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The Anarchist
Nothing is quite what it seems in Mamet's latest work. With a nod to his mentor, Harold Pinter, Mamet employs his signature verbal jousting in "The Anarchist," which centers on two women: a prison governor and a prisoner with a life sentence trying to make the case that she merits parole. The Broadway premiere stars Patti LuPone and Debra Winger.
96 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2011
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About the author
David Mamet
226 books739 followersDavid Alan Mamet is an American author, essayist, playwright, screenwriter and film director. His works are known for their clever, terse, sometimes vulgar dialogue and arcane stylized phrasing, as well as for his exploration of masculinity.
As a playwright, he received Tony nominations for Glengarry Glen Ross (1984) and Speed-the-Plow (1988). As a screenwriter, he received Oscar nominations for The Verdict (1982) and Wag the Dog (1997).
Mamet's recent books include The Old Religion (1997), a novel about the lynching of Leo Frank; Five Cities of Refuge: Weekly Reflections on Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy (2004), a Torah commentary, with Rabbi Lawrence Kushner; The Wicked Son (2006), a study of Jewish self-hatred and antisemitism; and Bambi vs. Godzilla, an acerbic commentary on the movie business.
As a playwright, he received Tony nominations for Glengarry Glen Ross (1984) and Speed-the-Plow (1988). As a screenwriter, he received Oscar nominations for The Verdict (1982) and Wag the Dog (1997).
Mamet's recent books include The Old Religion (1997), a novel about the lynching of Leo Frank; Five Cities of Refuge: Weekly Reflections on Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy (2004), a Torah commentary, with Rabbi Lawrence Kushner; The Wicked Son (2006), a study of Jewish self-hatred and antisemitism; and Bambi vs. Godzilla, an acerbic commentary on the movie business.
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
December 12, 2017
He may have aged into something of a conservative crank, but Mamet is still the best playwright of the last 50 years and just one of the finest American writers.
December 23, 2017
Not a perfect play by any means. While Cathy is an utterly fascinating character, Ann comes across more as a plot device than an equal and opposite to Cathy. Be prepared for discussions of philosophy in the middle of a play about a fight for power.
January 6, 2014
As a drama, this is pure polemics. As polemics, this is pure melodrama. Subtlety, poetry, insight, truth, humanity: they're all missing. Mamet's better work captures his fantasy of how groups of colleagues (mainly men) talk, how they use language to define their social structure and, especially, power centers. Here, in the drama of two women playing cat-and-mouse with each other (standing in for the back-and-forth of opposing views on security, punishment, compassion), Mamet stumbles. Every moment feels contrived. It's as if Sleuth were cobbled together out of Fox News broadcasts, with each "reveal" uncovering not a new layer of honesty, but a deeper strain of paranoia and misanthropy. As a long-time fan of this writer, someone who first felt the electric charge of Sexual Perversity and American Buffalo as they were published while I was in high school, this is a shocking decline to witness.
March 28, 2016
Fans of Mamet's more male-oriented, group talk will be let down, as this is a discourse, only every so often fascinating, between two females: one a lasped rebel, the other, more conservative. They talk back and forth in the usual witty banter filled with religion, philosophy, politics, and government and more but none of these topics, in Mamet's hand, have much weight--he doesn't have much to say that's new and it is hard not to disagree with many of the points Mamet seems so convinced by. Has Mamet's conversion to radical republican politics tainted his recent work? I keep hearing that, but with "The Anarchist" I have read just where and how his newfound religion can seep into his work and tarnish it. Yes, even as confined as this play is, it could have been much better with a better thinker that also had Mamet's gift for language.
February 13, 2013
This is a beautiful, important piece of philosophical writing. It should be taught in theatre classes, literature classes, psychology classes and philosophy classes. I understand part of the reason this play had such a short run on Broadway--it is not meant for the Broadway patron; it is meant for truly thoughtful, introspective, intelligent people. I can't say that I would have paid a Broadway price to see this play had I read it beforehand--but I definitely would see it in a smaller scale house. Maybe I'd pay a mid-week matinee price. But the price of the book seems adequate.
September 22, 2025
Mamet is one of the most interesting hypocrites I’ve ever read, every time I pick up one of his works it’s a gamble of if I’ll roll my eyes & stop engaging in the first few minutes or follow through with gritted teeth ignoring any desire for a break.
I’m a trans woman, Marxist, & overall in opposition to genocide, I naturally have a lotta disagreement with everything he talks about now. But he keeps me coming back like the worst relative you know but that you love talking to in-spite of everything.
All I knew about this was that it was that Patti LuPone was so good in it Ari Aster offered her the awesome role of Mona Wassermann.
At the start I was annoyed at the style of dialogue & lack of clarity, but I stayed because of curiosity. I think this is my favorite thing I’ve yet read from Mamet, it feels like it hits all of his core aspects that draw me in but feels just restrained enough to actually address them beyond genre & expectation.
