Jack Gelber

This book explores the works of Humanist/Absurdist American playwright Jack Gelber (1932-2003), whose groundbreaking, immersive play The Connection (produced by The Living Theatre in 1959) served as the link between the Art Theatre/Beat Generation and the Off-Off Broadway movement.

The Connection was an immersive theatre piece, produced by the historic The Living Theatre, which provided a Pirandellian framework in which actors playing junkies demonstrated what it was like to wait for a fix. This play forever cemented Gelber's status in the American theatre, and yet his subsequent works have been overlooked. This study, the first monograph-length work dedicated to Gelber's plays, will consider the plays of Jack Gelber as important social humanist absurdist works which force the audience to consider how the systems we create are flawed, to the extent that some addictions are permissible (even championed) while others are not. The plays of Gelber will be analysed closely, supplemented (where possible) with reactions to the plays as produced, while contextualizing each work within its own socioeconomic moment.

This book will appeal to scholars, professors, students, and other historians who have an interest in American playwriting.