Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #105630 in Books
• Published on: 1996-09-23
• Binding: Paperback
• 192 pages

Synopsis
"The finest American playwright of his generation" (Sunday Times) Glen Garry Glen Ross (also made in to a film starring Jack Lemmon and Al Pacino) "his superb play about real estate salesmen in a cut-throat sales competition" (New Society); in Prairie du Chien a railway carriage speeding through the Wisconsin night is the setting for a violent story of obsessive jealousy, murder and suicide, told within shooting distance of a card-hustler and his victim. "A short poignant study in violence and the twin drives of love and money, told with hypnotic power thorugh a travelling raconteur" (City Limits); The Shawl shows a clairvoyant wondering whether to cheat a bereaved woman of her inheritance and "confirms Mamet's place as about the best living writer of vivid American dialogue" (Daily Telegraph). Set in the cut-throat world of Hollywood, Speed-the-Plow sees two old-time movie collaborators manipulate the aspirations of a young woman who will do anything to attain her dream of success "a brilliant black comedy, a dazzling dissection of Hollywood cupidity." (Newsweek)

Customer Reviews

Excellent collection of Mamet works
This is an excellent third volume collecting the plays of David Mamet. The first, 'Glengarry Glen Ross', is one of his most famous. This is due to the film version with Jack Lemmon and Al Pacino- which Mamet wrote the screenplay for. This was a major artistic breakthrough when it was performed for the first time in 1984; many see it as Mamet's equivalent of 'Death of a Salesman'.It is based in a Florida estate agents, a Darwinian exercise in self-survival through corporate means. Mamet experienced working in such a place- and paints a still relevant portrait of the binds of capitalism...The next play, 'Prairie du Chien', was originally produced for radio in 1979 and has subsequently been performed on stage. It's a wonderful short-work that is part ghost and part shaggy-dog story. The setting in 1910 on a train in Wisconsin reminded me of scenes in Eastwood's 'Unforgiven' and Jarmusch's 'Dead Man'. It also reminds me of the William Faulkner short-story 'Barn Burning'. As with the next play, 'The Shawl', it evokes the supernatural. When read next to certain chapters in 'The Cabin', these works make much more sense. Note the figure of the sleeping child which predicts 'The Cryptogram' and the adaptation of 'The Winslow Boy'...The final play here is 'Speed-the-Plow', which Neil Jordan is convinced is about Mamet's involvement in 'We're No Angels'- though Mamet had been writing screenplays for years (as is seen in 'On Directing Film'). It's a very witty, caustic play with another BG-initialed character- Bobby Gould in this case (note, Joe Mantegna would play 'Bobby Gold' a year later in the excellent Mamet film, 'Homicide'). 'Speed-the-Plow' predicts the recent 'State and Main' and can stand next to works such as 'The Bad & The Beautiful', 'Two Weeks in Another Town', 'The Player' and 'SOB'.

This is an excellent collection of some of Mamet's works that comes highly reccomended.

Fine, Funny Writings
This collection of David Mamet plays includes the excellent "Glenngarry Glen Ross", an incredibly dark satire about the determination of real estate agents to close their deals and save their jobs. The language in this play is funny, crude and tough. Mamet at his best.

Also included is another cruel, biting satire "Speed the Plow" which pokes fun at Hollywood executives, when Bobby Gould, the head of production for a film studio, snubs his friend Charlie Fox's idea for a blockbuster movie in favour of something more cerebral. Underrated, in my opinion, and very entertaining.

The two plays which complete this collection is "Praire du Chein", a play that was orignally written for radio and of interest due to its paralellism of a story of a murder as a card game erupts into violence, and "The Shawl," a play which shows the tricks of the fortune telling trade as two lovers plan to con a rich woman. Again, probably underrated due to its brief length but it contains some gems of dialogue.

The inclusion of "Glenngarry Glen Ross" alone makes this an essential book but the addition of the other plays adds to its value.