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York Notes Advanced offer a fresh and accessible approach to English Literature.This market-leading series has been completely updated to meet the needs of today's A-level and undergraduate students.Written by established literature experts, York Notes Advanced intorduce students to more sophisticated analysis, a range of critical perspectives and wider contexts. ... Read more

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A classic play by Tennessee Williams in a definitive, author-approved edition.Reality and fantasy are interwoven with terrifying power as two actors on tour—brother and sister—find themselves deserted by the trope in a decrepit "state theatre in an unknown state." Faced (perhaps) by an audience expecting a performance, they enact "The Two-Character Play"—an illusions within an illusion, and "out cry" from isolation, panic and fear. "I think it is my most beautiful play since Streetcar," Tennessee Williams said, "and I've never stopped working on it....It is a cri de coeur, but then all creative work,all life, in a sense is a cri de coeur."

In the course of its evolution, several earlier versions of The Two-Character Play have been produced. The first of them was presented in 1967 in London and Chicago and brought out in 1969 by New Directions in a signed limited edition. The next, staged in 1973 in New York under the title Out Cry, was published by New Directions in 1973 The third version (New York, 1975), again titled The Two-Character Play, is the one Tennessee Williams wished to include in New Directions' The Theatre of Tennessee Williams series. It is this version which is presented in this ND paperback. ... Read more

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Tennessee Williams is synonymous with 20th-century theatre. For nearly half a century, he wrote plays that transformed stages and amazed audiences around the world. This reference is a comprehensive guide to his life and works. Included are roughly 160 alphabetically arranged entries on topics related to Williams and his writings. Individual entries treat his works, his family members and acquaintances, places central to his writings, and such topics as music, race, religion, art, and politics. Entries cite works for further reading and are written by expert contributors, and the encyclopedia closes with a selected, general bibliography. ... Read more

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an encyclopedia that lives up to its definition
The Tennessee Williams Encyclopedia is a terrific resource. Written in considerable detail, the text covers an extraordinary range of the playwright's life in public and private.
The onlt reservation I have is that some of the overviews are not as accurate or complete as they should be. Capsule reviews of film and television adaptations fail to cover all versions and so the reader is occasionally unsatisfied.
Otherwise, this is a must-have, if you have the bucks to dish out. It is not so large or glossy a book to come with such a stiff ticket price. ... Read more

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first publication of Williams' stage adaptation ... Read more

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revolve aroun Constantine's new playan stagedonuncles estate
Exceptional play fitted with perfectly great performers. I saw it first hand here in Des Moines, IA.It was sad, funny, inspiring, dangling, ramantic and beautiful. ... Read more

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first publication of Williams' stage adaptation ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

revolve aroun Constantine's new playan stagedonuncles estate
Exceptional play fitted with perfectly great performers. I saw it first hand here in Des Moines, IA.It was sad, funny, inspiring, dangling, ramantic and beautiful. ... Read more

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script for movie with 4 pages of b&w photos ... Read more

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Baby Doll 1956
Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/RCISZSAC5NJUH Tennessee Williams "Baby Doll" Theme song from the Warner Bros Motion Picture.
This 1956 vintage sheet music is a complete arrangement for voice (lyrics) with piano accompaniment and chords in the key of G-Major. Cover features Carroll Baker.

Motion Picture Themes available in sheet music:
A Friend of Yours (The Great John L.)
One Day When We Were Young (The Great John L.)
Cuanto Le Gusta (From A Date With Judy)
In Love in Vain (Centennial Summer)
Sing me a "Song of the Islands"
The More I See You
My Shining Hour
Laura - Starring Gene Tierney
Where Is Your Heart (The Song from Moulin Rouge)
The Continental (You Kiss While You're Dancing) "The Gay Divorcee"
... Read more

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"While I have, over the years, read many collections of letters by famous writers, few have moved me as much as those by Tennessee Williams. There is no artifice to these letters, no calculation, no awareness of posterity looking over the shoulder. What there is, instead, is a revelation of the author's creative process, an unedited outpouring of Williams' mind and heart and—perhaps most wonderfully!—the sound of his voice, for he wrote these letters as he spoke, and his inflections, his intonations, are there in full. You cannot read these letters without hearing Tennessee speaking them."—Edward Albee

