Playhouse

by Richard Bausch

From the prize-winning fiction writer Richard Bausch (“A master of the novel as well as the story . . . Effortlessly engaging” —Sven Birkerts, The New York Times) , a sharp, affecting, masterly new novel about a close-knit theater community in Memphis and one turbulent, transformative production of King Lear .

As renovations begin at the Shakespeare Theater of Memphis, life for the core members of the company seems to be falling into disarray. Their trusted director has just retired, and theater manager Thaddeus Deerforth—staring down forty and sensing a rift growing slowly between himself and his wife, Gina—dreads the arrival of an imperious, inscrutable visiting director. Claudette, struggling to make ends meet as an actor and destabilized by family troubles, is getting frequent calls from her ex-boyfriend—and also the narcissistic, lecherous television actor who has been recruited to play King Lear in their fall production.

Also invited to the cast is Malcolm Ruark, a disgraced TV anchor muddling through the fallout of a scandal involving his underaged niece—and suddenly in an even more precarious situation when the same niece, now eighteen, is cast to play Cordelia. As tensions onstage and off build toward a breaking point, the bonds among the intimately drawn characters are put to extraordinary tests—and the fate of the theater itself may even be on the line.

Deftly weaving together the points of view of Thaddeus, Claudette, and Malcolm, and utterly original in its incorporation of Shakespeare’s timeless drama, Playhouse is an unforgettable story of men and women, human frailty, art, and redemption—a work of inimitable imaginative prowess by one of our most renowned storytellers.

Genres: Fiction, Novels, Contemporary

352 pages, Hardcover

First published February 14, 2023

About the author

An acknowledged master of the short story form, Richard Bausch's work has appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, Esquire, Harper's, The New Yorker, Narrative, Gentleman's Quarterly. Playboy, The Southern Review, New Stories From the South, The Best American Short Stories, O. Henry Prize Stories, and The Pushcart Prize Stories; and they have been widely anthologized, including The Granta Book of the American Short Story and The Vintage Book of the Contemporary American Short Story.

Richard Bausch is the author of eleven novels and eight collections of stories, including the novels Rebel Powers, Violence, Good Evening Mr. & Mrs. America And All The Ships At Sea, In The Night Season, Hello To The Cannibals, Thanksgiving Night, and Peace; and the story collections Spirits, The Fireman's Wife, Rare & Endangered Species, Someone To Watch Over Me, The Stories of Richard Bausch, Wives & Lovers, and most recently released Something Is Out There. His novel The Last Good Time was made into a feature-length film.

He has won two National Magazine Awards, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Lila-Wallace Reader's Digest Fund Writer's Award, the Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, The 2004 PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story and the 2013 John William Corrington Award for Literary Excellence . He has been a member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers since 1996. In 1999 he signed on as co-editor, with RV Cassill, of The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction; since Cassill's passing in 2002, Bausch is the sole editor of that prestigious anthology. Richard Bausch teaches Creative Writing at Chapman University in Southern California

Reviews

[Doug · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5, rounded down.

I had never read anything by either of the Bausches (Richard had a twin brother Robert, now deceased, who was also a writer), and this came as a pleasant little surprise. As my field is theatre, and surprisingly, very few books use such as a setting, thought I'd try it out. It ISN'T the Great American Novel by any stretch, but the storyline was compelling, the characters all unusual and well-defined, and it took me back to my own days of making plays. It was just a pleasure to read something not TOO complicated, but still counting as literary fiction, and I enjoyed it immensely.

[Barbara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Had a stack of books and couldn't get into anything--except for the ARC for PLAYHOUSE, Richard Bausch's new novel. He's not only master of the short story form, he writes great longform fiction. This book is a study in the art of observation. Multiple POVs and he pulls it off masterfully.

[Geonn Cannon · Rating 3 out of 5]

This would've been better if it was maybe... 2/3 the length. So much of it was just boring conversations about middle-aged white men having Issues. Women were treated mostly as unknowable creatures that were mostly just there to be present. I won't say they were pointless or without agency, but literally none of the men in the story seemed to understand how to interact with them or what their purpose might be.

