Angels in America, Part One: Millennium Approaches (Angels in America)

by Tony Kushner

book data

1,592 ratings, 4.40 average rating, 66 reviews (more data...)

rating	frequency	%
5		58%
4		28%
3		9%
2		3%
1		1%

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published

May 1st 1993 (first published 1992) by Theatre Communications Group

binding

Paperback, 136 pages

isbn

1559360615 (isbn13: 9781559360616)

description

The most anticipated new American play of the decade, this brilliant work is an emotional, poetic, political epic in two parts: Millennium Approaches ...more

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05/28/08

saxonb rated it:

bookshelves: school

Its like doing lines of cocaine while at a Prince concert then going home and reading Foucault.

or

Angels in America is a grandiose, surrealistic bombast of a play dealing with almost every contemporary American facet of being gay in the U.S. during the late 80's to early 90's. Politics, law, Aids, family, religion are all included. Kushner examines these elements and the nature of Power in the states, how it is used in these relationships, and the effect it has on the gay comm...more

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11/13/08

Daniel rated it:

bookshelves: have-read, plays, theatre

Read in November, 2008

As a former reader of plays submitted to a nationally recognized theatre, I remember reading this play well before it was ever staged. I didn't care for it a whole lot at the time, but I suspect it has gone through a few rewrites to get where it is today.

What I liked, now, about this script is the very theatricality of it. Kushner understands theatre and writes to it exceedingly well.

The characters are well defined and the 'forwards,' the moments in the play which keep ...more As a former reader of plays submitted to a nationally recognized theatre, I remember reading this play well before it was ever staged. I didn't care for it a whole lot at the time, but I suspect it has gone through a few rewrites to get where it is today.

What I liked, now, about this script is the very theatricality of it. Kushner understands theatre and writes to it exceedingly well.

The characters are well defined and the 'forwards,' the moments in the play which keep the reader/audience wanting to know what happens next, are strong.

What I still don't care for (and what would have made this very wrong for the theatre for which I read this originally)is the graphic language and imagery.

I've never considered myself prudish. I think the short works of Steve Almond are great, and they are often sexually graphic. I enjoy the works of David Mamet, and his language is incredibly foul. My own works run the gamut of gore, sexually graphic, sexual innuendo, and foul-mouthed, so I don't think that's my problem here.

But I fully admit that it might be the homosexual nature of all this. But still, I think it's more than that.

First, I don't think I cared to hear about (more than once), and see, a character, dying of AIDS, "shitting blood." If it was there to touch a nerve,it worked -- the first time. Even in this short play, I became deadened to it and was simply disgusted.

And the sexual references, nearly all homosexual sex, made me uneasy. I think, I really think, that it had less to do with the gay nature of the sex but was because I never felt that any of the sex was the result of caring, loving relationships. Even the one heterosexual reference (the wife offering to perform fellatio on her husband), seemed 'dirty' because it was apparant that they didn't really have a love for each other.

When a script such as this is this full of sex, and yet the characters don't appear to be emotionally involved with one another, the sex is cheapened and seems very self indulgent. And then I don't care about these selfish characters.

Some will argue that the relationship between Prior and Louis was loving -- having lasted four years, but I don't get that. I never see that. It seems ... it feels ... demanding. Almost as though it was forced on at least one of them.

Theatrical. Intelligent. Well-defined characters. But not a single character yet that I find embraceable.(less)

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04/18/07

Christina rated it:

ROY: Your problem, Henry, is that you are hung up on words, on labels, that you believe they mean what they seem to mean. AIDS. Homosexual. Gay. Lesbian. You think these are names that tell you who someone sleeps with, but they don't tell you that.

HENRY: No?

ROY: No. Like all labels they tell you one thing and one thing only: where does an individual fit into the food chain, the pecking order? Not ideology, or sexual taste, but something much simpler: clout. Not who I fuck...more

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05/22/09

Robert Beveridge rated it:

bookshelves: finished, owned-and-still-own

Read in May, 2009

Tony Kushner, Angels in America: Millennium Approaches (Theatre Communications Group, 1993)

I thought Millennium Approaches was going along like a house on fire for the first two-thirds of its length. It's character-driven, it's funny despite its heartbreaking subject matter, it handles an historical figure in such a way as to make him larger than life. (I will admit up front that, despite my mother having suggested I do so for something like twenty years now, I have not read Citizen Co...more Tony Kushner, Angels in America: Millennium Approaches (Theatre Communications Group, 1993)

