This is a GREAT musical with excellent music. It tells the story of Mary Lennox, who is sent to live with her uncle, Archibald Craven, after the deaths of her parents. The book and lyrics are by Marsha Norman, based on the book by Frances Hodgson Burnett. An wonderful broadway musical to definitely take a look at!

This has been one of my favorite musicals since when I first sw it in 1991. It tells the classic story of the beloved novel by the same name. The music is lovely and the whole thing has a mysterious air to it, something never really done in a Secret Garden movie or musical before. I like it. All the lyrics are wonderful and the songs have a wonderful tune too. It is neat to be able to read all the lyrics and all the spoken words. The original cast recording of this musical has some of the spoken words, but not near all of them. It is a nice way to re-live the experience. I highly reccomend this book. If you like this book, you may also like the original novel "The Secret Garden" by Frances Hodgson Burnett and the original cast recording of the musical itself.

This provides some powerful words when put into the hands of two capable actresses. There is a very interesting contrast between the two versions of Arlene, the main character. One is a young troublemaker, an unrepentant criminal. The other is a more mature, rehabilitated woman who is ready to take her place in society. Highly recommended.

Being a huge Marsha Norman fan, I think that Third and Oak: The Laundromat sums up what this extraordinary playwright attempts to focus on in all of her theatrical works. That is to say, this one act is about the relationships between women and more specifically the relationships women have to themselves. I don't think it is too much to say that Alberta and Deedee are both coping with the ache of loneliness, both in relation to their men and to their self-esteem. Norman explores the issue with two women who are of two completely different worlds, both in age and class, who find themselves in dire need of the other's differences to make it through the wee hours of 3am. It is twenty pages of breaking down the walls we think we need to create to hold ourselves together. A true exploration of the woman's soul.

This is a good Valentine's story. There are lots of sentences. Since it's inexpensive, it would be a good gift for children in a reading program. Our kids enjoyed reading it.

Marsha Norman, 'night, Mother (Hill and Wang, 1983)

What a refreshing piece of work-- a sparse, clear-headed play that examines the ramifications of suicide and (for once) comes up with the right answer. The action takes place in two rooms, with two people, and runs about an hour and a half. The two characters, a late-thirties daughter and her mother, start with the idea that the daughter is planning on committing suicide later that night, and the resulting tension between them allows both an examination of the more stable, understandable reasons behind the desie to end one's life and the soul-baring necessary in any familial relationship (and present in only a few).****

What if your daughter or son came into the living room, and she or he told you that he or she was going to end her or his life? How would you respond? What would you do? And the question is what can you do?

Mama thinks that her and her daughter are having a normal night at the house until she finds out that her daughter has planned to end her life. At first, Thelma "Mama" thinks that Jessie is kidding when she says that she wants to shoot herself. When Thelma realizes that Jessie is serious, the conflict begins between the struggle of life and death which is out of Thelma's hands.

Thelma stalls and tries to find out why Jessie wants to end her life. In the small amount of time between life and death, Thelma finds out more about her daughter than she ever did in her entire time with while she releases secrets and concerns that she never revealed to her daughter.

'Night Mother is a play that unwinds spellbound confessions and displays intense emotions that run through the course of people lives. Jessie and Thelma are powerful characters that makes me feel like I am there with them in the room. Jessie, in the first time in her life, feels like she has a sense of control, and death is freeing her as she sees life imprisoning her. The whole play is intriguing and complex. The ending will make you feel like you have realized that life is complex and question why you exist as a human being.

Night, Mother is a play that covers every aspect of human life: love, family bonds, importance and usefulness in society, to a slew of others too numerous to count. The dialogue between Mother and Jessie is gripping, terse and tense. The ending will inbue in the reader so many unexplainable thoughts, which will come back at you in life like flashes in the night, to make you all the more wiser and compassionate. Outstanding!

I saw this play in person, and just finished the book. Nothing better than great poetry made for our time. Highly recomend for those who who've seen it, or heard a review. Some of the plays are musical so they don't translate well to paper. One drawback.

Love's Fire embodies our perception of language. The spoken and unspoken voices of God, Love, Nature, and Humanity become the essential elements in this collection of one acts. Riveting and powerful, Love's Fire demands to be performed. Not only is the language spoken by the actors and heard by the audience, but the language of our contemporary masters blends with the master of language himself, William Shakespeare. As Love's Fire reinvigorates our grasp of language we come to an understanding that poems, sonnets, books, plays, spiritual songs, or body movements fuel the fire of love. An excellent piece of work by 7 masters who dedicated the collection to the Bard.

Shakespeare's inspired words talk to today's audience through the intriguing interpretations of master American playrights. Especially fascinating is John Guare's "The General of Hot Desire". These original works defy description...so read them...or better yet...perform them...and appreciate these unique literary gems in all their splendor.