THE STORY: Talented and precocious, Irving Yanover, at the tender age of 10, is both a piano prodigy and, at times, a thorn in the side of his orthodox parents, who lament his unaccountable predilection for bacon. But knowing that his mother and father indulge a similar passion (while dining out at a Chinese restaurant), Irving can only question their double standard. But even more upsetting is the unhappy fate of Annie, the Yanovers' young Ukrainian housekeeper, whose romance with a young Italian immigrant is bitterly opposed by her staunchly old-world parents—even though everyone knows that Annie's father is an enthusiastic devotee of Italian opera. Happily, however, these and other problems are delightfully resolved, with wit, gentle humor and a warm sense of humanity which will endear the play to audiences of all faiths and backgrounds.

The dramatic trilogy has been flourishing for some time now in new works and revivals of older works by American, British, and European playwrights. This book analyzes recent American works by Caucasian, African American, Asian American, and Hispanic American men and women. There are five chapters beginning with Opposing Families (trilogies of, e.g., Lanford Wilson, Foote, Machado, and McCraney are examined). Carson, Rabe, and McLaughlin are among those in the Classical Reimaginings chapter while Coen, Berc, and Wolfe constitute the Medieval Reimaginings chapter. Van Itallie, Havis, Rapp, and Hwang, among others, create New Forms. LaBute, Fierstein, and Nelson, among others, create New Selves. The concluding chapter is devoted to Ruhl's Passion Play, which spans 400 years of theatre-creating from Elizabethan England to Hitler's Germany to the Reagan era in America.

Drama Characters: 4 male, 3 female Interior Set This poignant drama about a dysfunctional Jewish family in Massachusetts is structured as a memory play. Roddy Stern recalls what it was like growing up in a family dominated by his paranoid and pathologically jealous father, a truck driver who lurked outside his house instead of working to catch his wife with other men. A long suffering and abused saint, Roddy's mother raised two children in this difficult environment. Roddy's

THE STORY: In Martin Gottfried's words: The story is about two rats. One has control over a rich hunting ground in New York City and the other has come down from Greenwich, Connecticut, looking for an in. The power rat is reluctant to let anybody into his domain but his visitor is convincing and talks his way in, until an infant child makes his appearance. Then the country rat wants his bite, the city rat is revealed as kindhearted and they fight over the screaming baby. It is a hideously powerful conclusion to a fascinating and comic play. The play's fascination, though, is more with its treatment of rats as souls. Mr. Horovitz is not simply dealing with sewer rats in the city. He is also dealing with people-rats in their conniving for position (a subject which he has artfully treated before). The play moves from very funny parallels with social status to very grisly parallels with greed. It is superb and Horovitz has quickly established himself as a playwright of smooth technique, serious intent and great imagination.

THE STORY: Zuckerman, a college student, has ran over and killed a young man riding a skate board. As the play opens he is in his room pasting newspaper clippings into a scrapbook, humming contentedly, as he listens to a report of the accident on the radio. There is a knock at the door. Joanna, the fiancee of the dead man, enters in tears of accusation. After her initial tirade it's not long before they end up in each other's arms and in bed, quarreling over the amount of space devoted to each of them in the newspaper's report of the accident. Zuckerman's outrage during the quarrel is the only emotion he feels, whereas shedding tears is no problem for Joanna. But what amuses and disturbs them most is the chilling speed with which their instinctive self-concern overcomes the grief of the one and the guilt of the other. What develops is an intense new liaison between the two of them which quickly erases all memories of the departed.