Spalding Gray

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  • Aronson, Arnold. "Sakonnet Point." The Drama Review 19, No. 4 (December 1975): 27-35. (Examination of the structure, images, action, and other performance-related elements of Sakonnet Point.)
  • Bierman, James. "Three Places in Rhode Island." The Drama Review 23, No. 1 (March 1979): 13-30. (Detailed analysis of the dramaturgy of Gray's trilogy.)
  • Brustein, Robert. Review of Sex and Death to Age 14. The New Republic 195, No. 1 (July 7, 1986): 36-7. (Favorable evaluation that claims "Gray creates an erotic history of early adolescence that does for New England Protestants what Lenny Bruce and Philip Roth did for New York and New Jersey Jews.")
  • Canby, Vincent. "Soloists on the Big Screen." The New York Times (22 March 1987): II, 19. (Review of the movie version of Swimming to Cambodia that places it in the genre of "concert film.")
  • Carr, Cindy. "Spalding Gray." American Film XII, No. 7 (May 1987): 62. (Profile of Gray and an appreciation of the film version of Swimming to Cambodia that declares it "an epic meditation on illusion and reality.")
  • D'Erasmo, Stacey. "Gray Matters." Harper's Bazaar, No. 3365 (May 1992): 46, 135. (General appreciation of Gray and his work. D'Erasmo states, "Gray deserves an award for making the spoken word terrifying and spectacular to a mass audience.")
  • Dace, Tish. "Monologues in the Making." Plays and Players, No. 389 (February 1986): 16-17. (Admiring profile that praises Gray's style: "his phraseology, his structure, his relatively uninflected voice and relaxed face, a tempo of rapid patter punctuated by purposeful pauses.")
  • Dika, Vera. "Critical/Mass." Art in America 76, No. 1 (January 1988): 37-40. (Argues that the film version of Swimming to Cambodia is not "a mere recording of a previously staged event but a new work, one that actually extends and completes the original aspirations of the performance piece.")
  • Gentile, John S. "Spalding Gray." In his Cast of One: One-Person Shows from the Chatauqua Platform to the Broadway Stage, pp. 148-52. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. (Links Gray to the solo performance tradition "that is rooted in the art of storytelling and the basic human need to hear and to tell stories.")
  • Gray, Spalding. "About Three Places in Rhode Island." The Drama Review 23, No. 1 (March 1979): 31-42. (Recollection by Gray of his early experiences in the theater and the development of Sakonnet Point, Rumstick Road, and Nayatt School*.)
  • Hornby, Nick. Review of Impossible Vacation, by Spalding Gray. Times Literary Supplement (14 January 1994): 20. (An unfavorable review of Impossible Vacation.)
  • Johnson, Brian D. "The Talking Cure: A Performer Bases His Career on Confession." Maclean's (13 July 1992): 44. (Offers a brief overview of Gray's career and favorable assessment of Impossible Vacation and Monster in a Box.)
  • King, W. D. "Dramaturgical Text and the Historical Record in the New Theatre: The Case of Rumstick Road." Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism 7, No. I (Fall 1992): 71-87. (Examines the composition, structure, and performance strategies of Rumstick Road*.)
  • Leslie, Guy. Review of Monster in a Box. Theater Week 4, No. 16 (26 November 1990): 34. (Finds Gray's storytelling in Monster in a Box "highly entertaining" but observes that "some indication that storytelling cannot neatly tie a ribbon around all of life's experiences is called for.")
  • Maslin, Janet. Review of Swimming to Cambodia. The New York Times (13 March 1987): C 8. (Describes the film of Swimming to Cambodia as "a two-man undertaking, one that shows off both Mr. Gray's storytelling talents and [director] Jonathan Demme's ability to frame them.")
  • McGuigan, Cathleen. "Gray's Eminence." Newsweek CVIII, No. 4 (28 July 1986): 69. (Declares that Gray "has reinvented the oral tradition.")
  • Panjabi, Gita. "Spalding Gray: Writing the Spoken, Speaking the Written." In In the Vernacular: Interviews at Yale with Sculptors of Culture, edited by Melissa E. Biggs, pp. 151-88. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1991. (Gray discusses his early influences, creative processes, and the artistic concerns of his monologues.)
  • Prinz, Jessica. "Spalding Gray's Swimming to Cambodia: A Performance Gesture," in Staging the Impossible: The Fantastic Mode in Modern Drama, edited by Patrick D. Murphy, pp. 156-68. New York: Greenwood Press, 1992, pp. 156-68. (Argues that in its attempt to come to terms with the horrors that took place in Cambodia, Swimming to Cambodia represents "a reaction to or defense mechanism against the fantastic and seemingly impossible facts of history.")
  • Queenan, Joe. Review of Monster in a Box, by Spalding Gray. National Review (20 July 1992): 43-4. (A tempered review of Monster in a Box.)
  • Rich, Frank. "To Play Oneself May Be the Greatest Illusion of All." The New York Times (29 June 1986): 3, 25. (Includes a review of Swimming to Cambodia, in which Rich observes: "What makes Spalding Gray so theatrical in his seemingly nontheatrical way is not only his talent as a storyteller and social observer but also his ability to deepen the mystery of the demarcation line between performer and role.")
  • Shank, Theodore. "Spalding Gray and Elizabeth LeCompte: The Wooster Group." In his American Alternative Theater, pp. 170-79. New York: Grove Press, 1982. (Focuses on the autobiographical content of Gray's work, particularly Three Places in Rhode Island.)
  • Shewey, Don. "The Year of Spalding Famously." Village Voice XXIX, No. 46 (13 November 1984): 99, 107. (Profile of Gray that stresses his status as an "underground celebrity.")
  • Siegle, Robert. "Spalding Gray and the Colorful Quilt of Culture." In his Suburban Ambush: Downtown Writing and the Fiction of Insurgency, pp. 252-59. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989. (Examines the ways in which Gray's works "disrupt the traditional relationship between a passive audience and method actors preserving the illusion of reality on a raised stage.")
  • Simon, John. Review of Monster in a Box. New York Magazine 23, No. 48 (10 December 1990): 109. (Very mixed assessment asserting that some of Monster in a Box "has a fey, off-the-wall charm, [but] some of it is just self-indulgent blather.")

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Gray, Spalding (Drama Criticism)
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