Anton Chekhov

Laurence Senelick

Chekhov is a unique force in modern drama. His works have long been cherished for their brilliant wit and unusual ability to provide striking insights into the human condition. In these stunning, individually published translations of three of Chekhov's most popular and beloved plays, Laurence Senelick presents a fresh perspective on the master playwright and his groundbreaking dramas. This volume illuminates the timeless trials of art and love and bring Chekhov's memorable characters to life. Each of these three plays showcases the hallmark features of a Chekhov classic: clashing desires, complex family dynamics, the individual's loss of balance and sense of identity in the shifting eruptions of society and a modernizing Russia, and the angst of artistic struggle and ambition. Supplementing each of the plays are an account of Chekhov's life, a note on the translation, introductions to each work, and variant lines - often removed due to government censorship - which illuminate the context in which they were written and shed light on Chekhov's work as a playwright. These editions are the perfect guides to enriching our understanding of this great dramatist or to staging a production.

Three Sisters

The Cherry Orchard

The Seagull

The Changing Room traces the origins and variations of theatrical cross-dressing through the ages and across cultures. This is the first-ever cross-cultural study of theatrical transvestism.

Sex, Drag and Theatre

The Changing Room

Anatoly Smeliansky

This is the first book to explore the world of the theatre in Russia after Stalin. Through his work at the Moscow Art Theatre, Anatoly Smeliansky is in a key position to analyse contemporary events on the Russian stage and he combines this first-hand knowledge with valuable archival material, some published here for the first time, to tell a fascinating and important story. Smeliansky chronicles developments from 1953 and the rise of a new Soviet theatre, and moves through the next four decades, highlighting the social and political events which shaped Russian drama and performance. The book also focuses on major directors and practitioners, including Yury Lyubimov, Oleg Yefremov, and Lev Dodin, among others, and contains a chronology, glossary of names, and informative illustrations.

The Russian Theatre After Stalin

Sergei Ostrovsky

In this monumental work, Laurence Senelick and Sergei Ostrovsky offer a panoramic history of Soviet theater from the Bolshevik Revolution to the eventual collapse of the USSR. Making use of more than eighty years’ worth of archival documentation, the authors celebrate in words and pictures a vital, living art form that remained innovative and exciting, growing, adapting, and flourishing despite harsh, often illogical pressures inflicted upon its creators by a totalitarian government. It is the first comprehensive analysis of the subject ever to be published in the English language.

A Documentary History

The Soviet Theater

These four Russian comedies were written during the reign of Nicholas I, a period of considerable repression and censorship. They represent the most popular genres of the period. Lensky's Her First Night was an immensely popular vaudeville which held the stage for years; Kozma Prutkov's Fantasy is a parody of vaudeville which was banned after one night. Turgenev's Luncheon with the Marshal is a comedy of manners about provincial life, and Saltykov-Schedrin's Pazukhin's Death is a satire of greed and corruption so savage that it was forbidden during the author's lifetime. This collection constitutes a remarkable comic spectrum which will assist in enlarging the English language repertoire with a set of newly available and hightly stageworthy scripts.

Russian Comedy of the Nikolaian Rea

Peter Bilton

Chronicles the emergence of a national feeling in the theatres of Northern and Eastern Europe from the mid-eighteenth to the late nineteenth centuries.

National Theatre in Northern and Eastern Europe, 1746-1900

The Murderer as Romantic Hero from Sade to Lacenaire

The Prestige of Evil

Despite constant hindrance from government interference and control, the Russian theater has produced many memorable playwrights, schools of thought, and plays, whose influence can be seen throughout the world. Nikolai Gogol''s The Inspector, Maksim Gor'kii's The Lower Depths, and Anton Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard remain staples of repertories in every language. The ideas of Konstantin Stanislavskii, Vsevolod Meierkhol'd, and Mikhail Chekhov continue to inspire actors and directors, and designers still draw on the graphics of the World of Art group and the Constructivists. The Historical Dictionary of Russian Theater is the only reference work in English devoted exclusively to Russian theater and drama. It provides information on the popular plays and playwrights while also offering information on many persons, works, and phenomena omitted from standard encyclopedias. Through the use of a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, an appendix, and hundreds of cross-referenced dictionary entries on directors, stage designers, actors, plays, playwrights, concepts, theater buildings, and troupes, this reference provides an unrivaled account of Russian theater.

Historical Dictionary of Russian Theater

Many now consider Chekhov a playwright equal to Shakespeare. Senelick studies how his reputation evolved, and how the presentation of his plays varied and altered from their initial productions in Russia to recent postmodern deconstructions.

A Century of the Plays in Performance

The Chekhov Theatre

This volume makes available an international collection of plays, from Britain, the US, Germany, France and Russia, providing an essential and fascinating resource for anyone interested in the theatre culture of this period. Lovesick brings together six plays, each with individual introductions, including an author biography and a production history. The editor provides a contextual introduction to the volume offering valuable information about the ancestry of gay theatre and queer performance. The anthology reveals how 'sexual deviance' made its way into the drama of this time, and also how homosexual playwrights used comic or lyrical devices in order to celebrate a 'superior sensibility'.

Modernist Plays of Same-Sex Love, 1894-1925

Lovesick

The answers to these questions - and much, much more - are to be found in The Changing Room , which traces the origins and variations of theatrical cross-dressing through the ages and across cultures. It examines: * tribal rituals and shamanic practices in the Balkans and Chinese-Tibet * the gender-bending elements of Greek and early Christian religion * the homosexual appeal of the boy actor on the traditional stage of China, Japan and England * the origins of the dame comedian, the principal boy, the glamour drag artiste and the male impersonator * artists such as David Bowie, Boy George, Charles Ludlam, Dame Edna Everage, Lily Savage, Candy Darling, Julian Clary and the New York Dolls. Lavishly illustrated with unusual and rare pictures, this is the first ever cross-cultural study of theatrical transvestism. It is a must for anyone interested in cross-dressing, theatre, and gender.

This second edition of Historical Dictionary of Russian Theatre covers the history through a chronology, an introductory essay, appendixes, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 1000 cross-referenced entries on individual actors, directors, designers, entrepreneurs, plays, playhouses and institutions, Censorship, Children’s Theater, Émigré Theater, and Shakespeare in Russia. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about Russian Theatre.

Historical Dictionary of Russian Theatre

During its fifty year run, Theatre Arts Magazine was a bustling forum for the foremost names in the performing arts, including Stanislavski, Laurence Olivier, Lee Strasberg, John Gielgud and Shelley Winters. Renowned theatre historian Laurence Senelick has plundered its stunning archives to assemble a stellar collection of articles on every aspect of acting and theatrical life.

Theatre Arts on Acting

Provides a fresh and global perspective on the works and influence of a nineteenth-century musical and theatrical phenomenon.

Laurence Senelick

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