in the eighteenth year of South Africa's democracy a tender coming-of-age story for a nation and its youth.Following a rehearsed reading at HighTide Festival in 2013, Klippies by South African playwright Jessica Siân received its world premiere at Southwark Playhouse, London, on 13 May 2015.
The Funfair (Modern Plays)
by Simon StephensI kept telling myself I wanted something more out of my life, something brighter. I had all these ideas in my head. Thing is, I had to go down so low just to try to lift my life up a little bit higher. Simon Stephens's exciting new adaptation of the twentieth-century classic Kasimir and Karoline is a dark, political and hilarious play that sets two young lovers in the throes of a break-up against the hypnotic whirl and bright lights of a funfair.The Funfair takes us on a ride through the loops, dips and highs of one night at a fairground, exploring a crisis of capitalism set to the soundtrack of a rock and roll love song.The play received its world premiere at Manchester's Home Theatre on 14 May 2015 and was the theatre's first-ever production.
The Angry Brigade (Modern Plays)
by James GrahamIts government has declared a vicious class war. A one-sided war . . . We have started to fight back . . . with bombs.Against a backdrop of Tory cuts, high unemployment and the deregulated economy of 1970s Britain, a young urban guerrilla group mobilises: The Angry Brigade. Their targets: MPs, embassies, police, pageant queens. A world of order is shattered by anarchy and the rules have changed. An uprising has begun. No one is exempt.As a special police squad hunt the home-grown terrorists whose identities shocked the nation, James Graham's heart-stopping thriller lures us into a frenzied world that looks much like our own.The Angry Brigade was first produced by Paines Plough in September 2014 and this edition, featuring changes to the script, has been published to coincide with the production's transfer to the Bush Theatre, London, in May 2015.