I thought Millennium Approaches was going along like a house on fire for the first two-thirds of its length. It's character-driven, it's funny despite its heartbreaking subject matter, it handles an historical figure in such a way as to make him larger than life. (I will admit up front that, despite my mother having suggested I do so for something like twenty years now, I have not read Citizen Cohn, her favorite Roy Cohn biography, and so I can't actually say how much of Kushner's portrayal of Cohn is accurate; it is, however, all kinds of fun.) And Kushner was getting his message across in just the right way—letting the story impart the message. Then comes Scene 2 of Act 3, where Louis and Belize are sitting in a bar talking. And Louis' logorrhea is message, message, message, message, message, and the whole thing just goes to hell in a handbasket. The funny thing is, Belize recognizes that it's all message, message, message, message, message and calls Louis on it repeatedly. Even Kushner's characters can't stand message drama! (That doesn't stop Louis from prattling on.) I've been seeing this more and more recently; authors trying to insert message drama (or fiction or poetry or...) by making the characters who have to put up with it slap the speaker into senselessness. (Unless it's internal, then they get nasty looks; think about the interminable message paragraphs that Kenzie suddenly comes up with in A Drink Before the War, for example.) Here's a tip, guys: it doesn't matter how you try to cache message-based writing into your work. It's still crap. It has always been crap (well, okay, 95% of the time), and it will always be crap. And here's the kicker, in Tony Kushner's case: if you're already treading on ground that activists have worked over hundreds of thousands of times, there's basically a guarantee that some political activist with a placard has already said everything you're trying to say. And probably said it better. In this case, it's been done hundreds, if not thousands of times. It's not only message crap, it's retreaded message crap.

Now that I've spent three hundred words on Louis and Belize's painful, conversation in Act Three, I'll say that the rest of the play is just plain awesome. The characters jump off the page, the pace is fast (despite there being almost no action), the dialogue is, in the main, witty and interesting. Take out that one scene, and this is great stuff. Unfortunately, no one thought to take out that one scene. ***
(less)

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11/08/07

Willie rated it:

Read in January, 1996

I saw the infamous Charlotte Rep production in...1995, I think, and it more or less changed everything-- what classes I took in college, where I went to college, and what kind of theatre I wanted to commit my life to. I'm in the midst of a reading of the play at North Carolina Stage Company (Nov 9-11, 2007), so I'm going to post something I wrote for that here:

I first saw Angels in America at Charlotte Rep in, I think, 1995. It was one of those rare, actually life changing events, a...more I saw the infamous Charlotte Rep production in...1995, I think, and it more or less changed everything-- what classes I took in college, where I went to college, and what kind of theatre I wanted to commit my life to. I'm in the midst of a reading of the play at North Carolina Stage Company (Nov 9-11, 2007), so I'm going to post something I wrote for that here:

I first saw Angels in America at Charlotte Rep in, I think, 1995. It was one of those rare, actually life changing events, and a real turning point in my thinking about the possibilities of live theatre, and my potential place in it.
About five years later, I got to play Louis Ironson at my alma mater, Guilford College, a year after graduating--it was a hugely terrifying and rewarding nine-month process. Last night, while looking through my script in preparation for this reading, I realized that I still had some notes from the director of that production in my script as a bookmark.
Re-reading them was interesting for a lot of reasons, not the least of which was that the dates of the notes were exactly seven years ago: the final days of October and first of November, 2000. We were about a week away from opening the play, and only a few days from the night we got out of rehearsal and breathed a huge collective sigh of relief upon hearing that Al Gore had won the presidential election. Of course, the next morning everything had changed. We kept on going, of course, despite the gloom that has suddenly descended, trying to face Bad News like the most generous of the characters we were playing on stage, with varying degrees of success.
Now, seven years later, Bush is somehow still president, pessimism and cynicism abound, and here we are about to spend a week sinking our teeth into this nearly twenty year old play set during the Reagan administration. I think Kushner's insistence on hope and beauty in the face of destruction and despair still offer a powerful tool to all who ache for change and realize that (as Amanda points out above) for better or worse, the world only spins forward. I'm sorry I will have to miss the WNCAP discussion on Monday evening. I'm glad it is happening.
One final thing: on a personal note, it is remarkably easy for me to see some good in the last seven years, and to wonder at the tricks of universal timing. The final performance of Millennium Approaches at NCSC will be on November 11th, seven years to the day since a casual acquaintance of mine saw me in the same play at Guilford and decided, at some point during the performance, to call me up for a date. This November 11th, she will again be in the audience - this time not as a relative stranger, but as my closest partner; my wife. And I will again be on stage, feeling so very grateful for the opportunity to work on this play that has helped mark some of the most important personal and professional milestones in my life thus far, as well as national and global ideas, events, and confrontations.
I am super excited about being part of this reading. I've wanted to work with many of these actors for a long time, and some of them were involved with that first Angels I saw in Charlotte twelve years ago. I'm glad that these words will again be spoken aloud, and will again challenge and encourage each of us to find the good, to hold stubbornly to truth, and to actively, aggressively create Hope.(less)

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12/14/08

Tara rated it:

bookshelves: booklist-for-2008, personal-favorites

Read in December, 2008

I think that this had to be the first play that I appreciated on a level beyond literature. I've gone through a ton of different playrights, and I feel that there's something so human about this piece that transcends the subject matter. Gay or straight, it's something I recommend to everyone. I also highly recommend the TV series by HBO.

