Some playwrights want to change the world. Some want to revolutionize theater. Tony Kushner is that rarity of rarities: a writer who has the promise to do both
Program Titles
- Pulitzer Prize-winning Playwright
Tony Kushner: Pulitzer Prize-winning Playwright, Angels in America and Homebody/Kabul Tony Kushner intends his plays to be part of a greater political movement; his work is concerned with moral responsibility during politically repressive times. Kushner has a way of bringing the lofty into the sphere of the approachable by creating everyday characters who collide both comically and tragically on stage. The gay, Jewish socialist from Louisiana addressing audiences that are receptive to ideas for change and progress. Kushner talks about weighty philosophical and political topics—without being didactic or patronizing. And because he genuinely respects the intelligence of both his students and his audience, it’s truly rousing to hear Tony Kushner speak about timeless matters such as faith, death, and life.
Tony Kushner’s seven-hour, two-part, Broadway production of Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes is a masterful epic—it has received a Pulitzer Prize, two Tony Awards, two Drama Desk Awards, the Evening Standard Award, two Olivier Award Nominations, the New York Critics Circle Award, the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award, and the LAMBDA Literary Award for Drama. In 1998, London’s National Theatre selected Angels in America as one of the ten best plays of the 20th century. About Angels in America, Newsweek magazine wrote, “The entire work is the broadest, deepest, most searching American play of our time.” The 2003 HBO television version of this play was directed by Mike Nichols and featured actors Al Pacino, Meryl Streep, and Emma Thompson.
Kushner’s other plays include Hydrotaphia, A Bright Room Called Day, Slavs!: Thinking About the Longstanding Problems of Virtue and Happiness, and adaptations of Goethe’s Stella, Brecht’s The Good Person of Setzuan, Ansky’s The Dybbuk, and Corneille’s The Illusion. In addition, Kushner has received grants from the New York State Council on the Arts, the NEA, the Whiting Foundation, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters; he has also received a Lila Wallace/Reader’s Digest Fellowship, and a medal for Cultural Achievement from the National Foundation for Jewish Culture. Tony Kushner’s recent projects include the play Henry Box Brown or the Mirror of Slavery; two musical plays, St. Cecilia or The Power of Music and Caroline or Change; and the incredibly prescient Homebody/Kabul. A new volume, entitled Save Your Democratic Citizen Soul!.
Books by Tony Kushner
- Caroline or Change
- Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes : Part One: Millennium Approaches Part
- Conversations
- Thinking About the Longstanding Problems of Virtue and Happiness
- A Bright Room Called Day
Book Tony Kushner for your Event!