[Isabella Whytcross · Rating 1 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley and Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage and Anchor for allowing me to read an e-ARC of this novel in exchange for an honest review!

Richard Bausch created a cacophony of stories and voices in Playhouse, some definitely more interesting than others.

Bausch does get props for juggling all of these point of view’s however, that is where my praise stops. It seems that in every sub plot the female is somehow made the antagonist whilst not making them more than one dimensional.

Gina shows clear signs of menopausal struggles but is not further examined other than to be at odds with her husband.

Mona is a newly eighteen year old actress playing along side her disgraced uncle whom she had serious and suspicious altercations with years ago. She has clearly needed to grow up quickly as shown in her uncle Malcolm’s point of view. Her behaviour however, is childish and fitting for her age. Her trauma is not taken into count with her actions and she is instead written as a whiny and naïve character.

Claudette is a massively talented actress going through major personal discoveries as she takes her declining dad into her care full time whilst juggling acting. Her love for her dad is stopping her from fully committing to her adult life as seen by her increasingly concerning relationship with her ex-husband. Her meek attitude toward the men in her life as well as Mona and Gina’s characters are indicative of the authors own beliefs.

Each female character suffers under the men in their lives but are written as the villains from the males’ perspective. This could be seen as a point being made of society’s portrayal of women however, it just falls flat. The men are all deemed victorious in the end apart from Claudette’s ex.

This was just not my cup of tea and was not good.

Overall, I rate this book 1 out of 5 stars.

[Samantha · Rating 2 out of 5]

Richard Bausch is, technically speaking, a very good writer. And that skill certainly comes through here in Playhouse, though unless you are a great fan of small theater politics or me too narratives, there’s not much to get excited about.

I’m no true enthusiast of either in book, though I’m fine with their inclusion as part of a plot which has other things to recommend it. This feels mostly like small and petty suburban stuff, one of my least favorite settings and themes in fiction.

The dialogue, while well written technically, is dull and droning and none of the characters are either particularly unique or particularly likable. There are loads of good theater books and loads of good books with a me too bent, so there’s no real reason to pick up a book like this that isn’t particularly exceptional on either subject and has little else that is uniquely good about it.

King Lear is always an interesting element to introduce into a novel, but this doesn’t do what the best Shakespeare-adjacent novels do, which is create a great allegorical comparison between what’s going on with the characters with what happens in the play.

This doesn’t by any means meet my parameters for a “bad” book, but it’s also not one that feels truly worth your time. Bausch has other, better novels. Read those instead.

*I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.*

[Christopher Napolitano · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can’t remember the last piece I read by Richard Bausch. For a time, well, many years, I lived on a steady diet of short fiction professionally and personally, and Bausch is a prolific writer of short stories. And novels. So I know I’ve read quite a few (maybe even published one or two?). I can’t say that any of them quite grabbed hold of me the way, say, TC Boyle or Thom Jones or Chuck Pahluniak or Jane Smiley do. Or people that I just chance across, like Victor LaValle. Is it a back-handed insult to say it? I guess, but I mean no harm.

Bausch is a skillful writer, accomplished in many dimensions–plot, voice, characters, language. Within a few pages of a Bausch book, you’re cheek to jowl with real people dealing with complex issues in depth, handled with care. But…sometimes it can feel like I'm stuck at a dinner party with earnest, intelligent and incredibly dull people. No, that’s not quite right—it’s as if no one is clicking and no fun can be had, but I (the blowhard and unreliable narrator forever searching for exuberance) know that in other circumstances, the souls of the people you’re confined with had moments in their lives where they really soared.
Playhouse features many elements that should resonate with me. It’s got Shakespeare, local theater, talented small-time actors, a few outrageous personalities and a chance to show the creative process at work. That last part is what I wanted to see, and didn’t, because there are only a few depictions of the performance or rehearsals or shaping of the play present here. Instead, the bulk of the book is concerned with the interior lives of the ensemble, principally the theater’s manager, its principal female actor, and a rehabilitating, fallen TV anchor in late middle age. I found the latter two characters quite absorbing; the former, not so much. So for a good chunk of the book I turned pages eager to move on and that, combined with my wish of what I thought the book could be versus the authorial decisions that lead the narrative far afield from it, led me to a familiar situation with Bausch. He has my admiration and respect, but my interest? It comes and goes.

