The dramatic trilogy has been flourishing for some time now in new works and revivals of older works by American, British, and European playwrights. This book analyzes recent American works by Caucasian, African American, Asian American, and Hispanic American men and women. There are five chapters beginning with Opposing Families (trilogies of, e.g., Lanford Wilson, Foote, Machado, and McCraney are examined). Carson, Rabe, and McLaughlin are among those in the Classical Reimaginings chapter while Coen, Berc, and Wolfe constitute the Medieval Reimaginings chapter. Van Itallie, Havis, Rapp, and Hwang, among others, create New Forms. LaBute, Fierstein, and Nelson, among others, create New Selves. The concluding chapter is devoted to Ruhl’s Passion Play, which spans 400 years of theatre-creating from Elizabethan England to Hitler’s Germany to the Reagan era in America.

Robert J. Andreach lives in Sea Girt, New Jersey.

Robert J. Andreach
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 199
Bibliographic Info: notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2012
pISBN: 978-0-7864-7097-6
eISBN: 978-0-7864-9265-7
Imprint: McFarland

Acknowledgments      iv

Introduction: Triptych, Performance Art and Trilogy      1

One: Opposing Families      7

Two: Classical Reimaginings      53

Three: Medieval Reimaginings      84

Four: New Forms      98

Five: New Selves      139

Conclusion: Passion Play      171

Notes      177

Bibliography      185

Index      189