Both these characters & their ideology & their symbology are extremely see through yet still buried behind these surface hypocrisies. The religious aspect really pissed me off in ways that very little conversations about religion actually get to the core to.
There’s this immense selfishness hidden inside the selflessness of both characters that feels like the core to the entire play. That question of “is doing a violent selfish act something that can be absolved? or is the question of that in itself one of selfish attempt to save one’s own pants?”
I feel like an asshole even engaging with that question but it’s something that is interesting & I enjoy confronting.
That’s why I keep coming back to Mamet even when I really hate the guy most of the time, he gets to the core of things in spite of all his noise & hypocrisy that very few writers are either too smart, too aware, too afraid, or too safe to truly get messy & engage with.
I’d really like to adapt this into a film one day but that would probably ruin the whole thing.
I’m a trans woman, Marxist, & overall in opposition to genocide, I naturally have a lotta disagreement with everything he talks about now. But he keeps me coming back like the worst relative you know but that you love talking to in-spite of everything.
All I knew about this was that it was that Patti LuPone was so good in it Ari Aster offered her the awesome role of Mona Wassermann.
At the start I was annoyed at the style of dialogue & lack of clarity, but I stayed because of curiosity. I think this is my favorite thing I’ve yet read from Mamet, it feels like it hits all of his core aspects that draw me in but feels just restrained enough to actually address them beyond genre & expectation.
Both these characters & their ideology & their symbology are extremely see through yet still buried behind these surface hypocrisies. The religious aspect really pissed me off in ways that very little conversations about religion actually get to the core to.
There’s this immense selfishness hidden inside the selflessness of both characters that feels like the core to the entire play. That question of “is doing a violent selfish act something that can be absolved? or is the question of that in itself one of selfish attempt to save one’s own pants?”
I feel like an asshole even engaging with that question but it’s something that is interesting & I enjoy confronting.
That’s why I keep coming back to Mamet even when I really hate the guy most of the time, he gets to the core of things in spite of all his noise & hypocrisy that very few writers are either too smart, too aware, too afraid, or too safe to truly get messy & engage with.
I’d really like to adapt this into a film one day but that would probably ruin the whole thing.
September 16, 2022
David Mamet strikes again and at the crux of our most loved and loathed professional pastime, tabooism and the audacity of (evil). To redeem or revile; what creates the personality of living on the fringe of opaque wonderment. We think of Manson (Charles), Ted Bundy, and the Zodiac Killer as foetus for higher more cult-ish synergy. To be put abreast of our abnormal distinctions gives and takes, so rightfully so. Quandry and delight in the garden of pleasure and sit-comical ideation. David Mamet is a playwright without time or mention of its passings. Give us a stage and act in the reformation of these almost pranksters of dialogue.
September 13, 2025
“One of Mamet’s weaker works; reading it was less satisfying than expected.”
“The dialogues can be interesting at times, but the whole play is too argumentative and lifeless. Reading it felt more like a dry debate than a living drama.”
«دیالوگها گاهی جالباند، اما کل نمایش بیش از حد جدلی و کمجان است. تجربهی خواندنش بیشتر شبیه مناظرهای خشک بود تا یک درام زنده.»
“The dialogues can be interesting at times, but the whole play is too argumentative and lifeless. Reading it felt more like a dry debate than a living drama.”
«دیالوگها گاهی جالباند، اما کل نمایش بیش از حد جدلی و کمجان است. تجربهی خواندنش بیشتر شبیه مناظرهای خشک بود تا یک درام زنده.»
March 22, 2022
If you need an example of gobbledygook, this is it. When he reviewed the premiere for Vulture in 2001, Scott Brown wrote, "I’m not objecting to a play that feels like work. I’m only objecting to work with no play in it." Perfectly said. And I love David Mamet.
February 20, 2018
In true Mamet style, it is very wordy. Would be an excellent production with top notch actors, but other than that, I fear it would be a bore.
March 2, 2018
I normally love Mamet's work.This was a huge disappointment.It seemed really contrived.
February 20, 2019
Power of thought and authority play a game of truth and dare. I loved the air of argument and the uncertainty. I loved the implied notions and that I really couldn't pick a side.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 16, 2024
trash. how’d this get to broadway. kathy boudin girl i am so sorry
June 8, 2024
Conflict first. Exposition can take a walk !
June 28, 2013
My prior experiences with Mamet left me with little more than a tepid respect for his place in contemporary theatre. I was neither impressed with his signature style nor moved by his pieces, as some nagging little snob in the back of my brain felt his prizing of simplicity was always rife with subversive pretension. In terms of his previous plays, I still don't "get it," and I likely never will.
All of that said, I thoroughly enjoyed The Anarchist.