[Jeremy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Playhouse by Richard Bausch is a book about theater, taking place in and around a theater and the act of putting on a show. The Shakespeare Theater of Memphis is undergoing a multimillion-dollar renovation. The opening production will be King Lear. Wolfgang Amadeus Thaddeus Deerforth (thankfully referred to as Thaddeus throughout, Wolfie affectionately by his wife) is the general manager, his wife, Gina, is the resident set designer. But with Gina entering into a depression, and Thaddeus always worrying and anxious, their marriage feels to be on shaky ground. Claudette Bradley is an actor with the company (she's playing Goneril). Her beloved father is showing signs of dementia after a stroke, and instead of watching him wither away in a home, she moves him in with her, hiring a homecare worker. Her ex-husband keeps on calling her with erratic phone calls. Malcom Ruark is former news anchor disgraced after a car accident involving his underaged niece and alcohol, though nothing sexually untoward happened. Sober now, the visiting director casts him (not as Lear, that goes to a visiting British actor) for some star power. Then his niece, Mona, is cast as Cordelia, who will be using ASL to sign her lines in an attempt to make a powerful statement that the actors can never really figure out. The book becomes less about putting on the show then about all the interpersonal backstage dramatics. Novels, like plays, can offer us a backstage and inside look into people, and Shakespeare is a grand example of this. And while Playhouse offers the inter-dramatics in spades, it becomes, at times, inert in its actions. A late breaking event adds a little drama but is too quickly resolved. But it does show the strong bond theater and theater people builds. In this case, the play is the thing.

[Bookoholiccafe · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Shakespeare Theater of Memphis is undergoing renovations and the theater company members are facing a lot of personal challenges. Thaddeus Deerforth, the theater manager, is struggling with his marriage and a new, difficult visiting director. Claudette, an actor in the company, is dealing with financial troubles and the unwanted attention of two exes. Malcolm Ruark, a disgraced TV anchor, is also involved in the production and faces further scandal when his niece is cast to play Cordelia. As tensions rise both on and offstage, the fate of the theater and the relationships between the characters are put to the test. Told from the perspectives of Thaddeus, Claudette, and Malcolm, and incorporating Shakespeare’s King Lear, Playhouse is a captivating tale of humanity, art, and redemption by a talented storyteller.

A compelling story about a theater company facing various personal and professional challenges. The use of Shakespeare's King Lear is an interesting addition and should appeal to fans of the playwright. The multiple perspectives of the characters should also make for an engaging read. However, it remains to be seen how well the author weaves together all of the different plotlines and characters.
The characters in the book are unique and imaginative, and the plot is engaging and enjoyable.

[Anne Moose · Rating 5 out of 5]

I highly recommend this book. I read Playhouse cover-to-cover on flights between Southern California and Boston, and I was both fully immersed in the story and in awe of the author’s exquisite writing.

There’s a lot to unpack with this novel. It’s actually multiple stories about multiple overlapping relationships, each character in some way connected to a new theater production of King Lear. The front of the book lists a “Cast of Characters,” and it comes in handy because, with quite a few characters and overlapping plotlines, it helps you keep track of who’s who and how everyone is connected in this fascinating glimpse into the complex world of the theater.

Most of the individual stories revolve around love and loss in some way, but they manage to highlight a vast range of human experience, including marital disintegration, mental disintegration, alcohol and drug abuse, family conflict, sexual misconduct, crushed dreams, new beginnings... All the sub-plots come together beautifully in the end around an event that both makes the story whole and is the perfect hopeful conclusion to a book that is mostly dark until right before the curtain rises.

