A new play from the Pulitzer- and Tony Award–winning author of Proof, coming to Broadway this April

In midcentury America, newspaper columnists are kings—and Joseph Alsop wears the biggest crown. Joe sits at the nexus of Washington life: beloved, feared, and courted in equal measure by the very people whose careers and futures he determines. But as the sixties dawn and America undergoes dizzying change, the intense political dramas Joe has been throwing his weight around in—supporting the war in Vietnam and Soviet containment, criticizing student activism—come to bear a profound personal cost.

Based on the real-life story of Joe Alsop, whose columns at the time of his 1974 retirement were running three times a week in more than three hundred newspapers, David Auburn’s The Columnist is a deft blend of history and storytelling. A hilarious, searing portrait of the glorious rewards and devastating losses that accompany ego, ambition, and the pursuit of power, The Columnist pens a vital letter from a radically changing decade to our own turbulent era.

Critics have generally agreed that The Great Gatsby, published in 1925, is the crowning achievement of Fitzgerald's literary career. It evokes not only the ambiance of the jazz-age search for the American dream of wealth and happiness, but also the larger questions of fading traditional values in the face of increasing materialism and cynicism.

Fitzgerald frames his plot as a story within a story, as the narrator, Nick Carraway, relates his version of Jay Gatsby's life. Nick, seeking freedom from his constricted Midwestern existence, takes a job in New York City and rents a bungalow in West Egg, Long Island, next door to the lavish mansion of the mysterious Jay Gatsby. Nick's wealthy cousin, Daisy Buchanan, and her husband Tom, invite Nick to dinner with the attractive but flighty Jordan Baker at their luxurious home on the neighboring island of East Egg. Unsettled by the Buchanans' seemingly purposeless lives, Nick returns home and notices his neighbor Gatsby staring longingly at a green light across the bay coming from the Buchanans' property. Tom later persuades Nick to accompany him to a place he calls the Valley of Ashes and introduces him to his blowsy mistress, Myrtle Wilson. Tom, Myrtle, and Nick end up at an apartment in New York, where a wild party ensues, and in a violent outburst, Tom strikes Myrtle and breaks her nose. Later in the month, Gatsby sends Nick an invitation to come to a sumptuous party at his estate, where Nick meets his neighbor for the first time. This is the first of many parties Nick attends at the Gatsby mansion in the company of many of the rich and famous. When Gatsby later takes Nick to New York for lunch, he regales him with tales of his war medals and his Oxford education. The other guest at lunch is the notorious gangster Meyer Wolfsheim, who reportedly fixed the World Series in 1918. Nick, befuddled by Gatsby's questionable associations, is also taken aback when Jordan asks him on Gatsby's behalf to invite Daisy to lunch at Nick's bungalow. He does so even though he now knows that Daisy and Gatsby were in love prior to her marriage to Tom. The two ill-fated lovers meet, and Gatsby takes Daisy to his mansion and invites her to his next party. Daisy agrees, but when she disapproves of some of his guests, Gatsby stops entertaining altogether. He eventually tells Nick of his truly humble Midwest origins, noting that his name is really Gatz, that he did not graduate from Oxford, and that he has made his fortune in bootlegging and other nefarious ventures. One day Gatsby, the Buchanans, Jordan, and Nick drive to New York. On the way, they stop at the garage of George Wilson, husband of Myrtle, who tries to get money from Tom and announces that he and Myrtle are leaving town. At a hotel in New York, Tom accuses Gatsby of trying to steal his wife, and a fierce argument ensues. Daisy heads home with Gatsby, and shortly thereafter Tom and Jordan stop at Wilson's garage to find that Myrtle has been killed by a hit-and-run driver of a yellow car. Tom blames the death on Gatsby though the real driver at the time was Daisy, whom Gatsby seeks to protect. George Wilson, thinking Gatsby was the driver, goes to Gatsby's estate, shoots him, and then kills himself. Only Gatsby's father, who thinks his son was a great man, attends his funeral. Nick later learns that Tom had a part in Gatsby's death, having convinced Wilson that Myrtle and Gatsby were lovers. Disillusioned with the Buchanans and their ilk, Nick decides to return to the Midwest.

