Race

(Paperback)

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Description

There is nothing. A white person. Can say to a black person. About Race . . . Race. Is the most incendiary topic in our history. And the moment it comes out, you cannot close the lid on that box. Sparks fly when three lawyers and a defendant clash over the issue of race and the American judicial system. As they prepare for a court case, they must face the fundamental questions that everyone fears to ask. What is race What is guilt What happens when the crimes of the past collide with the transgressions of the present Drawing on one of the most highly-charged issues of American history, David Mamet forces us to confront deep-seated prejudices and barely-healed wounds in this unflinching examination of the lies we tell ourselves and the truths we unwillingly reveal to others. Race was first seen in New York at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre on December 6, 2009, directed by David Mamet. It receives its UK premiere at the Hampstead Theatre on 23 May 2013.

Reviews

Scalpel-edged intelligence * New York Times *
Intellectually salacious . . . Gripping . . . rapid-fire Mametian style . . . Deep in its gut, Mamet's new play argues, everything in America and this play throws sex, rape, the law, employment and relationships into its 90 minutes of stage wrangling is still about race. * Chicago Tribune *
[Mamets] exhilarating epigrammatic style broadcasts the will to prevail. * New Yorker *
Mamet lets us see the way sensitivity to the most incendiary topic in our history, as Jack describes race, can breed better liars. * LA Times *
Race is wholly watchable. Gripping, actually. Dont believe anyone who argues otherwise. * Chicago Tribune *
It's black against white, man versus woman in a typically blunt David Mamet straight-talker about the law and discrimination ... David Mamet doesn't mince his words in Race ... an engaging brew of wit, rage, and shifting sympathies -- Kate Bassett * Independent *
During a typically provocative 90 minutes Mamet probes the self-conscious, slippery, hostile and patronising ways in which we so often discuss issues connected to race and racial politics. -- Henry Hitchings * Evening Standard *
An offbeat courtroom drama ... This twin-investigation structure is ingenious. And both inquiries are niftily calibrated to pivot on the issues of skin colour, sex and exploitation ... Mamets taut, fraught, nervy dialogue bristles with shocking and hilarious truths about the legal process. -- Lloyd Evans * Spectator *

Author Bio

David Mamet (b. 1947) is an award-winning American playwright and screenwriter. His first and many subsequent plays were first performed by the St Nicholas Theatre company, Chicago, of which he was a founding member and Artistic Director. In 1978 he became Associate Artistic Director of the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, where American Buffalo had been first staged in 1975, subsequently winning an Obie Award and opening on Broadway in 1977 and at the National Theatre, London, in 1978. His greatest hits, Glengarry Glen Ross and Oleanna, followed in 1983 and 1993 respectively. Other works by Mamet published by Methuen Drama include David Mamet Collected Plays 1-4; American Buffalo; Sexual Perversity in Chicago; Duck Variations; A Life in the Theatre; Edmond; The Cryptogram; Reunion; The Woods; The Water Engine; Lakeboat; The Disappearance of the Jews; Speed-the-Plow; Three Uses of the Knife, and Dr. Faustus.