Bravo, Richard Bausch. Playhouse is brilliant.

[Clifford · Rating 5 out of 5]

Playhouse by Richard Bausch appealed to me because I studied with the author at the Sewanee Writers’ Conference and have stayed in touch with him. I was also interested in the book because of the subject matter, which deals with the revival of a Shakespeare theater in Memphis (where Bausch once taught). There’s a large cast of characters (and a cast list at the beginning, as befits a story about a theatrical production), and the story is told from many different points of view. Except that it isn’t particularly funny, it reminded me of Slings and Arrows, the Canadian TV series about a Shakespeare festival in Canada. My interest, of course, stems from my own involvement on the Board of Trustees of the American Shakespeare Center, where I’ve witnessed variations on the drama and intrigue Bausch portrays in the novel. I was particularly engaged by the depiction of the production of King Lear and the challenges faced by the director and various actors.

[Joe]

I write about Richard Bausch's new novel “Playhouse” in The Brooklyn Rail.

As you might guess, a novel about a theater called “The Globe” will likely include Shakespearean-like knaves, fools, villains, and flawed heroes. Playhouse includes them, but there’s no play within a play here. Divided into six parts, the traditional third-person story is told from the points of view of Thaddeus, Malcolm, and Claudette. There are few, if any, post-postmodern experimental shenanigans here. Instead, Bausch, that Old Lion of Literature, who’s won many awards for his long and short fiction, is a consummate realist as a storyteller, and, as I’ve said in the past: No one is better at realistic storytelling than Bausch.

https://brooklynrail.org/2023/03/book...

[Eleanore · Rating 4 out of 5]

"He let a little time go by. His brother watched him, apparently believing he was pondering the idea, while in fact he was trying very hard to keep from falling into little pieces. 'I'm all right.' It felt as if he'd hauled the words up out of the whole dark tangle of himself."

Really dug this, so ended up taking much longer than it normally would have to savor reading it. Plus its author and its subject matter both put someone in particular very strongly in my mind, and the timing of the very day I even began reading it ended up being rather uncanny in that regard, something I'll probably always remember when I think of it. Beautiful nuance of character across a rather large cast.

"As he watched her, it occurred to him that honesty itself could constitute a failure of love, perhaps even a form of aggression. The idea was evanescent as breath fogging a window."

[Candi Sary · Rating 5 out of 5]

“After nine months and one week in the womb, with Mozart’s music flowing every day over his little space of warmth, Thaddeus was born with a distinct taste for Aretha Franklin.”

Richard Bausch is such an incredible storyteller. Those who love theater will especially appreciate his new novel, and yet even though my Shakespeare background is rather “shaky” I loved getting to know this beautifully flawed cast of characters as they prepared for a production of KING LEAR. Bausch’s characters don’t stay on the page. He takes his time fully forming them into real people. I felt like I knew them. And I really heard them through the realistic (and often comical) dialogue. I thoroughly enjoyed this deeply moving story that looks at the power of art in our chaotic lives.

[Corey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Richard Bausch’s new novel is a full meal. It’s lush and richly populated with a colorful troupe of characters, all beautifully delineated, all deliciously human. At times it reminded me of the supernal novels of Iris Murdoch. She, too, could create a large cast and swirl them about in a dizzying plot made up of fascinating incident and literary legerdemain. Bausch’s voice never falters and his control over his action is masterful. Here is one of our finest writers at the top of his game. Oh, and Playhouse is set in my hometown of Memphis, Tennessee, which he reconstructs in all its ragged glory.

[Moira Williamson · Rating 2 out of 5]

As someone who works in the Memphis Theatre Community (at Playhouse on the Square, usually referred to as Playhouse…) this book was a bit of a let down. I wish the note that the author had taken liberties with locations in Memphis was at the beginning, rather than the end. I spent most of the book confused as to how they teleported from Busters Liquor in East Memphis to Mud Island so suddenly. It just felt weird to constantly name drop places (that didn’t add or subtract from the plot) but not put them in the right section of the city.
Also the story itself just wasn’t doing it for me. It kinda goes to nothing in the end.