Echoes of the American Dream pervade the novel, which contrasts the supposed innocence and moral sense of the Western characters with the sophistication and materialism of the Eastern characters. Gatsby's lavish existence in the nouveau riche Long Island community of West Egg, moreover, cannot ever compensate for his lack of the more pedigreed wealth of East Egg. He remains an innocent in his single-minded pursuit of Daisy

Toby the main character in this story is a man at the end of his life, Wife passed away retired from high rise steel work, home sold. He is on the verge of moving in with his daughter when fate takes him on the journey of his life. Toby unwittingly finds himself in the whirlwind of a new life with people he has met for the first time, a new love with a woman who has a definate interest in him. He finds himself on the high seas, a good cigar, and friends he can depend on. So follow along with Toby as the feel of sea air mixed with a party in formal dress gets you the reader to realize the future is never in dought.

Cameron is a young, sexy hustler who has always used to her book smarts and street smarts to survive. Raised as an orphan she has always had the mentality that she has to do what she has to do to get by...and stripping is her hustle of choice.

The convenient cash flow is just what she needs to pay for college--but will this lifestyle prove to be more than what she bargained for? Juggling work, school, and an insanely jealous boyfriend, will Cameron be able to survive all the chaos and come out unscathed?

Cameron will take you on a crazy journey throughout her life as secrets are revealed, friends are exposed, and drama unfolds.

Whoever said stripping was easy didn't know what the hell they were talking about!

Without Virginia Woolf, we might not have Jack Bauer. And where would we be without Kiefer Sutherland running around besting terrorists? When Virginia Woolf published Mrs Dalloway in 1925, literature was undergoing some radical changes. Along with James Joyce (whose Ulysses is, well, good luck with that one), Woolf revolutionized the novel form by writing a story which takes place all in one day. This brilliant woman was a vital part of the Modernist literature movement, and after her, books would never be the same.

(By the way, Modernist Literature is a hefty phrase that basically refers to literature written between 1899 and 1945, and involving experimentation with the traditional novel format. Modernist literature plays all sorts of games with time and order, perspective, and point of view. There was a lot of play with form, so a fragmented plot became more common than, say, having a clear beginning, middle, and end. Many critics say these radical experiments were a response to the violence of the World Wars. Lesson over: now you're totally going to get bonus points for knowing what modernist literature is. You can thank us later.)

Mrs Dalloway was daring not only in form, but also in content. Virginia Woolf brought to light an ugly truth that people didn't really talk about much at the time: the war really messed people up psychologically. The brutal trench warfare hadn't made men more masculine or turned them all into heroes; more often, it drove them mad. Woolf helped people see that post-traumatic stress disorder was a serious condition that haunted many survivors of the war. Based on two short stories entitled Mrs Dalloway in Bond Street and the unfinished The Prime Minister, Mrs Dalloway not only tells us that Septimus is damaged, but it also shows us what the world looks like through his eyes. We also get to see in depth how our main protagonist, Clarissa Dalloway, suffers from her own form of psychological damage: the more subtle, everyday oppression of English society.

That's all pretty depressing, so onto the good stuff. In 2005, Time magazine named Mrs Dalloway one of the best English language novels from 1923 to the present. It's widely considered to be one of the most influential novels of the twentieth century and has even been reinterpreted by Michael Cunningham as the book The Hours (Woolf's original title for Mrs Dalloway). And the best sign of its popularity? Mrs Dalloway and The Hours have both been made into (awesome) movies.

