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Filled with practical advice from an award-winning playwright, with a range of resources to guide you in the craft and business of theatre writing, The Art of Writing for the Theatre provides everything you need to write like a seasoned theatre professional, including: • how to analyze and break down a script • how to write a wide range of plays • how to critique a theatre production • how to construct and craft critical essays, cover letters, and theatrical resumes This thorough introduction is supplemented with exercises and new interviews with a host of internationally acclaimed playwrights, lyricists, and critics, including Marsha Norman, Beth Henley, Lyn Gardner, Octavio Solis, Ismail Khalidi, and David Zippel, among many others. Accompanying online resources include playwriting and script analysis worksheets and exercises, an example of a playwriting resume, and critical points to consider on playwriting, design, acting, directing and choreography.

What do you do if you find yourself weeping in the stalls? How should you react to Jude Law's trousers or David Tennant's hair? Are you prepared to receive toilet paper in the post? What if the show you just damned turns out to be a classic? If you gave it a five-star rave will anyone believe you?Drawing on his long years of experience as a national newspaper critic, Mark Fisher answers such questions with candour, wit and insight. Learning lessons from history's leading critics and taking examples from around the world, he gives practical advice about how to celebrate, analyse and discuss this most ephemeral of art forms - and how to make your writing come alive as you do so.Today, more people than ever are writing about theatre, but whether you're blogging, tweeting or writing an academic essay, your challenges as a critic remain the same: how to capture a performance in words, how to express your opinions and how to keep the reader entertained. This inspirational book shows you the way to do it.Foreword by Chris Jones, Chief theater critic, Chicago Tribune