Out of Character: Rants, Raves, and Monologues from Today's Top Performance Artists

Presents a sampling of thirty-two monologue performances from the artists of P.S. 122, including Spaulding Gray, John Leguizamo, and Laurie Anderson

Miller, the artistic director at Performance Space 122 in New York, has seen plenty of "performance artists," and here he collects the work of 32 solo performers who draw on theater, dance and stand-up comedy to push the boundaries of storytelling. While many well-known practitioners of this amorphous genre are included, such as Eric Bogosian, Holly Hughes, John Leguizamo, Spalding Gray and Reno-others, like Karen Finley and Ann Magnuson, are absent. Miller acknowledges that since the essence of these artists' work is live performance, this book-script excerpts plus introductory notes for each performer-can't fully capture the subject. Some of the material here still shines: Lisa Kron's hilarious narration of humiliation; Tim Miller's poignant evocation of the death of a lover from AIDS; Danny Hoch's take on a white boy channeling hip-hop rhythms. Then again, some work comes off as self-indulgent or obscure, and some of the most boundary-pushing performers, like transsexual Kate Bornstein, or Ron Athey, the tattooed, HIV-positive performance artist who sometimes bleeds during his show, probably need to be seen, not read. Some contributors offer useful reflections on the creative process; David Cale compares his work to songwriting; Gray calls his work "oral composition." Unfortunately, editor Miller chooses not to explore trends and themes here and the reader must wade through a certain amount of dross to glean insights. Photos.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Started by a handful of New York choreographers and performance artists and named after the rehabbed school building it inhabited, P.S. 122 became in the 1980s one of the most important performance art venues in the country and launched hundreds of performers, famously including Eric Bogosian, Tim Miller, and Danny Hoch. Mark Russell, P.S. 122 artistic director since 1983 (and no relation to the well-known political satirist), here collects the work of 32 P.S. 122 artists. Some are superstars in the field--Spalding Gray, John Leguizamo, Laurie Anderson--but Russell mixes in a number of less-known but noteworthy lights, such as Holly Hughes, Penny Arcade, and Lisa Kron. The resulting smorgasbord of material, much never previously published, amounts to a broad sampler of New York's downtown performance scene. Some pieces are frustratingly short (no monologue is more than six pages long), yet usually enough is offered to give a true taste of a performer's style. The book also includes biographical material and less-helpful "personal statements" from the artists. Jack Helbig