Boone Spaulding's picture
Boone Spaulding from Coldwater, Michigan, U.S.A. is reading Solarcide Presents: Nova Parade March 31, 2012 - 11:41am

I show you mine, you show me yours?


Macbeth - Shakespeare
Hamlet - Shakespeare
A Doll’s House - Ibsen
Ghosts – Ibsen
Playboy of the Western World – Synge
The Crucible - Miller
Edmond – Mamet
Glengarry Glen Ross – Mamet
Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead - Stoppard
Angels In America - Kushner

 

What, if any, influence you?

bryanhowie's picture
bryanhowie from FW, ID is reading East of Eden. Steinbeck is FUCKING AMAZING. March 31, 2012 - 11:52am

Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead - Stoppard
Angels In America - Kushner

You got the two that first popped into my head.  I've only seen the movie and read Stoppard, but I saw the first half of Angels in America at a play, read the books, and watched the movie.  Angels is amazing.

jyh's picture
jyh from VA is reading whatever he feels like March 31, 2012 - 1:55pm

Hurlyburly - David Rabe

The Infernal Machine - Jean Cocteau

jyh's picture
jyh from VA is reading whatever he feels like March 31, 2012 - 1:56pm

Ile - Eugene O' Neil

PandaMask's picture
PandaMask from Los Angeles is reading More Than Human March 31, 2012 - 1:57pm

The Glass Menagerie

Covewriter's picture
Covewriter from Nashville, Tennessee is reading & Sons March 31, 2012 - 2:07pm

Do Broadway Musicals count? Les Miserables is my favorite. I've seen it six times, and can't wait to see it again. It's the best play ever. When the priest hands the thief the rest of the silver and tells the police the stolen stuff was a gift, but he forgot the rest of the silver, I get chills.  If anyone hasn't seen it, you should.

Covewriter's picture
Covewriter from Nashville, Tennessee is reading & Sons April 1, 2012 - 10:40pm

@ranch. I loved the book too. Thank you Victor Hugo! It's the story that started the whole thing, but yes I LOVE the musical. I've taken all my family and close friends to see it -- even bought tickets for some -- and I don't understand why they don't love it as much as I do. I have the sound track, the mugs and a t-shirt with that picture of Cozette.  As a lover of Broadway Musicals, I have to say i did not like Phantam or CATS. I can see why those two would turn you off. I hated CATS. (I love my real kitty cats but i saw no point to the play.) Wicked is definately worth seeing. Les Miz is in a class of it's own for me. Go see it again!

Covewriter's picture
Covewriter from Nashville, Tennessee is reading & Sons April 1, 2012 - 10:47pm


Can i also add any play by Shakespeare if it is "Shakespeare in the Park" with some pasta salad and a bottle of wine?

avery of the dead's picture
avery of the dead from Kentucky is reading Cipher Sisters April 2, 2012 - 6:10am

@Cove - I love the musical of Les Miserables as well.  You aren't alone!

ReneeAPickup's picture
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ReneeAPickup from Southern California is reading Wanderers by Chuck Wendig April 2, 2012 - 7:36am

Most influential stage play= Much Ado About Nothing. Almost every single romantic comedy that followed it followed the formula to a T. As far as influencing ME...hmmm that is tough. I'll have to visit back.

XyZy's picture
XyZy from New York City is reading Seveneves and Animal Money April 2, 2012 - 9:04am

Lots of good stuff in this thread already. For me, my formative years were spent reading the theater of the absurd, so I have a soft spot for Albee, Pirandello, Ionesco, and Beckett (to whatever degree the term fits their styles.)

To pick some:

Zoo Story - Albee

Six Characters in Search of an Author - Pirandello

Rhinoceros - Ionesco

Play, Endgame, Ohio Impromptu, Not I, A Piece of Monologue, Happy Days... oh, who am I kidding, almost all of them... - Beckett

I also like farce:

Lady Windermere's Fan, The Importance of Being Earnest - Wilde

Loot, What the Butler Saw - Orton

A Comedy of Errors - Shakespeare

Also, Stoppard fans should see a production of The 15-minute Hamlet, which is actually a twelve-minute version and a three-minute version back to back.

Andrez Bergen's picture
Andrez Bergen from Melbourne, Australia + Tokyo, Japan is reading 'The Spirit' by Will Eisner April 2, 2012 - 6:18pm

For me: Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, Long Day's Journey Into Night, Henry V, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.

Renfield's picture
Renfield from Hell is reading 20th Century Ghosts April 9, 2012 - 1:03am

I'm going to have to go with William on this one.

