Overview

From his first unscripted appearance on an Off-Broadway stage in the revolutionary 1960s to the frontpage news of his death from AIDS in 1987 at age 44 Charles Ludlam embodied ä and helped to engender ä the upheavals of his time. The astonishing life and legacy of this force to be reckoned with are at last revealed in ÊRIDICULOUS!Ê a literary biography of an American comic genius. After founding the Ridiculous Theatrical Company in 1967 Ludlam sustained an ever-shifting troupe of bohemian players through two decades of perennially daunting circumstances by writing 29 plays ä plays that he starred in and directed as well. While Ludlam's work has become increasingly popular at regional theatres on college campuses and on stages throughout the world his gender-bending theories and wide-ranging cultural impact have reached far beyond Bette Midler the original cast members of ÊSaturday Night LiveÊ and the countless other artists he influenced during his abbreviated lifetime. Like his early plays Ludlam's life was rife with the sex drugs and creative experimentation that characterized the freewheeling '60s and '70s. Based on a decade of research and interviews with more than 150 people who knew or worked with Ludlam ä including all of the major players in his troupe and seven of his lovers ä ÊRIDICULOUS!Ê recreates the dramatic life of an inimitable and subversive theatrical master with you-are-there intensity.ÞWinner of the LAMBDA Literary Award for Biography and the Theatre Library Association Award for Outstanding Theatre Book of the YearÞ David Kaufman makes a persuasive case for Ludlam's being a genius ... As a record of Ludlam's life and the theatrical world in which he was both guru and grandmaster this book is informed and passionate. Þä Mel Gussow ÊThe New York TimesÊÞ A fascinating portrait of an authentic stage genius and the New York avant-garde scene in which he toiled with such demented and dedicated diligence. Þä PlaybillÞ The phenom who inspired everyone from Bette Midler and Madeline Kahn to Tony Kushner and Paul Rudnick was no box of chocolates ä which as reading experiences go makes his story all the sweeter. Þä ÊVanity FairÊÞ This is one helluva piece of work. Þä Marilyn Stasio Variety.com

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9781557836373

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DAVID KAUFMAN is the bestselling author of Doris Day: The Untold Story of the Girl Next Door as well as a long-time theater critic and contributor to The New York Times, The Nation, and Vanity Fair. He lives in New York City.

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