Enigmatic actress Vanda Jordan appears unannounced for an audition with director Thomas Novachek. She's determined to land the leading role in his new production – despite seeming wrong for the part. The director is weary of auditioning a string of other actors, but agrees to see her, and is drawn quickly in to her act.As Novachek reads the lines of the male character in his play - Venus in Furs by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, the Austrian author who gave his name to masochi...

This definitive biography of Anne Boleyn establishes her as a figure of considerable importance and influence in her own right.Anne Boleyn is the most notorious of England’s queens, but more famous for her death as an adulterer than for her life. Henry’s second wife and mother of Elizabeth I, Anne, was the first English queen to be publicly executed. Yet what do we know of the achievements and the legacy of her short reign?In The Life and Death of Anne ...

As a young Jewish man in 17th century Amsterdam, Baruch de Spinoza excelled as a theological student; but as he encountered free-thinking Protestants, atheists, and radicals in this relatively tolerant city, he began to question his religion and the nature of God. As a result, he was branded a heretic and faced excommunication.Includes an interview with Steven Nadler, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and author of A Book Forged in Hell: Spinoza’s Scan...

A series of short comic vignettes from playwright David Ives, In the title work, two houseflies try to make the most out of their brief time on earth.An L.A. Theatre Works full-cast performance featuring Fran Adams, Ed Begley Jr., Shannon Cochran, Evan Gore, Arye Gross and Victoria Principal.Directed by Ron West. Recorded before a live audience in March, 1998.

A collection of four works from the American playwright known as "wizardly . . . magical and funny . . . a master of language" ( The New York Times).This collection brings together four full-length plays from the same dazzling pen that produced the one-act comic masterpieces of All in the Timing.Polish Joke is about a young Polish-American's trip through ethnic stereotypes. Nine-year-old Midwesterner Jan Bogdan Sadlowski, nickname...

When Louisiana became a part of the United States the great wilderness to the westward of the Mississippi was the home of many native tribes, or groups of tribes, retaining their primitive manners and customs, little influenced by contact with Europeans. Their villages were scattered along the water courses or skirted the prairies, over which roamed vast herds of buffalo, these serving to attract the Indians and to supply many of their wants—food, raiment, and covering for their shelters.

The world according to David Ives is a very add place, and his plays constitute a virtual stress test of the English language -- and of the audience's capacity for disorientation and delight. Ives's characters plunge into black holes called "Philadelphias," where the simplest desires are hilariously thwarted. Chimps named Milton, Swift, and Kafka are locked in a room and made to re-create Hamlet. And a con man peddles courses in a dubious language in which "hello" translates as "velcro" an...

A series of short comedic works from playwright David Ives, with subjects ranging from the Lindbergh baby to chimps typing literary classics. The title work is a more serious, nostalgic look at two generations of apartment dwellers who meet in a time warp.An L.A. Theatre Works full-cast performance featuring Samantha Bennett, Jane Brucker, Ian Gomez, Arye Gross, Richard Kind, Dinah Manoff, Nia Vardalos and Tom Virtue.Directed by Ron West. Recorded before a live audience in ...

LIGHTSPEED is an online science fiction and fantasy magazine. In its pages, you will find science fiction: from near-future, sociological soft SF, to far-future, star-spanning hard SF--and fantasy: from epic fantasy, sword-and-sorcery, and contemporary urban tales, to magical realism, science-fantasy, and folktales.This month's cover art is by Galen Dara, illustrating the original fantasy short "Godmeat," by Martin Cahill. We also have an original fantasy short story from Kodiak Ju...

'Highly entertaining . . . constructed as skilfully as a drink mixed by the author's Uncle Charlie' New York TimesIn the rich tradition of bestselling memoirs about self-invention, The Tender Bar is by turns riveting, moving, and achingly funny. An evocative portrait of one boy's struggle to become a man, it's also a touching depiction of how some men remain lost boys.JR Moehringer grew up listening for a voice, the voice of his missing fa...

“A painfully beautiful memoir….Written with such restraint as to be both heartbreaking and instructive.”—E. L. DoctorowA revered, many times honored (George Polk, Peabody, and Emmy Award winner, to name but a few) journalist, novelist, and playwright, Roger Rosenblatt shares the unforgettable story of the tragedy that changed his life and his family. A book that grew out of his popular December 2008 essay in The New Yorker, Making Toast is a moving account of unexpected los...

Posey is really nervous about starting first grade. Instead of getting walked to her classroom, her mom has to drop her off at the Kiss-and-Go Lane. Then she'll have to walk into school and face the Monster of the Blue Hall all by herself. Worst of all, she has to do it without the one thing that always makes her feel brave and special: the tutu that turns her into the Pink Princess. But when Posey inspires her new teacher to throw a first-day parade in which all the kids are invited to we...