Research Catalog

Details

Additional authors

1. Gurney, A. R. (Albert Ramsdell), 1930-2017
2. Asner, Edward
3. Guare, John
4. Wasserstein, Wendy
5. Wilson, Edwin, 1927-
6. City University of New York

Description

1. 1 videocassette (VHS) (112 min.) : sd., col.; 1/2 in.

Summary

1. Four separate interviews, approximately 28 min. each.
2. Wendy Wasserstein discusses her beginnings as a playwright at Smith College and Yale School of Drama, meeting people at Yale University with whom she still associates, the autobiographical nature of women characters in her plays, how she gives her characters wit and comedy, and her play The Heidi chronicles, its construction and the influence on it of the women's movement.
3. A.R. Gurney discusses how he wrote plays while teaching at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, his plays' form and structure particularly in Cocktail hour, Children, and The dining room, and how his work reflects the people that he knows and their Eastern establishment milieu.
4. Ed Asner talks about the two years he acted in Chicago in Paul Sills company, performing in New York City in Threepenny opera at Theatre de Lys, moving to Los Angeles to work in film, television, and public radio, and the political difficulties of being President of the Screen Actors Guild.
5. John Guare discusses the structure of a well-made play, the success of his play House of blue leaves and how it was written, and his attempts in three historical plays, Women in water, Gardenia, and Lydie Breeze, to imitate the historical sweep of 19th century novels.

Series statement

1. CUNY Spotlight

Subject

1. Yale School of Drama
2. Weill, Kurt, 1900-1950 > Dreigroschenoper
3. Gurney, A. R (Albert Ramsdell), 1930-2017 > Dining room
4. Asner, Edward > Interviews
5. Women in literature
6. Gurney, A. R (Albert Ramsdell), 1930-2017 > Interviews
7. Gurney, A. R (Albert Ramsdell), 1930-2017 > Cocktail hour
8. Women dramatists > Interviews
9. Guare, John > Sources
10. Guare, John > Interviews
11. Interviews
12. Gurney, A. R (Albert Ramsdell), 1930-2017 > Sources
13. Wasserstein, Wendy > Sources
14. Women's rights in literature
15. Motion picture actors and actresses > Political aspects
16. Wasserstein, Wendy > Interviews
17. Gurney, A. R (Albert Ramsdell), 1930-2017 > Children
18. Sills, Paul, 1927-2008 > Friends and associates
19. Dramatists, American > Interviews
20. Wasserstein, Wendy > Heidi chronicles
21. Guare, John > House of blue leaves

Genre/Form

1. Interviews.

Call number

1. NCOW 92

Note

1. Part of the series, CUNY Spotlight, broadcast on CUNY-TV, sponsored by the City University of New York.

Performer (note)

1. Interviewed by Edwin Wilson.

Event (note)

1. Videotaped by the cable station, CUNY-TV, New York, N.Y.

Title

1. [Interviews with Wendy Wasserstein, A. R. Gurney, Ed Asner, and John Guare] [videorecording] / City University Television, The Center for Advanced Study in Theatre Arts (CASTA) [presents]

Imprint

1. New York, [between 1988 and 1991]

Series

1. CUNY Spotlight

Performer

1. Interviewed by Edwin Wilson.

Event

1. Videotaped by the cable station, CUNY-TV, New York, N.Y.

Added author

1. Gurney, A. R. (Albert Ramsdell), 1930-2017, interviewee.
2. Asner, Edward, interviewee.
3. Guare, John, interviewee.
4. Wasserstein, Wendy, interviewee.
5. Wilson, Edwin, 1927- interviewer.
6. City University of New York.

Research call number

1. NCOW 92