Recommended Plays for Reading

Submitted by nadine on Tue, 02/20/2001 - 10:01
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  • 1. The Compleat Works of William Shakspeare: The Reduced Shakespeare Company. (This is worth reading just for the footnotes! It is hysterical)
  • 2. The Actor's Nightmare- Christopher Durang
  • 3. Baby and The Bathwater- Christopher Durang
  • 4. For Whome the Southern Belle Tolls (A Glass Menagerie Parody) and other plays in "27 Short Plays"- Christopher Durang
  • 5. The Crucible- Arthur Miller
  • 6. Death of A Salesman- Arthur Miller
  • 7. The Last Yankee- Arthur Miller
  • 8. Kindertransport- ?
  • 9. Love! Valour! Compassion! Terrence McNally
  • 10. Danny and the Deep Blue Sea- John Patrick Shanely
  • 11. The Red Coat- John Patrick Shanely
  • 12. The Lovliest Afternoon of the Year- John Guare
  • 13. The Odd Couple- Neil Simon
  • 14. Rumors- Neil Simon
  • 15. Lost in Yonkers- Neil Simon
  • 16. Blith Spirit- Noel Coward
  • 17. The Importance of Being Earnest- Oscar Wilde
  • 18. The Little Foxes- Lillian Hellman
  • 19. The Children's Hour- Lillian Hellman
  • 20. Miss Julie- August Strindberg
  • 21. St Joan- GB Shaw
  • 22. Man and Superman- GB Shaw
  • 23. 6 Characters in Search of an Author- Luigi Pirandello
  • 24. Our Town- Thornton Wilder
Author Comments: 

I have really just eliminated "literature" plays, like Shakespeare, because non-theatre people read them anyway. I think that most people would enjoy reading plays if they tried it. It really requires using your imagination in a way a book does not which I find enjoyable. Also, funny plays are laugh aloud in a way that most funny books are not.

listology4710/19/2001

having read all those plays do you perhaps have some suggestions of which ones have monologues for female characters that are not done to death at auditions????

listology4704/16/2002

You may want to read the following plays:

Closer- Patrick Marber
It's All True- Jason Sherman
The Beauty Queen of Leenane

the above list and MacBeth (Willy Shake), Death of A Salesman (Arthur Miller) and The Cherry Orchard (Chekov) were the reading list for my dramatic literature class that ends on Wednesday (17 April 2002)

Clearly reading a play is meant to be an activity done out loud.