Moliere
Author
Language
English
Description
The play opens with Argan, a severe hypochondriac, going through the bill from his apothecary (the pharmacist) item by item. He pays out only about half of what is on the bill. That done, he calls for his maid, Toinette. When she fails to appear immediately he shouts and calls her name until she arrives. Toinette is not interested in putting up with Argan's temper, so she mocks his rage.
Author
Language
English
Description
Scapin constantly lies and tricks people to get ahead. He is an arrogant, pompous man who acts as if nothing were impossible for him. However, he is also a diplomatic genius. He manages to play the other characters off of each other very easily, and yet manages to keep his overall goal - to help the young couples - in sight.
3) L'Avare
Author
Language
Français
Description
The miser of the title is called Harpagon, a name adapted from the Latin harpago, meaning a hook or grappling iron. He is obsessed with the wealth he has amassed and always ready to save expenses. Now a widower, he has a son, Cléante, and a daughter, Élise. Although he is over sixty, he is attempting to arrange a marriage between himself and an attractive young woman, Mariane.
Author
Series
Language
English
Description
Two timeless comedies by one of France's greatest playwrights: Tartuffe, a 1664 verse comedy concerning a scoundrel who impersonates a holy man, and the 1670 prose farce The Bourgeois Gentleman, a lampoon about the superficial characteristics of Parisian nobility. Original French texts with excellent English interpretations on facing pages.
Author
Language
English
Description
The King, who will have nothing but what is magnificent in all he undertakes, wished to give his court an entertainment which should comprise all that the stage can furnish. To facilitate the execution of so vast an idea, and to link together so many different things, his Majesty chose for the subject two rival princes, who, in the lovely vale of Tempe, where the Pythian Games were to be celebrated, vie with each other in fêting a young princess...
Author
Language
English
Description
Magdelon and Cathos, two young women from the provinces who have come to Paris in search of love and jeux d'esprit. Gorgibus, the father of Magdelon and uncle of Cathos, decides they should marry a pair of eminently eligible young men but the two women find the men unrefined and ridicule them.
7) The Miser
Author
Language
English
Description
The miser of the title is called Harpagon, a name adapted from the Latin harpago, meaning a hook or grappling iron. He is obsessed with the wealth he has amassed and always ready to save expenses. Now a widower, he has a son, Cléante, and a daughter, Élise. Although he is over sixty, he is attempting to arrange a marriage between himself and an attractive young woman, Mariane.
Author
Language
Français
Description
Magdelon and Cathos, two young women from the provinces who have come to Paris in search of love and jeux d'esprit. Gorgibus, the father of Magdelon and uncle of Cathos, decides they should marry a pair of eminently eligible young men but the two women find the men unrefined and ridicule them.
Author
Language
English
Description
After his death, Molière was gradually recognized in France as that country's most important dramatist. Along with this realization came a desire to write plays ABOUT the writer, his life on the stage, and his interaction with the other dramatists of his age, and also with King Louis XIV. Even Alexandre Dumas featured Molière as a character in his historical play, The Young Louis XIV. Molière himself was such a large, dynamic figure in real life...
Author
Language
English
Description
The play takes place at Mr. Jourdain's house in Paris. Jourdain is a middle-aged 'bourgeois' whose father grew rich as a cloth merchant. The foolish Jourdain now has one aim in life, which is to rise above this middle-class background and be accepted as an aristocrat. To this end, he orders splendid new clothes and is very happy when the tailor's boy mockingly addresses him as 'my Lord'.
12) Psyche
Author
Language
English
Description
Psyche's jealous sisters attempt to attract the attention of her two most recent suitors, without success. Psyche refuses both suitors before being called away by a messenger. The messenger then informs Psyche's sisters that she must be sacrificed on the mountain top and devoured by a monster. The sisters confess their delight before a group of mourners arrive on stage and sing the first intermède, the plainte italienne.
14) The Bungler
Author
Language
English
Description
In 17th Century Sicily, a clever valet named Mascarille tries to help his boss Lélie win the girl of his dreams -- only to find that Lélie is a monumental dunce who ruins every one of his intricate schemes. Undaunted, Mascarille invents progressively wilder plots, only to see his best-laid plans go very awry in Molière's The Bungler. Translated by Richard Wilbur. An L.A. Theatre Works full-cast performance featuring Richard Easton as Mascarille;...
Author
Language
English
Description
An older man tries to turn a young girl into the perfect wife by sending her to a convent until she is seventeen years old. To his frustration, the girl falls in love with another man after she returns. From the French master of comedy, The School for Wives is considered Moliere's masterpiece
Author
Language
English
Description
Tartuffe is one of Molière's most significant successes (1622-1673). Moliere is one of France's most popular playwrights. In this adaptation, David Serero brings the play to its essence for a perfect one-act performance (1 hour 20 minutes) with his Cast.
The Plot: Tartuffe, a sanctimonious scoundrel who professes extreme piety, is taken into the household of Orgon, a wealthy man. Under the guise of ministering to the family's spiritual and moral...
17) The misanthrope
Author
Series
Language
English
Description
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known popularly by his stage name Molière, is regarded as one of the masters of French comedic drama. When Molière began acting in Paris there were two well-established theatrical companies, those of the Hôtel de Bourgogne and the Marais. Joining these theatrical companies would have been impossible for a new member of the acting profession like Molière and thus he performed with traveling troupes of actors in the French...
19) Tartuffe
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known popularly by his stage name Molière, is regarded as one of the masters of French comedic drama. When Molière began acting in Paris, there were two well-established theatrical companies, those of the Htel de Bourgogne and the Marais. Joining these theatrical companies would have been impossible for a new member of the acting profession like Molière and thus he performed with traveling troupes of actors in the French...
20) Tartuffe
Author
Language
English
Description
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known popularly by his stage name Molière, is regarded as one of the masters of French comedic drama. When Molière began acting in Paris there were two well-established theatrical companies, those of the Hôtel de Bourgogne and the Marais. Joining these theatrical companies would have been impossible for a new member of the acting profession like Molière and thus he performed with traveling troupes of actors in the French...