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I looked forward to disappearing into this book every time I picked it up, and now I'm sad that it's over. I felt like I knew the wide range of characters, and the theater world is the perfect background for their struggles.
Richard Bausch is an expert at capturing the essence of people as they go about dealing with their very human problems, all the while hoping for some happiness to arrive in the midst of chaos. It's a sharp, clever, compassionate look at real people, living in the real world.

[Rosanna Staffa · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was a pleasure to see life in the theatre, the restlessness and the exposure feared and desired in equal measure. I lived with the flawed cast preparing for a production of KING LEAR. I was allowed to enter the emotional backstage of the performers, where the dialogue was cracking with wit and sharp intuitions. ‘I think plays consciously set up to make some point or other end up missing the point.’
The fragility of the human experience on stage and off was genuinely touching and treated with delicate humor. 

[Vicky · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is going to become a rare DNF for me. It felt hastily thrown together, unpolished. Bausch did not solve its central structural problem, which is its large "cast" of characters. Appropriately, there is a Dramatis Personae at the front of the book, but it is irksome to have to constantly refer to it each time a character appears, at least until a few of the characters have gelled in one's mind. The fact that there is a dramatis personae perhaps points to the real problem here: that the story should have been embodied in a play, not a novel:a play about a playhouse and its people.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can’t imagine why the reviews on this are so low. It’s a very honest look at a small professional theatre in Memphis struggling with an unconventional production of Lear and several of those involved. Yes it borders on the melodramatic, but the characters are real, subtly drawn, and honest. Thankful that it wasn’t a parody of theatre folks and that it has a real understanding of the art. The three major characters are complex and interesting, and the story well told in a linear fashion.

[Ellen Mays · Rating 3 out of 5]

Difficult for me at first, just felt too confusing with so many characters. But then I began to care about the narrators, Malcolm and his recent shame, Thaddeus who was losing hos wife, and Claudette who rescued her father. I liked reading about the friends and not-friends who work together to create a play, the politics and the artistic interpretations and those who need spotlights. It was sad but nearly funny at times; I’m glad I didn’t give up on the book.

[Bill Silva · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars. There’s a lot of contrivance in both the plot and the characters, and Bausch has some odd word choices (does anyone really call a napkin a serviette? and he must use the descriptive noun “woolgathering” half a dozen times). But anyone interested in theater, Shakespeare, and general human folly and frailties will find the novel of interest and reasonably engaging.

[Mary Camarillo · Rating 5 out of 5]

An intimate backstage view of a production of King Lear in the steam of a Memphis Tennessee summer. Marriages unravel, families fall apart, but the show goes on—“a dream of violent passions and immense failures in a world bereft of clemency” mirroring the real world and still finding hope and connection. Bravo!

[Kristin Pacelli · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book took a bit of getting into for me, and I had convinced myself it was pretentious about 1/4 of the way through the book. I’m a theater nerd, so I picked it up based solely on the name, but almost put it down several times because I simply don’t understand Shakespeare.

Then I suddenly found myself caring about what happened to each of the main characters.

The characters were masterfully written. Each had unique strengths and flaws that amounted to a group of tightly knit friends and foes that I felt a sort of kinship towards.

I’d have rated this four stars based on the surprise ending, but I had some trouble getting into the first bit of the story; it simply didn’t catch my interest at first.

[Fiona Rogers · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved this. Compelling. Recommend.

[Jan Amidon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a creative assortment of characters! Sort of a John Irving-esque quirkiness to them, and a very entertaining plot surrounding a theater's production of King Lear. Greatly enjoyed reading it.

[Ruth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just a good story. Well drawn characters.

[Jean · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent novel about a Memphis Shakespearean theatre company and the drama behind the scenes. A great cast of characters.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am going to start adding surcease and jejune to my everyday vocabulary.

[syddfieldd · Rating 4 out of 5]

i really liked this.

[Matthew Frets · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a soap opera, but an entertaining one.