Daring content and awards aside, Mrs Dalloway is meaningful because it was very personal to Virginia Woolf. Woolf suffered from constant headaches and mental breakdowns throughout her life; some have diagnosed her as having bipolar disorder or being manic depressive. Whatever her diagnosis was, Woolf struggled with her own illness even as she worked hard to describe the suffering of Septimus and Mrs Dalloway. And, of course, it's hard to read the book without thinking about her suicide in 1941. Yet as the ending indicates, Virginia Woolf never completely abandons hope or the idea that life always has beauty.

Anna Broxton's marriage to the top Tommy John surgeon in the West and their idyllic ranch life in the Flathead Valley of Montana makes most women envy her. That is, until one simple moment changes her family forever.

Unable to bear the presence of her once adored husband, she abandons her life and finds her nowhere a small organic farm on the Southern tip of Sweden. There, she tills the soil, plants seeds, learns to pickle cucumbers, and fights her attraction to a younger man.

Her unlikely friendships with two unique women awaken her to suffering other than her own and help her face her part in the tragedy. She returns home to find her husband has found his own nowhere and must fight for whatever love remains in the gaps of their shattered family.

Her Nowhere is a tearjerker about relationships and what they can survive-if we let them. It is appropriate for book club discussion about our own unique tragedies, how we respond to them, how they shape us, humanitarianism, organic farming, and the imperfection of motherhood.

Bonus - Book Group Discussion Questions included.

Few musicals have had the impact of Lerner and Loewe's timeless classic My Fair Lady. Sitting in the middle of an era dominated by such seminal figures as Rodgers and Hammerstein, Frank Loesser, and Leonard Bernstein, My Fair Lady not only enjoyed critical success similar to that of its rivals but also had by far the longest run of a Broadway musical up to that time. From 1956 to 1962, its original production played without a break for 2,717 performances, and the show went on to be adapted into one of the most successful movie musicals of all time in 1964, when it won eight Academy Awards. Internationally, the show also broke records in London, and the original production toured to Russia at the height of the Cold War in an attempt to build goodwill. It remains a staple of the musical theater canon today, an oft-staged show in national, regional, and high school theaters across the country.

Using previously-unpublished documents, author Dominic McHugh presents a completely new, behind-the-scenes look at the five-year creation of the show, revealing the tensions and complex relationships that went into its making. McHugh charts the show from the aftermath of the premiere of Shaw's Pygmalion and the playwright's persistent refusal to allow it to be made into a musical, through to the quarrel that led lyricist Alan Jay Lerner and composer Frederick Loewe to part ways halfway through writing the show, up to opening night and through to the present. This book is the first to shed light on the many behind-the-scenes creative discussions that took place from casting decisions all the way through the final months of frantic preparation leading to the premiere in March 1956. McHugh also traces sketches for the show, looking particularly at the lines cut during the rehearsal and tryout periods, to demonstrate how Lerner evolved the relationship between Higgins and Eliza in such a way as to maintain the delicate balance of ambiguity that characterizes their association in the published script. He looks too at the movie version, and how the cast album and subsequent revivals have influenced the way in which the show has been received. Overall, this book explores why My Fair Lady continues to resonate with audiences worldwide more than fifty years after its premiere.

Behold the newest nobody of the funniest century yet. He's almost Christ like, from a distance, in terms of height and weight. Listen closely or drift off uncontrollably, as he speaks to you directly about the notion of home, about the notion of the world. All of it delivered with the authority that is the special province of the unsure and the un homed, which is a word he made up accidentally. The running time, if he doesn't die or think of anything else, is roughly one hour.
Title and Deed is a provocative new work by Pulitzer Prize finalist and Horton Foote Prize winner Will Eno, whom the New York Times called 'a Samuel Beckett for the Jon Steward generation.' Title and Deed premieres at Signature Theatre, New York 8th May, 2012 3rd June 2012

An illustrated new translation of Sophokles’ Antigone.