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12/07/08

Carmen rated it:

bookshelves: plays

Read in January, 1994

Legacies and what is passed down from one generation to the next. How history and the present combine. Then throw religion, sexuality, and indentity into the mix, plus some other stuff. An operatic writing endeavor that wants to take it all on, I admire that.

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01/23/09

Gabrielle rated it:

Read in January, 2009

Although not my first time reading this play, I thoroughly enjoyed this read. This is one of the most important pieces of theater in the past 50 years. I never tire of reading it, seeing it, talking about it, studying it.

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02/27/09

Tiffany rated it:

Read in February, 2009

Why do plays have to be so abstract? Maybe because they are written to be spoken so all the characters have to voice their abstracted thoughts....Eventually, I'll get around to part 2

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02/05/09

Shaelee rated it:

Great book, had a lot of issues that I think people in this generation can relate too. I love that it touches on these issues, it makes them real to people who deny they exist.

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01/10/09

Cheryl rated it:

Read in January, 2009

Kushner uses humorously crude language to convey the seriousness of the AIDS epidemic, closeted homosexuality, religious repression, and Reagan politics. The play's fantastical air is so over the top; I'd love to see how it's executed on stage. (Part Two seems even more dramatic...)

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01/02/09

Jenn rated it:

Read in January, 2007

Read this once in a play analysis class. Plan to re-read it again when I get around to the second part.

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12/17/08

Mfalco65 rated it:

Read in January, 2001

Brilliant. Simply Brilliant. Even as a play, it is as rich and has as much depth as a novel.

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04/02/08

Kate rated it:

bookshelves: school

This play is excellent. I like the Kushner was able to deal so well with such a senstive topic as this one. The characters are strong and the way that the characters have multiple sides to them creates an amazing read. I really enjoyed the fact that you can read part 1 of the play alone and it will still make sense and wrap up nicely without feeling that you need to read the second half. The only thing that is confusing is when there is a dual scene which on stage would be easy to comprehend...more

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05/21/08

Matt Runkle rated it:

Has a copy to sell/swap — Read in June, 2008

recommended to Matt Runkle by: Anna Brown

Loved this. Make sure you read Part 2 too. It integrated a lot of my favorite things: weird Mormon imagery; campy, fantastic spirituality; Cold-War politics; humorous portrayals of the Christian right without being condescending. Parts of it were awful in a really satisfying way, like that George Michael song, "Praying for Time." I try to do a lot of this same stuff in my own writing-- so much so, that I worried the novel I'm writing seems like it's biting off this play. Oh well, at ...more

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03/03/09

Heather added it

Hell of a play...

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01/12/09

Tyler rated it:

Read in June, 2005

One of the most aweful, disturbing books I've ever read. Thanks, Auburn University "Great Books II."

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04/07/08

Kristian rated it:

Read in January, 2008

I haven't read this thing in like foreverago. I was worried it'd lose its power with time. Nope. It's still quite relevant today. It's an important piece of queer theater. It's a mash-up of Tennessee Williams lyricism and Larry Kramer politics. I'm still surprised this gayer than gay play became such a huge hit. Was it the 'Angels' in the title that lured people in? Oh, Angels. Oh, in America. Sounds nice, honey, let's take the kids.

Now I have to go find Part 2 and read tha...more

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02/14/08

Ashes rated it:

This brazenly honest play weaves reality and fantasy with religion and secularism. Kushner is unapologetic as he depicts the raw truth of what it once meant (or still does in some instances) to be gay in America or to be somehow broken, fall, and far beneath the America Dream. It's an exquisite and forthright play worthy of all the attention it has received. A must read for those with an open mind or people within the queer community.

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08/11/07

Kenneth rated it:

bookshelves: drama

I wonder why I didnt like this play more...perhaps bcuz I read it in class, where I was supposed to *love* it, where everyone else was gushing like school children over it and I felt the need to temper my liking of it. That said it is, along with part 2, a good play (if a bit heavy handed and over the top). One should definitely take in a live performance if ever the chance comes up.

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