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House Arrest and Piano

Two Plays

By Anna Deavere Smith

By Anna Deavere Smith

Best Seller
Paperback $16.95

Apr 13, 2004 | ISBN 9781400033577

House Arrest and Piano by Anna Deavere Smith
Paperback
Apr 13, 2004 | ISBN 9781400033577

Paperback
–

  • Paperback $16.95

    Apr 13, 2004 | ISBN 9781400033577

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About House Arrest and Piano

From the award-winning actor and playwright Anna Deavere Smith, two teeming, pungent cross-sections of the American experience.

In the provocative and at times bitterly funny play House Arrest, Smith examines the relationships between a succession of American presidents and their observers in and out of the press. Arcing from Clinton and Monica Lewinsky to Jefferson and Sally Hemings and alive with the voices of such real-life figures as Ed Bradley, George Stephanopoulos, Anita Hill, and Abraham Lincoln, the result is a priceless examination of the intersection of public power and private life.

In Piano, Smith casts her gaze back a century as she follows the tangled lines of race, sex, and exploitation in a prosperous Cuban household on the eve of the Spanish-American War. Deftly and suspensefully, Smith tells a story of ruptured allegiances and ramifying deceptions in which no one—master or servant, friend or enemy—is what he or she pretends to be. Together these two plays are further proof that Anna Deavere Smith is one of the most searing and revelatory voices in the American theater.

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Also by Anna Deavere Smith

Notes from the Field
Letters to a Young Artist
Talk to Me
Twilight
Fires in the Mirror
See all books by Anna Deavere Smith

About Anna Deavere Smith

Anna Deavere Smith is an actress, teacher, playwright, and the creator of the acclaimed On the Road series of one-woman plays, which are based on her interviews with diverse voices from communities in crisis. A recipient of the National Humanities Medal from… More about Anna Deavere Smith

Product Details

Category: Literary Collections

Paperback | $16.95
Published by Anchor
Apr 13, 2004 | 304 Pages | 5-3/16 x 8 | ISBN 9781400033577

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Praise

“As Anna Deavere Smith’s unique theatrical experiences have illustrated, history can be most revealing, not to mention most entertaining, when it’s liberated from the books and caught on the wing.” —Variety

“The most exciting individual in American theater.” —Newsweek

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