With text blocks hand-inked on the page by Anne Carson and her collaborator Robert Currie, Antigonick features translucent vellum pages with stunning drawings by Bianca Stone that overlay the text.

Anne Carson has published translations of the ancient Greek poets Sappho, Simonides, Aiskhylos, Sophokles and Euripides. Antigonick is her first attempt at making translation into a combined visual and textual experience. Sophokles’ luminous and disturbing tragedy is here given an entirely fresh language and presentation. Thoroughly delightful.

Cam'ron and Raheem hail from the notorious Brick City in Newark New Jersey. The two friends grew up eating noodles off of the same fork, now they are primed to eat off the drug game. From the Bricks to the ATL nigga's must bow down or get laid down.

Cam'ron epitomizes the grimy streets of Newark, he's a supreme hustler with a vicious murder game. Cam'ron loves four things: his money, family, his homie, and his boo. Touch either one and you get served, Cam'ron warns the streets. Of course Newark niggas are the grimiest so they don't take heed to Cam'ron's threat, they touch all of the above.
Tamika who is Cam'ron's boo makes shit hotter when she sets out to show him that he's not the only hustler checkin for her and she does not have to condone his womanizing. When Tamika gets with a hustler who refuses to let her go back to Cam'ron the consequences get catastrophic for somebody.

Meanwhile, Raheem who is the polar opposite from his man, is quietly putting his G down in the Dirty South. When ATL thugs test Raheem's gun they find out that a quiet storm is the deadliest. Raheem is as gentle with his woman as he is proficient with his murder game.
Kayundra, Raheem's shorty has fallen into drug addiction and it has her in a vice grip. Raheem's love for Kayundra never wavers. He helps her beat her addiction and soon she's refocused on her dream of becoming a R&B diva. With Raheem's help Kayundra lands a recording deal and almost overnight she becomes a star. But success comes at a price that threatens to shatter their love.
Raheem and Cam'ron go hard for what they want, and they attain it, leaving a lot of bodies along the way. They make many mothers bury their sons and shed tears, but on the road to hood fame and riches they learn that sometimes the enemy strikes back and its your turn to cry.

When the blood and tears stop falling will what Cam'ron and Raheem gained be worth what they both lose?Cam'ron and Raheem hail from the notorious Brick City in Newark New Jersey. The two friends grew up eating noodles off of the same fork, now they are primed to eat off the drug game. From the Bricks to the ATL nigga's must bow down or get laid down.

Cam'ron epitomizes the grimy streets of Newark, he's a supreme hustler with a vicious murder game. Cam'ron loves four things: his money, family, his homie, and his boo. Touch either one and you get served, Cam'ron warns the streets. Of course Newark niggas are the grimiest so they don't take heed to Cam'ron's threat, they touch all of the above.
Tamika who is Cam'ron's boo makes shit hotter when she sets out to show him that he's not the only hustler checkin for her and she does not have to condone his womanizing. When Tamika gets with a hustler who refuses to let her go back to Cam'ron the consequences get catastrophic for somebody.

Meanwhile, Raheem who is the polar opposite from his man, is quietly putting his G down in the Dirty South. When ATL thugs test Raheem's gun they find out that a quiet storm is the deadliest. Raheem is as gentle with his woman as he is proficient with his murder game.
Kayundra, Raheem's shorty has fallen into drug addiction and it has her in a vice grip. Raheem's love for Kayundra never wavers. He helps her beat her addiction and soon she's refocused on her dream of becoming a R&B diva. With Raheem's help Kayundra lands a recording deal and almost overnight she becomes a star. But success comes at a price that threatens to shatter their love.
Raheem and Cam'ron go hard for what they want, and they attain it, leaving a lot of bodies along the way. They make many mothers bury their sons and shed tears, but on the road to hood fame and riches they learn that sometimes the enemy strikes back and its your turn to cry.

When the blood and tears stop falling will what Cam'ron and Raheem gained be worth what they both lose?