My largest qualm with the Mamet of yore was the strictly cadenced speech that made him famous. I was always told that the language of his characters was meant to be "really realistic," and thus fittingly gritty and imperfect. This was the method behind the maddening sentence fragments, incomplete thoughts, and seeming entire conversations based upon concepts that his painfully mortal characters could never quite articulate. Nevertheless, I frequently felt that I was watching or reading plays about droves of confused people that had only recently discovered the faculty of language and were still hammering out the kinks.
For those unhappy few who may share my personal distaste, I highly recommend this play. To my un-Mametized palette, the playwright has reached a happy stylistic medium that justifies at last that which I've been told by his followers for years. Mamet navigates a philosophically and emotionally charged discourse between a veteran prison official and a hopeful parolee while avoiding the conventional tropes that tend to plague the subjects of justice, mercy, and power. Both women are intelligent, strong, and cunning, and perhaps most importantly, they are articulate—and inarticulate—within reason. Indeed, it is Mamet's artful infusion of human weakness that elevates this play beyond the slew of its theatrical cat-and-mouse predecessors—I was already completely immersed in the chase before I realized one was taking place. Cathy and Ann are two very real women using very real tactics in order to achieve very real objectives—it is precisely this simplicity that I had always been instructed to find in Mamet but very rarely could.
Having learned of the poorly-received Broadway production after I had finished the play, I would be interested to see it staged. Though I found Mamet's language to be on-point, there is admittedly rather shallow potential for much stimulation beyond the intellectual. For a review on a site based on reading, however, I would most certainly recommend it to anyone looking for a heaping serving of food for thought.
All of that said, I thoroughly enjoyed The Anarchist.
My largest qualm with the Mamet of yore was the strictly cadenced speech that made him famous. I was always told that the language of his characters was meant to be "really realistic," and thus fittingly gritty and imperfect. This was the method behind the maddening sentence fragments, incomplete thoughts, and seeming entire conversations based upon concepts that his painfully mortal characters could never quite articulate. Nevertheless, I frequently felt that I was watching or reading plays about droves of confused people that had only recently discovered the faculty of language and were still hammering out the kinks.
For those unhappy few who may share my personal distaste, I highly recommend this play. To my un-Mametized palette, the playwright has reached a happy stylistic medium that justifies at last that which I've been told by his followers for years. Mamet navigates a philosophically and emotionally charged discourse between a veteran prison official and a hopeful parolee while avoiding the conventional tropes that tend to plague the subjects of justice, mercy, and power. Both women are intelligent, strong, and cunning, and perhaps most importantly, they are articulate—and inarticulate—within reason. Indeed, it is Mamet's artful infusion of human weakness that elevates this play beyond the slew of its theatrical cat-and-mouse predecessors—I was already completely immersed in the chase before I realized one was taking place. Cathy and Ann are two very real women using very real tactics in order to achieve very real objectives—it is precisely this simplicity that I had always been instructed to find in Mamet but very rarely could.
Having learned of the poorly-received Broadway production after I had finished the play, I would be interested to see it staged. Though I found Mamet's language to be on-point, there is admittedly rather shallow potential for much stimulation beyond the intellectual. For a review on a site based on reading, however, I would most certainly recommend it to anyone looking for a heaping serving of food for thought.
March 15, 2016
This play, it seems to me, is more and more relevant each day. It is wonderfully written, with Mamet's unique style of punctuation, pace, interruption of pace & repetition. As an Australian theatre actor and director not having grown up with any exposure to Mamet at all, I still struggle with his punctuation. I think it will take a whole lot more getting used to, and it is the sort of thing that needs to be read out loud and played with. I have done a little bit of training in Mamet's techniques & I find it really interesting. Frustrating at times, but interesting. So I guess I am learning to love his work, slowly but surely.
June 9, 2016
surprisingly good for late period mamet, with political nuance that is absent from most of hus recent work. the anarchist is a two woman play, in which a political revolutionary who has spent a significant amount of time in prison for the murder of a police officer makes her case for release. through the course of the conversation, we touch of radicalism, religion (the titular anarchist has turned to jesus) the role of the state as a religious monolith, and sexuality. the play's tension builds as we get to know the characters better and the twists that come are natural to the characters, while exploring what justice and responsibility means.
June 24, 2013
The Anarchist is written in a platform. The book about two woman one named Ann case manger of a woman Cathy,she in jail for killing two copes.Cathy want to be prowled Ann want to help her,but Ann thinks Cathy is hiding information about two people who help her do the crime.Cathy over cores of time in jail had became a reformed christen, she also had a lesbian lover in jail who left jail before her.
June 9, 2016
well, Mamet is not my favourite playwright but I follow his career because he writes about interesting things. this play of his is about a conversation between two women: a prisoner and her guard. It's not an easy read plus the story is not dynamic sometimes it gets slow and boring and somehow it just didn't get my full attention. In spite of it being very short, it took me a whole day to finish it.
May 17, 2014
The Anarchist is a welcomed addition to Mamet's body of work. Here is a play that will continue to be discussed and debated for years to come.
February 20, 2016
This is the most wonderful sort play I have ever read.
Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews