Peering Behind the Curtain

This volume addresses disability in theater, and features all new work, including critical essays, interviews, personal essays, and an original play. It fills a gap in scholarship while promoting the profile of disability in theater. Peering Behind the Curtain examines the issues surrounding disability in many well-known plays, including Children of a Lesser God , The Elephant Man , 'night Mother , and Wit , as well as an original play by James McDonald.

Thomas Fahy, Kimball King

Part 1; Chapter 1 Between Two Worlds: The Emerging Aesthetic of the National Theater of the Deaf, Kanta Kochhar-Lindgren; Chapter 2 "Better Me Than You": Children of a Lesser God, Deaf Education, and Paternalism, Robert C. Spirko; Chapter 3 Violence, Pain, Pleasure: Wit, Pamela Cooper; Chapter 4 Making an Art out of Suffering: Bill T. Jones's Uncle Tom, Tess Chakkalakal; Chapter 5, Ruby Cohn; Chapter 6 Depression-the Undiagnosed Disability in Marsha Norman's 'night, Mother, Sarah Reuning; Chapter 7 "Some Unheard-of Thing": Freaks, Families, and Coming of Age in The Member of the Wedding, ThomasFahy; Chapter 8 Young Doctors Come to See the Elephant Man, JohannaShapiro; Part 2; Chapter 9 Acting without Limits: Profiles of Three Physically Disabled Performers, Lilah F. Morris; Chapter 10 Two-Act Play, Nancy Bezant; Chapter 11 An Interview with James MacDonald, Thomas Fahy; Chapter 12 Balance Is Stillness, James Macdonald;