Theatre
Romantic modernist
Bruce Bennett
Selected Prose of Dorothy Hewett
edited by Fiona Morrison
UWA Publishing, $32.95 pb, 282 pp, 9781921401626
Best known for her poetry and plays, Dorothy Hewett was also the author of novels, short stories and numerou ...
The price
Desley Deacon
Views From The Balcony: A Biography of Catherine Duncan
by Michael Keane
Macmillan Art Publishing, $39.95 pb, 224 pp, 9781921394577
Catherine Duncan looks like becoming the poster girl for Australian women playwrights of the ...
One man in his time
Brian McFarlane
John Gielgud: Matinee Idol to Movie Star
by Jonathan Croall
Methuen Drama, $75 hb, 688 pp, 9781408131060
As the dust settles on twentieth-century acting giants, and reputations are appraised, it is at least argua ...
Others abide our question. Thou art free.
We ask and ask: Thou smilest and art still,
Out-topping knowledge.
(Matthew Arnold, ‘Shakespeare’)
When Arnold wrote his famous sonnet, he could have been anticipating John Bell’s book, which repeatedly asks provocative questions about the man and the work that have been his ...
Symphony of histrionic voices
Michael Morley
Talking Theatre: Interviews with Theatre People
by Richard Eyre
Nick Hern Books (New South), $49.95 hb, 349 pp, 9781848420465
One of many dangers lying in wait for the writer (and reader) of theatre-insi ...
Stephen Sondheim: Finishing the Hat; and Mark Eden Horowitz: Sondheim on Music
Backstage promenade with Stephen Sondheim
Michael Morley
Finishing the Hat: Collected Lyrics (1954–1981), with Attendant Comments, Principles, Heresies, Grudges, Whines, and Anecdotes
by Stephen Sondheim
Virgin Books, $69.95 hb, 472 pp, 9780753522585
The prisoner–playwright who overdosed on opportunity
Murray Waldren
Wasted: The True Story of Jim McNeil, Violent Criminal and Brilliant Playwright
by Ross Honeywill
Viking, $32.95 pb, 312 pp, 9780670073955
Jim McNeil was a two-bit thug. A liar, ...
Peter Fitzpatrick reviews 'Collected Plays, Volume II' by Patrick White and 'Collected Plays, Volume II' by David Williamson
In a recent interview on ABC radio, the playwright, Stephen Sewell, deplored the lack of revivals of notable Australian plays. Now and then, one of the pioneer playwrights from the first half of the century is honoured briefly in this way, but it is much rarer to find one of the professional companies revisiting the major works of the last twenty-five years. As Sewell implied, this reflects the lack of a strong sense of a tradition of ‘modem classics’ in our theatre.
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