NMSU Theatre Arts Departmental Reading List
(updated 7/15/2019)
Plays
| Aeschylus | Oresteia (Agamemnon, Libation Bearers, Eumenides) |
| Albee, Edward | Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? |
| Anonymous | Everyman, Abraham and Isaac |
| Aristophanes | Lysistrata |
| Auburn, David | Proof |
| Baitz, Jon Robin | Other Desert Cities |
| Beckett, Samuel | Endgame, Happy Days, Waiting for Godot |
| Booth Luce, Clare | The Women |
| Brecht, Bertolt | The Caucasion Chalk Circle, Mother Courage and Her Children |
| Chekhov, Anton | The Cherry Orchard, The Seagull, Three Sisters |
| Churchill, Caryl | Cloud 9 |
| Coward, Noel | Hay Fever, Private Lives |
| Cruz, Nilo | Anna in the Tropics |
| Dumas fils, Alexandre | La Dame aux Camélias |
| Etherege, George | The Man of Mode |
| Euripides | The Bacchae, Hippolytus, Medea |
| Farquhar, George | The Beaux’ Stratagem |
| Feydeau, Georges | A Flea in Her Ear |
| Frayn, Michael | Copenhagen, Noises Off |
| Fugard, Athol | Master Harold and the Boys, The Road to Mecca |
| Gay, John | The Beggar's Opera |
| Glaspell, Susan | Trifles |
| Gogol, Nicolai | The Inspector General |
| Guare, John | The House of Blue Leaves |
| Gunderson, Lauren | Silent Sky |
| Hansberry, Lorraine | A Raisin in the Sun |
| Hellman, Lillian | The Children's Hour |
| Henley, Beth | Crimes of the Heart |
| Hwang, David Henry | M. Butterfly |
| Ionesco, Eugene | The Bald Soprano, The Chairs |
| Ibsen, Henrik | A Doll's House, Ghosts, The Master Builder |
| Jones, LeRoi (Amiri Baraka) | Dutchman |
| Johnson, Ben | Volpone |
| Kanin, Garson | Born Yesterday |
| Kaufman, George S. and Moss Heart | The Man Who Came to Dinner, Once in a Lifetime |
| Kushner, Tony | Angels in America I: Milennium Approaches |
| LaBute, Neil | The Shape of Things |
| Lorca, Federico Garcia | Blood Wedding, The House of Bernada Alba |
| Lillo, George | The London Merchant |
| Mamet, David | Oleanna |
| Margulies, Donald | Dinner with Friends |
| Marlowe, Christopher | Doctor Faustus |
| Medoff, Mark | Children of a Lesser God, When You Comin' Back Red Ryder |
| Middleton, Thomas and William Rowley | The Changeling |
| Miller, Arthur | After the Fall, Death of a Salesman, A View from the Bridge |
| Molière | The Misanthrope, Tartuffe |
| Nichols, Peter | Passion Play |
| Norman, Marsha | 'night, Mother |
| Odets, Clifford | Awake and Sing!, Waiting for Lefty |
| O'Neill, Eugene | Beyond the Horizon, Desire Under the Elms, Long Day’s Journey Into Night, Mourning Becomes Electra |
| Orton, Joe | Loot, What the Butler Saw |
| Parks, Suzan-Lori | The America Play |
| Pinter, Harold | The Homecoming |
| Pirandello, Luigi | Six Characters in Search of an Author |
| Priestley, J. B. | An Inspector Calls, Time and the Conways |
| Racine, Jean | Phaedra |
| Rostand, Edmond | Cyrano de Bergerac |
| Ruhl, Sarah | The Clean House |
| Saroyan, William | The Time of Your Life |
| Sartre, Jean Paul | No Exit |
| Shaffer, Anthony | Murderer |
| Shaffer, Peter | Equus |
| Shakespeare, William | Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Tempest, Twelfth Night |
| Shaw, George Bernard | Candida, Mrs. Warren's Profession |
| Shepard, Sam | Buried Child, True West |
| Sheridan, Richard | Brinsley the Critic, The School for Scandal |
| Simon, Neil | Brighton Beach Memoirs |
| Sophocles | Antigone, Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus |
| Steele, Richard | The Conscious Lovers |
| Stoppard, Tom | Arcadia Travesties |
| Strindberg, August | Miss Julie, The Father |
| Treadwell, Sophie | Machinal |
| Valdez, Luis | Zoot Suit |
| Vogel, Paula | How I Learned to Drive |
| Wasserstein, Wendy | The Heidi Chronicles, Uncommon Women and Others |
| Webster, John | The Duchess of Malfi |
| Wedekind, Frank | Spring Awakening |
| Weiss, Peter | Marat/Sade |
| Wilde, Oscar | The Importance of Being Earnest, Lady Windermere's Fan, Salome |
