Recent Book Releases
Among this year’s newly released books on New York City theater are three works by award-winning playwrights published by Theatre Communications Group (TCG) and the second volume of a reference series on Broadway plays with themes of crime and murder.
Dominique Morisseau, Confederates (New York, TCG, 2026, paperback, $16.95, ISBN 978-1-63670-252-0) – A powerful and insightful satire on the racism, sexism, and classism experienced by two fictional Black women from different periods in American history. This play follows the stories of Sara, a slave in her twenties who became a Union spy in the Civil War, and Sandra, a present-day scholar in her late thirties/early forties and professor of political science at a predominantly white-patriarchal university. Filled with farcical humor, scathing observations, and spot-on parallels between then and now, the potent work examines how much we’ve progressed and how far our society still needs to go in the ongoing quest for freedom, respect, and true equality.
Lucas Hnath, Hillary and Clinton (New York, TCG, 2026, paperback, $17.95, ISBN 978-1-63-670260-5) – Set in 2008, in “an alternate universe where anything can happen,” the play offers a rumination on the private life and public persona of a well-known political figure, and the deals and sacrifices made in the pursuit, and the ultimate failure, of her run for the US presidency. Originally written in 2008, then rewritten in 2018, after the losses of the real-life titular figure’s two campaigns. Hnath’s imagined woman, struggling against a more popular candidate in the primary election, enlists the aid of her husband (the former President), despite his own scandalous fall from favor and their rocky relationship. The fictional musing considers what ends she will go to in her drive for power and her reflections on a political climate in which she might win, on another planet, in the infinity of space and time.
Annie Baker, Infinite Life (New York, TCG, 2026, paperback, $17.95, ISBN 978-1-63670-215-5) – Five women and one man, ranging in age from their forties to their seventies, come together at a wellness clinic two hours north of San Francisco to heal their chronic pain, afflictions, and suffering through fasting and alternative medicine. They meet, relax on the retreat’s open-air patio, and engage in mundane ice-breaking chit-chat that initially makes us laugh. Over the course of several days, they read, philosophize, get to know each other, and make connections, as their conversations become increasingly personal and poignant, with slow reveals of their illnesses and anatomy, broken relationships and sexual desires. Through it all, the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright keeps us aware of the eternal state of existence and the unremitting advance of time, with her signature deliberate pacing, and the characters noting how many minutes, hours, or days have passed between scenes in this profoundly affecting work.
Amnon Kabatchnik, Bloody Broadway, Volume II (Orlando, FL, BearManor Media, 2026, paperback, $39.00, ISBN 979-8-88771-972-6) – In the second volume of his compendium of Broadway plays on the themes of “Menace, Murder, and Mystery,” the retired theater professor and director Kabatchnik concentrates on the years 1930-60. The book catalogues a total of 88 works, arranged in chronological order. The illuminating entries contain a summary and analysis of the plot (including “potentially offensive elements” of derogatory content, to maintain an accurate historical perspective), biographical information about the playwright, major actors, and director, details of production data, and the play’s reception by critics and scholars. It’s an invaluable reference source for theater historians and a must-have for dedicated fans of Broadway.
