(Bought at the Little Red Book Shack in Hudson, NY for $1): Julie Salamon's well-researched biography of Pulitzer and Tony winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein reveals a complicated woman. Wasserstein became the voice of a generation of women who were underrepresented in media, advocating for fulfilling identities outside of male protection and dominance. In her personal life, she gravitated to gay men, and attempted to have a child with many of them. Her "husbands" included playwrights Christopher Durang and Terrence McNally, director Gerald Guitterez, artistic director Andre Bishop and costume designer William Ivey Long. She recreated her relationships with her family in plays like Isn't It Romantic and The Sister Rosensweig and the real-life connections were even more complex.
The book also provides a social history of changing women's roles in American society and the theater from the 60s into the early 2000s when Wendy passed away at the age of 55.
I interviewed her once for a book I was writing on long-running on and Off-Broadway shows. My cousin went to college with her. I was an usher for the Off-Broadway run of Isn't Romantic at the Lucille Lortel Theater, so I saw the play many times. So it was fascinating to get to know the really Wendy, funny, smart, maternal, and complex.
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