Volume I of The Selected Letters of Tennessee Williams ends with the surprise Broadway triumph of The Glass Menagerie in 1945. Volume II extends the correspondence from 1945 to 1957, a time of intense creativity for Williams, which saw the production of six major plays and several major film projects, especially the notorious Baby Doll, which brought Williams and his main collaborator Elia Kazan into conflict with powerful agencies of censorship, revealing Williams' studied resistance to the forces of conformity. Letters written to Kazan, Carson McCullers, Gore Vidal, publisher James Laughlin, and Audrey Wood, Williams' resourceful agent, continue earlier lines of correspondence and introduce new celebrity figures. His Broadway and Hollywood successes vie with a string of personal losses and a deepening depression, making this period an emotional and artistic roller coaster. Through it all, his wit, aplomb, mischievousness, and wickedly keen eye for human idiosyncrasies make it clear why Gore Vidal, upon reading the letters, declared Williams "the most distinctive, humorous, American voice since Mark Twain." ... Read more

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A must have for Tennessee Williams fans
These letters of Tennessee Williams offer a rare insight into the private life of Tennessee Williams.

Tennessee Williams -- In his own words...
I became interested in Tennessee Williams after reading the book "Tom," which is a biography of Tennessee's life.So after reading "Tom," I ordered "The Selected Letters of Tennessee Williams, Vol 2" from Amazon and began reading it as soon as it arrived.I chose to order volume 2 before volume 1 because it contains letters to and from Tennessee during some of the most productive years of his career.It is interesting to read, in his own words, how he handled and felt about these successes.

In anticipation of the Tennessee Williams Festival in New Orleans this month, I suppose it is time to move on to volume 1.As always, I'll let you know what I think....

Covers the Most Productive Years of his Life
This is the second volume of correspondence of Tennessee Williams covering the most productive middle years of his life.

It includes letters to and from friends during what was his most productive time. This when he was writing some of his best works, and the letters reflect the difficulties he was having with the work in process. These letters end in 1957 when he had just had two failed plays and the ever present critics were predicting the end of his career.

The book also includes a running commentary on the letters to keep them in perspective to the actuall happenings in his life. As a result, they form a sort of autobiography of the great dramatist.
... Read more

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A play produced only twice in the 1940s and now published for the first time reveals that Tennessee Williams anticipated the themes of Star Trek by decades. Sixty years ago a young Tennessee Williams wrote a play looking toward the year 2001. Stairs to the Roof is a rare and different Williams' work: a love story, a comedy, an experiment in meta-theatre, with a touch of early science fiction. Tennessee Williams called Stairs to the Roof "a prayer for the wild of heart who are kept in cages" and dedicated it to "all the little wage earners of the world." It reflects the would-be poet's "season in hell" during the Depression when he had to quit college to type orders eight hours a day at the International Shoe Factory in St. Louis. Stairs is Williams' revenge, expressed through his alter ego, Benjamin Murphy, the clerk who stages a one-man rebellion against the clock, the monotony of his eight-to-five job, and all the dehumanizing forces of an increasingly mechanized and commercial society. Ben's swift-moving series of fantastic adventures culminate in an escape from the ordinary that is an endorsement of the American dream. In 1941 with the world at war and civilization in danger of collapse, Williams dared to imagine a utopian future as Ben leads us up his stairs towards the Millennium. Stairs to the Roof was produced only twice, once at the Playbox in Pasadena, California, in 1945, and subsequently at the Pasadena Playhouse in 1947. Now, in an edition meticulously prepared by noted Williams scholar Allean Hale, Williams fans can share this play of youthful optimism. ... Read more

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Tennessee "Y2K" Williams!
Following closely upon the heels of NOT ABOUT NIGHTINGALES and SPRING STORM, this latest New Directions release is refreshingly optimistic for Williams.In this early play, he didn't feel confined to three acts, butinstead wrote nearly twenty vignettes, some only a few lines long, to tellthe story of Benjamin Murphy, employed at the Continental Branch ofConsolidated Shirtmakers.Very impressionistic, this play opens withmechanistic technae in the background as Murphy's supervisors wonder wherein the world Murphy is.He's literally found stairs to the roof!A placeto smoke, but also a place to dream and to breathe fresh air.As thescenes proceed, the story becomes more and more fantastical and wild, withobsession and foxes and carnivals and millenial magic.Great fun--I'mteaching it to my high school freshman English students this year! ... Read more

