Homebody/Kabul
Description
In HOMEBODY/KABUL, Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright Tony Kushner, author of ANGELS IN AMERICA, has turned his penetrating gaze to the arena of global politics to create this suspenseful portrait of a dangerous collision between cultures. Written before 9/11, this play premiered in New York in December 2001 and has had subsequent highly successful productions in London, Providence, Seattle, Chicago, and Los Angeles. This version incorporates all the playwright’s changes over the past two years and is now the definitive version of the text.
Production Info
Full Length Drama (about 215 minutes)
Multiple Sets
Contemporary Costumes
Press Quotes
“Tony Kushner’s HOMEBODY/KABUL is the most remarkable play in a decade … without a doubt the most important of our time.” —John Heilpern, New York Observer
“This compelling evening testifies that Mr Kushner can still deliver his sterling brand of goods: a fusion of politics, poetry and boundless empathy transformed through language into passionate, juicy theater … a reminder of how essential and heartening Mr Kushner’s voice remains.” —Ben Brantley, New York Times
“What a feast of a play. No playwright in the English language has a greater passion for language than Kushner. And to this Kushner adds that rare quality in American theater, a yearning to go beyond domestic stories and into the great world of political struggle. Brilliant. It keeps us thinking.” —Richard Christiansen, Chicago Tribune
“HOMEBODY/KABUL is a rich and intelligent piece.” —Peter Brook
“Kushner’s first big work on a great big canvas since his Pulitzer Prize–winning ANGELS IN AMERICA. This eerily timely work about Afghanistan is comparably mesmerizing and mournful, vast and intimate, emotionally generous and stylistically fabulist, wildly verbal, politically progressive and scarily well informed.” —Linda Winer, Newsday
“An extraordinary play … a deeply felt expansively ruminative drama.” —Paul Taylor, The Independent
“HOMEBODY/KABUL brings a passionate, critical voice to the conversation about world events. In the play, Kushner wrestles with his own complicated attitudes about a land whose destiny has been shaped by superpowers with agendas. The Kabul we see here is a place of great history and great cruelty, where Eastern and Western characters alike search for redemption in God or heroin or other people. It is a product of astounding timeliness. The cultural artifact of the moment.” —Michael Phillips, Los Angeles Times
Author
Tony KushnerBorn in New York City in 1956, and raised in Lake Charles, Louisiana, Tony Kushner is best known for his two-part epic, ANGELS IN AMERICA: A GAY FANTASIA ON NATIONAL THEMES. His other plays include A BRIGHT ROOM CALLED DAY, SLAVS!, HYDROTAPHIA, HOMEBODY/KABUL, and CAROLINE, OR CHANGE, the musical for which he wrote book and lyrics, with music by composer Jeanine Tesori. Kushner has translated and adapted Pierre Corneille's THE ILLUSION, S.Y. Ansky's THE DYBBUK, Bertolt Brecht's THE GOOD PERSON OF SEZUAN and MOTHER COURAGE AND HER CHILDREN, and the English-language libretto for the children's opera BRUNDIBÁR by Hans Krasa. He wrote the screenplays for Mike Nichols' film of Angels in America and Steven Spielberg's Munich. In 2012 he wrote the screenplay for Spielberg's movie Lincoln. His screenplay was nominated for an Academy Award, and won the New York Film Critics Circle Award, Boston Society of Film Critics Award, Chicago Film Critics Award, and several others. His books include But the Giraffe: A Curtain Raising and Brundibar: The Libretto, with illustrations by Maurice Sendak; The Art of Maurice Sendak: 1980 to the Present; and Wrestling with Zion: Progressive Jewish-American Responses to the Palestinian/Israeli Conflict, co-edited with Alisa Solomon. His recent work includes a collection of one-act plays entitled TINY KUSHNER, and THE INTELLIGENT HOMOSEXUAL'S GUIDE TO CAPITALISM AND SOCIALISM WITH A KEY TO THE SCRIPTURES. In addition, a revival of ANGELS IN AMERICA ran Off-Broadway at the Signature Theater and won the Lucille Lortel Award in 2011 for Outstanding Revival. Kushner is the recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, an Emmy Award, two Tony Awards, three Obie Awards, an Arts Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a PEN/Laura Pels Award, a Spirit of Justice Award from the Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, a Cultural Achievement Award from The National Foundation for Jewish Culture, a Chicago Tribune Literary Prize for lifetime achievement, and the 2012 National Medal of Arts, among many others. CAROLINE, OR CHANGE, produced at the National Theatre of Great Britain, received the EVENING STANDARD Award, the London Drama Critics' Circle Award and the Olivier Award for Best Musical. In September 2008, Tony Kushner became the first recipient of the Steinberg Distinguished Playwright Award, the largest theater award in the US. He is the subject of a documentary film, Wrestling with Angels: Playwright Tony Kushner, made by the Oscar-winning filmmaker Freida Lee Mock. He lives in Manhattan with his husband, Mark Harris.
Book Information
| Publisher | BPPI |
|---|---|
| Publication Date | 7/26/2017 |
| Pages | 134 |
| ISBN | 9780881457049 |
Special Notes
HOMEBODY was first performed as a staged reading at the Chelsea Theatre Centre
in London in December 1997
The play received its first full production at the Chelsea Theatre Centre in July 1999
HOMEBODY/KABUL premiered at New York Theatre Workshop in December 2001
The play opened at Trinity Repertory Company in March 2002
The play was produced by Berkeley Repertory Theatre in April 2002
The play was produced by The Young Vic in London in May 2002
The play was produced by Steppenwolf Theatre Company in July 2003
The play was produced at Intiman Theatre in September 2003
The play was produced at The Center Theatre Group/Mark Taper Forum in October 2003
The play was presented by Brooklyn Academy of Music,
The Center Theater Group/Mark Taper Forum
and Steppenwolf Theatre Company at BAM’s Harvey Theatre in May 2004
by special arrangement with Broadway Play Publishing Inc, NYC
www.broadwayplaypublishing.com