KinnicSwan's picture
KinnicSwan from River Falls, WI is reading Blues For Mister Charlie by James Baldwin June 25, 2014 - 7:32am

Lolita (the Edward Albee adaptation)

L.W. Flouisa's picture
L.W. Flouisa from Tennessee is reading More Murakami June 25, 2014 - 8:08am

Julius Ceasar -- read it in school. Phantom Of The Opera -- a very long time ago. Sweeney Todd -- to some degree or another. I don't watch to many plays as I hate hate hate musicals.

Yes you heard it first, a poet who hates musicals.

justwords's picture
justwords from suburb of Birmingham, AL is reading The Tomb, F. Paul Wilson; A Long Way Down, Nick Hornby June 27, 2014 - 3:30pm

Julius Caesar:  betrayal by best friends, the "Comes a Tide in the Affairs of Men" speech, consideration of tragedy.

To Kill a Mockingbird: (it's staged yearly in Monroeville, AL and also by high schools-- in particular a privileged local, almost all-white high school together with an inner-city almost all-black/hispanic high school) Scout's speech to lynch mob outside jail, Atticus's speech to the jury, and his talks with his children.

The Merchant of Venice: Portia's speech on the quality of mercytreatment of justice, mercy, and discrimination.

Rent: great boiling down of the meaning of life: It's ALL about the Rent -- both real and symbolic.

I'd add Citizen Kane, but I don't think it was ever a stage play.

 

Aud Fontaine's picture
Aud Fontaine from the mountains is reading Catch-22. Since like, always. July 14, 2014 - 7:40pm

For me it was Avenue Q, The Devil and Daniel Webster and Caligula. Definitely Caligula. I love the stage version by Albert Camus. It's even a great read. I have it on my phone.

justwords's picture
justwords from suburb of Birmingham, AL is reading The Tomb, F. Paul Wilson; A Long Way Down, Nick Hornby July 14, 2014 - 7:33pm

You're on the dark side, aren't you? -

Aud Fontaine's picture
Aud Fontaine from the mountains is reading Catch-22. Since like, always. July 14, 2014 - 7:40pm

I don't really get out a whole lot... 

jyh's picture
jyh from VA is reading whatever he feels like July 14, 2014 - 10:18pm

'Caligula' was good. I went into it thinking he was a horrible person (and still think he probably really was) but the play caused me to sympathize, if not with him personally then at least with the fictional dilemma of existence against the absurd and all that stuff.

Aud Fontaine's picture
Aud Fontaine from the mountains is reading Catch-22. Since like, always. July 14, 2014 - 10:30pm

Right? It's one of the most beautiful examples of absurdism in my opinion, especially the ending. I love the end. Oh my god, and the production I saw was just fantastic. It was really stripped down and minimalistic. Every one just wore like, dark suits and stuff (except for Caesonia who had a red dress) and the only set pieces were a bunch of different chairs and a few curtains. It was gorgeous. 

jyh's picture
jyh from VA is reading whatever he feels like July 14, 2014 - 10:52pm

I'd like to see more 20th-21st Century stuff live. I've only read it, along with basically everything else except Shakespeare.

ChristiLea's picture
ChristiLea from Texas is reading Pride & Prejudice July 18, 2014 - 7:20pm

I love seeing The Merry Wives of Windsor on stage. Mostly because I enjoy seeing women besting men in a time where they weren't equals, which also means I'm not so much a fan of The Taming of the Shrew, but that's another issue entierely. Othello is brilliant to me--love Iago (possibly most perfect villain, at least to me).

Have also seen Phantom of the Opera at least 5 times (and I'm going again in August) but I'll be the first to admit I love it more because of the book than the play. I could read that one 900 times and still be happy to read it again.

Is it wrong to admit I really loved Guys and Dolls? To be fair, it was the first play I'd ever seen in person so it may hold more sentimental value than anything else.

justwords's picture
justwords from suburb of Birmingham, AL is reading The Tomb, F. Paul Wilson; A Long Way Down, Nick Hornby July 19, 2014 - 1:54am

@ChristiLea: Guys and Dolls-- good choice! I love Damon Runyon's stories.

@JYH: This Is Our Youth is playing now in Chicago (Steppenwolf Theatre Company); it's 1982, but it's getting good reviews--supposed to get to Broadway next.

@kAndrezB: Henry V indeed. The movie version w/Kenneth Branaugh is very good, except for his "wooing" scene--a little stilted, but otherwise, excellent.

jyh's picture
jyh from VA is reading whatever he feels like July 19, 2014 - 5:20pm

@JW --- Never heard of it. And I'm nowhere near Chicago.