Twenty-five years ago, Angels in America made its Broadway premier. It won the Pulitzer Prize for drama and the Tony Award for best play, but Tony Kushner’s landmark work was always more than just a theater piece. It changed the way gay lives are represented in popular culture and the story of its many productions is also the story of AIDS and the struggle for gay rights. In this vibrant oral history, Butler, writer and director of productions including The Trump Card and Real Enemies, and Kois, editor and writer for Slate’s culture section, bring together the voices of more than two hundred people closely associated with Angels, from Meryl Streep and Mary-Louise Parker to directors, producers, historians, critics, and Kushner himself, to reminisce, tell stories, debate, and celebrate a piece that’s as vital today as it was when it opened in San Francisco in 1991.

Butler and Kois are in conversation with Glen Weldon, co-host of NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast. The three of them will be joined for a staged reading of one chapter from the book, featuring: Alexandra Petri, humor writer for the Washington Post and author of A Field Guide to Awkward Silences; Mark Joseph Stern, a writer for Slate covering the law and LGBTQ issues; Jacob Brogan, host of the Slate podcast Working; and D.C. based stage actors Kimberly Gilbert and Michael Kevin Darnall.

https://www.politics-prose.com/book/9781635571769

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