BEST REVENGE
HOW THE THEATER SAVED MY LIFE AND HAS BEEN KILLING ME EVER SINCE
(Cune Press, 2004)
“If you’re thinking of a career in playwriting, this book is both primer and guide.” - John Bishop, playwright of Musical Comedy Murders of 1940.
Middle-aged playwright Steve Fife – in conflict with his ex-wife, his current girlfriend, and a legion of creditors – journeys from Hollywood to Atlanta to work with the theater idol of his student days, legendary avant-garde director Joseph Chaikin. Thus begins a roller-coaster ride of a very unusual sort, combining personal revelations with theatrical obsessions, the step-by-step disclosure of a master director’s rehearsal process with a search for spiritual truth (and a decent night’s sleep). Just hop aboard and get a backstage pass to the “holding-on-by-your-fingernails” reality of life in the contemporary American theater.
Featuring anecdotes about Sam Shepard, James Woods, F. Murray Abraham, Joseph Papp, John Guare, Dustin Hoffman, Groucho Marx, Samuel Beckett, Franz Kafka, Mary Tyler Moore, Dracula, Keats and the Ghost of Tennessee Williams.
REVIEWS:
“… hysterically funny yet deliciously heartbreaking. I laughed ‘til I wept ‘til I laughed again! Should be required reading for every aspiring artist.” – Mark Rydell, Oscar-nominated director of “The Rose” and “On Golden Pond”
“A humorous, cautionary tale of a struggling playwright… Fife lovingly portrays the brilliant but disabled Joe Chaikin… This is an amusing look at backstage antics for theater lovers.” – Publishers Weekly
“Most of the time, theater looks like a mutual admiration society. But Stephen Fife’s new memoir Best Revenge gives voice to all the insecurities and petty feelings that go on behind the scenes in theater… In Best Revenge, Fife offers a dirty-thoughts-and-all self-portrait in extreme close-up, in the model of early Philip Roth… Best Revenge [also] calmly explores the craft of blocking & directing stage plays.” – Creative Loafing (Atlanta)
“Bilious and funny… Best Revenge comes from deep inside the heart and mind of a struggling artist… Best Revenge resembles Dostoyevsky’s Notes from Underground and Knut Hamsun’s Hunger. Fife is unafraid to tell the unattractive truth from the worm’s eye view… The best moments in Best Revenge are in the relationship between Fife and [Joe] Chaikin… The best revenge comes not only in surviving, but also in finding joy.” – American Theatre Magazine (May/June 2004)