In The Old Neighborhood David Mamet confirms his stature as a master of the American stage, a writer who can turn the most innocuous phrase into a lit fuse and a family reunion into a perfectly orchestrated firestorm of sympathy, yearning, and blistering authentic rage. In these three short plays, a middle-aged Bobby Gould returns to the old-neighborhood in a series of encounters with his past that, however briefly, open windows on his present. In "The Disappearance of the Jews," Bobby and an old buddy fantasize about finding themselves in a nostalgic shtetl paradise while revealing how lost they are in their own families. In the comfort of her kitchen, Bobby's sister "Jolly" unscrolls a list of childhood grievances that is at nice painful and hilarious. And the old girlfriend in "Deeny," faced with a man she once loved, finds herself obsessively free-associating on gardening, sex, and subatomic particles. Swerving from comedy to terror, from tenderness to anguish—with a swiftness that unsettles even as it strikes home—The Old Neighborhood is classic Mamet.
“Searing…heart-piercing…haunting and original…[Mamet’s] most emotionally accessible drama to date,”—The New York Times “Elegant and beautiful…David Mamet’s autobiographical play is full of laughter and lament.”—The New Yorker
“[Mamet’s] most personal, haunted and haunting play.”—Newsday “Riveting… luminous…beautifully rendered…a significant development in Mamet’s career.”—San Francisco Examiner
DAVID MAMET is a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and an Academy Award-nominated screenwriter, as well as a director, novelist, poet, and essayist. He has written the screenplays for more than twenty films, including Heist, Spartan, House of Games, The Spanish Prisoner, The Winslow Boy, Wag the Dog, and the Oscar-nominated The Verdict. His more than twenty plays include Oleanna, The Cryptogram, Speed-the-Plow, American Buffalo, Sexual Perversity in Chicago, and the Pulitzer Prizewinning Glengarry Glen Ross. Born in Chicago in 1947, Mamet has taught at the Yale School of Drama, New York University, and Goddard College, and is a founding member of the Atlantic Theater Company.
View titles by David Mamet
In The Old Neighborhood David Mamet confirms his stature as a master of the American stage, a writer who can turn the most innocuous phrase into a lit fuse and a family reunion into a perfectly orchestrated firestorm of sympathy, yearning, and blistering authentic rage. In these three short plays, a middle-aged Bobby Gould returns to the old-neighborhood in a series of encounters with his past that, however briefly, open windows on his present. In "The Disappearance of the Jews," Bobby and an old buddy fantasize about finding themselves in a nostalgic shtetl paradise while revealing how lost they are in their own families. In the comfort of her kitchen, Bobby's sister "Jolly" unscrolls a list of childhood grievances that is at nice painful and hilarious. And the old girlfriend in "Deeny," faced with a man she once loved, finds herself obsessively free-associating on gardening, sex, and subatomic particles. Swerving from comedy to terror, from tenderness to anguish—with a swiftness that unsettles even as it strikes home—The Old Neighborhood is classic Mamet.
Praise
“Searing…heart-piercing…haunting and original…[Mamet’s] most emotionally accessible drama to date,”—The New York Times “Elegant and beautiful…David Mamet’s autobiographical play is full of laughter and lament.”—The New Yorker
“[Mamet’s] most personal, haunted and haunting play.”—Newsday “Riveting… luminous…beautifully rendered…a significant development in Mamet’s career.”—San Francisco Examiner
Author
DAVID MAMET is a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and an Academy Award-nominated screenwriter, as well as a director, novelist, poet, and essayist. He has written the screenplays for more than twenty films, including Heist, Spartan, House of Games, The Spanish Prisoner, The Winslow Boy, Wag the Dog, and the Oscar-nominated The Verdict. His more than twenty plays include Oleanna, The Cryptogram, Speed-the-Plow, American Buffalo, Sexual Perversity in Chicago, and the Pulitzer Prizewinning Glengarry Glen Ross. Born in Chicago in 1947, Mamet has taught at the Yale School of Drama, New York University, and Goddard College, and is a founding member of the Atlantic Theater Company.
View titles by David Mamet