| Wilder, Thornton | Our Town, The Skin of Our Teeth |
| Williams, Tennessee | Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire |
| Wilson, August | Fences |
| Wycherly, William | The Country Wife |
Musical Theatre
Musicals
Gershwin, George
and Dubose Heyward Porgy and Bess
Kander, John
and Fred Ebb Cabaret
Kirkwood, James
and Marvin Hamlisch,
Edward Kleban A Chorus Line
Larson, Jonathan Rent
Laurents, Arthur, and
Leonard Bernstein,
Stephen Sondheim West Side Story
Laurents, Arthur, and
Stephen Sondheim,
Jule Styne Gypsy
Lerner, Alan J. and
Frederick Loewe Camelot, My Fair Lady
Rodgers, Richard, and
Oscar Hammerstein II Oklahoma!, The Sound of Music, South Pacific
Sondheim, Stephen,
and James Goldman Follies
Sondheim, Stephen
and Hugh Wheeler A Little Night Music
Stein, Joseph, and
Jerry Bock, Sheldon
Harnick Fiddler on the Roof
Musical Theatre History
Leon, Ruth “The Sound Of Musical”
McMillin, Scott “The Musical As Drama”
Miller, Scott “Strike Up The Band: A New History of Musical Theatre”
Aesthetics, Theory, History, and Criticism
Acting
Adler, Stella “The Art of Acting”
Barton, Robert “Style for Actors”
Bogart, Anne, and Tina Landau “The Viewpoints Book”
Bruder, Melissa “A Practical Handbook for the Actor”
Chekhov, Michael “To the Actor”
Chekhov, Michael “On the Technique of Acting”
Cohen, Robert “Acting One”
Cole, Toby, and Helen Chinoy “Actors on Acting”
Hagen, Uta “Respect for Acting”
Hagen, Uta “A Challenge for the Actor”
Meisner, Sanford “Sanford Meisner on Acting”
Shurtleff, Michael “Audition”
Stanislavsky, Constantine “An Actor Prepares, Building a Character, Creating a Role”
Costuming
Arnold, Janet “Pattern of Fashion” (2 volumes)
Corson, Richard “Stage Makeup”
Cunningham, Rebecca “The Magic Garment”
Ingham, Rosemary, and Liz Covey “The Costume Technician’s Handbook”
Laver, James “The Concise History of Fashion”
Directing
Albert, David “Rehearsal Management for Directors”
Brook, Peter “The Empty Space”
Cole, Toby, and Helen Chinoy “Directors on Directing”
Jones, David Richard “Great Directors at Work”
History, Theory, and Criticism
Aristotle “Poetics”
Bentley, Eric, ed. “Theory of the Modern Stage”
Brockett, Oscar “History of the Theatre” (10th edition)
Caputi, Anthony, ed. “Eight Modern Plays”
Carlson, Marvin “Theories of the Theatre”
Clurman, Harold “The Fervent Years”
Dukore, Bernard, ed. “Dramatic Theory and Criticism”
Golden, Leon, and O.B. Hardison “Aristotle’s Poetics: A Translation and Commentary for Students of Literature”
Hart, Moss “Act One”
Hartnoll, Phyllis, ed. “The Theatre: A Concise History” (4th ed)
Jacobus, Leo, ed. “The Bedford Introduction to Drama” (7th ed)
Miller, Arthur “Timebends”
Rousseau, Jean-Jacques “Politics and the Arts” (“Letter to M. D’Alembert”)
Lighting
Hays, David “Light on the Subject”
Pilbrow, Richard “Stage Lighting”
Rosenthal, Jean “The Magic of Light”
Schiller, Brad “The Automated Lighting Programmer’s Handbook”
Shelley, Steven Louis “A Practical Guide to stage Lighting”
Props
Thurston, James “Theatre Props Handbook”
Set Design
Aronson, Arnold “American Set Design”
Carter, Paul, and George Chiang “Backstage Handbook: An Illustrated Almanac of Technical Information”
Crabtree, Susan, and Peter Beudert “Scenic Art for the Theatre”
Payne, Darwin Reid “Design for the Stage”
Jones, Robert Edmund “The Dramatic Imagination”
Ma, Wenhai “Scene Design: Rendering and Media”
Pecktal, Lynn “Designing and Drawing for the Theatre Designing and Painting for the Theatre”
Rose, Rich “Drafting Scenery for Theatre, Film, and Television”
Woodbridge, Patricia, and Hal Tine “Designer Drafting and Visualizing for the Entertainment World”
Scenery
A.S. Gillette/J. Michael Gillette “Stage Scenery: It’s Construction and Rigging”
John Holloway “Illustrated Theatre Production Guide”
Jay O. Glerum “Stage Rigging Handbook”
J. Michael Gillette “Theatrical Design and Production”
Sound
Collison, David “Stage Sound”
