Best Plays...

[writerscut]

Cliched...maybe just a little...;) I'm just wondering what you guys...and girls believe are the best plays. I'm asking for a number of reasons...one, because I love reading a good play from time to time...second, because I am on the local play selection commitee for community theatre, and third, because I believe that to be the best, you must study the best. Two of the plays I have found helpful, and simply adore to death, are The Lion in Winter, by the late great James Goldman...(I was in that play last spring too!), and my personal favorite, Angels in America...please...list any you can think of...

[Writing Again]

I think one of the best plays I have ever seen, and I forget the title of it, was done in a professor's front room. There were only two actors.

One student, female, and the professor, male.

The theme centered around the school system and the value of the hoops you have to jump thru in order to get a degree and whether or not the system has any real meaning. It also pointed out that it is easy to say, as the professor did, that what you have is meaningless. It is less easy to say that when you are in danger of losing it.

Her viewpoint was that he openly disparaged the worth of something she had sacrificed her life to obtain.

This is the type of thing I think great modern plays are made of.

[AndersonK]

If I may ask a few questions...is your community theatre devoted to producing a wide variety of plays? Different categories have different favorites.
Classical? Mid Summer Night's Dream, Comedy of Errors. Greek tragedies? Agamemnon, Lysistrata.
Tragedy? Death of a Salemsan, Romeo and Juliet, Hedda Gabler
Drama? Our Town, The Children's Hour, Viriginia Wolff, Picnic
Comedy? You Can't Take it With You, Brighton Beach Memoirs,
Children's Theatre: Peter Pan, Ransom of Red Chief
Teen Theatre: Mother Hicks, Snoopy, Charlie Brown
Modern Musicals: Sweeney Todd, West Side Story, Beauty and the Beast, Chorus Line, West Side Story
Golden Musicals: Oklahoma, Sound of Music, King and I
These are just a few that come to mind. There are a ton of good ones out there.

[Yeshanu]

If you're doing musicals, my all-time favourite is Man of La Mancha. Also Fiddler on the Roof and Camelot...

Saw an absolutely hilarious play a couple of months ago called It Runs in the Family. Non-stop laughter.

Hmm...

The Glass Menagerie and The Miracle Worker were good, too.

Another vote for Peter Pan, as well.

[Kida Adelyn]

I really like Twelth Night and though I havn't read the whole script The Childrens Hour seemed really neat when I did part of it in a scene study last year.

[MacAl Stone]

I think The Importance of Being Earnest is great fun both to read and to watch.

Also a big fan of George Bernard Shaw.

I got to run lights for a community theater production of Godspell, when I was in college--and really loved the show.

[Cerealbowl03]

hey my school did a great one called "hay fever" it was hillarious if you have a good cast.
another amazing play is new and it is called "after Juliet" it is greatchorus members are props that sing at the most inappropriate moments.

[mindelei]

Looks like I'm reading all the "oldie but goodie" threads tonight. hehehe

Anywho... a couple of my favorite plays (these are comedies):

The Foreignor
Lend Me A Tenor


Just my two cents....
Mindelei :popcorn:

[Anatole Ghio]

GlennGary Glenn Ross, by David Mamet.

Fool for Love, by Sam Shepard.

[Topcat136]

I think one of the best plays I have ever seen, and I forget the title of it, was done in a professor's front room. There were only two actors.

One student, female, and the professor, male.

The theme centered around the school system and the value of the hoops you have to jump thru in order to get a degree and whether or not the system has any real meaning. It also pointed out that it is easy to say, as the professor did, that what you have is meaningless. It is less easy to say that when you are in danger of losing it.

Her viewpoint was that he openly disparaged the worth of something she had sacrificed her life to obtain.

This is the type of thing I think great modern plays are made of.



And the name of the play is: "Oleanna by David Mamet" Not only does it have to do with all those themes. But it has a lot to do with sexual harassment and the different ways words can be interpreted when their strung together! Fantastic play to see... But not to read! Mamet’s style can be intelligible on the page. But it is so natural on the screen and stage!

[Joe Calabrese]

I loved "The Ride down Mount Morgan" and not just because I saw it with Patrick Stewart, although that helped.

[mommie4a]

"The Real Thing" by Tom Stoppard

[gogoshire]

Thought I'd bump this thread.

I like anything by Edward Albee, especially "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf," "Three Tall Women," and "The Play About The Baby" (which I saw with Marian Seldes).

I also like Paula Vogel's "How I Learned to Drive."

[firehorse]

Anything by Mamet, Stoppard or Tony Kushner. Kushner is the playwright equivalent of Toni Morrison: he works on so many levels at once that it takes several readings/viewings to even begin to grasp his genius. IMO. As Topcat pointed out, Mamet does the same by playing with language.

Gogoshire - I worked with Marian Seldes on the original version of Annie 2 in 1989. The show was a massive failure (it was later re-worked into Annie Warbucks and had a decent run at Goodspeed), but Marian was one of the most gracious actresses I'd ever met.

(I was the "Annie Nanny," PA in charge of the kids. That's a whole story in itself.)

[gogoshire]

Firehorse-
I'm green with envy. I took an acting seminar with her at a theatre conference in Alaska, and it was one of the most phenomenal experiences of my life.

Later that night before the evening performance (she was in Three Tall Women), I ran into her in the bathroom and she asked me if I had a bandaid and a nail file. I DID! I was completely starstruck for the remainer of the week.

Like you, I love Kushner, Stoppard and Mamet, but after seeing Seldes do Albee, he's at the top of my list.

[William Haskins]

equus

[Maryn]

"Equus" is a great play. Interesting, because I saw it long ago and really don't remember it well at all, but I remember it blew me away.

I haven't chimed in because I'd find it so hard to limit the field. Plays that stayed with me long after attending and which haven't yet been mentioned include "Having Our Say," "Cabaret" (pretty amazing, considering that overall I don't care for musicals), "Of Mice and Men," and "Proof."

Maryn