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In his last years, America's leading playwright,Tennessee Williams, often threatened to publish a 'black book' describing the darker side of show business as he experienced it. Knowing he would not have time to complete it in his lifetime, he asked author Bruce Smith to write his personal memoirs of his years as Mr. Williams media and personal manager. That book is COSTLY PERFORMANCES/ Tennessee Williams: The Last Stage. It is now scheduled as a major motion picture release in 2005, starring Derek Jacobi as Tennessee Williams and Kevin Anderson as the author. ... Read more

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The Kindness of a Stranger...Who Became a Friend
What is most striking about this book is its lack of sentimentality and incisive, sharp language.There has, indeed, been much written about Tennessee Williams, perhaps too much; the endless nonsense of his being a self-hating homosexual, the lurid tales of his promiscuity, the alleged Oedipal complexes, the temper tantrums and paranoia, and other such twaddle have all obfuscated many essential things about the genius who was Tennessee Williams.This excellent book stands out because it reminds us of Mr. Williams' power -as a person and a playwright- and at the same time it is not sycophantic nor is it cleverly bitchy.Smith, the author, meets Williams rather by accident and the unlikely friendship blossoms.I found the writing to be rather enthralling, evocative, and extremely well-crafted, which allows it to stand apart from many of the other (lesser) books on Williams.It is a memoir and does not purport to be anything but that, which allows the reader a keen insight into the life and work and humanity of the great Tennessee Williams.Because it is told from Smith's eyes the recounting of these stories is deeply personal and often effervescent with images and ideas; a far cry from the mawkish, self-consumed memoirs that pass as literature these days.I also liked the fact that Smith names some names and makes clear the case that the critics, PR people, and the various 'powers that be' in the theater and film worlds (i.e. agents, lawyers, producers) all played their part in Williams' miserable and protracted demise as much as the alcohol and pills did.And while Smith does not exculpate Williams from his vices he carefully explains why, he in fact, had them, and elucidates the nefarious forces constantly in conflict with the artist and his creative process.

Make no mistake this is Mr. Smith's story of his friendship with Tennessee, and thank goodness for its uniqueness, honesty, and edge.I think to truly appreciate this book one has to be familiar with serious writing (Eliot, Shaw) and not the Pop pap that sadly passes for publishable literature today.COSTLY PERFORMANCES and its author are both class acts and any writer or artist or person with a soul or fan of Tennessee Williams will love this book.


PS
The comment about grammatical errors is totally wrong and unfounded.And the Braun woman; who is she?"The author needed distance"?If she works in a library, how does she not know what a memoir is, and what the first person POV narrative offers the reader?These types of hit jobs are precisely the type of aforementioned `nefarious forces' to which I referred.

This is a valuable theatrical memoir
I am a young actor living in London where the plays of Tennesssee Williams are experiencing a great deal of interest within the entire theatre community: schools and universities;theatre companies; theatre media. All fans of his work are turning to background material on Williams and one of the most discussed -- and admired -- is Costly Performances/Tennessee Williams: The Last Stage by Bruce Smith.Mr Smith has, since writing this memoir, become actively involved in London's theatre world, saying he learned "at the master's hand" many enduring and valuable lessons re dramaturgy, play production and, more importantly, playwriting. His play 'Papal Gore' is scheduled for a West End staging. As well, his book about Mr. Williams is now being made into a major motion picture here in England. Real theatre people understand the sensitivity Mr. Smith brought to his portrayal of Mr Williams in his last, very difficult years and value it as a real contribution to 20th Century theatre history. It is highly literate but -- above all -- a very good read. This book, with Lyle Leverich's
The Unknown Tennessee Williams and the gossipy The Kindness of Strangers by Donald Spoto provide an indepth look at the author's life and times. ... Read more

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Tennesee Williams' landmark play exposes the emotional lies governing relationships in the family of a wealthy Southern planter of humble origins. The patriarch, Big Daddy, is about to celebrate his 65th birthday. His two married sons, Gooper (Brother Man) and Brick, have returned for the occasion, the former with his pregnant wife and five children, the latter with his wife Margaret (Maggie). "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" is a brutally honest examination of homosexuality, father/son relationships, greed, manipulation, ageing, and death. ... Read more