Best Selling Books by David Mamet

Follows the adventures of the human ant, Roderick Spode, as he hangs out with his friend Cocky Cockroach, encounters Chaos the turtle, and fights his nemesis.

"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)

State Theatre Company Programs.

Consists of scripts and research materials relating to David Mamet''s original screenplay for the 1987 film The Untouchables, starring Kevin Costner and Sean Connery, and directed by Brian De Palma. The collection illustrates the creative process of writing The Untouchables, from the preliminary research stage to the revised final draft of 1986. Included are photocopied news clippings concerning Eliot Ness and Al Capone, handwritten notes, scene sketches that reveal Mamet''s ideas for dialogue and character traits, and outlines and drafts, all of which reveal the evolution of the work. A brief note from Art Linson, producer of the film, is included.

Includes drafts, scripts, screenplays, production notes and galley proofs for plays and films by Mamet, as well as essays and a lecture written by Mamet. Collection also includes clippings, press materials, and theater programs collected by Anna Erskine Crouse. Crouse is the mother of Mamet''s first wife, Lindsay Crouse, and is an honorary trustee of the Lincoln Center Theater.

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.

It is 1934, and Charles Lang has invented an engine that runs solely on water. Attorneys Morton Gross and Lawrence Oberman see an opportunity to make themselves rich off the back of Lang''s ingenuity, blackmailing him into handing over the patent for his invention. When his sister Rita urges him not to give in to the bullies, Lang''s quest for justice ends in tragedy.