Playwright, actor and director Charles Ludlam (1943–1987) helped to galvanize the Ridiculous style of theater in New York City starting in the 1960s. Decades after his death, his place in the chronicle of American theater has remained constant, but his influence has changed. Although his Ridiculous Theatrical Company shut its doors, the Ludlamesque Ridiculous has continued to thrive and remain a groundbreaking genre, maintaining its relevance and potency by metamorphosing along with changes in the LGBTQ community. Author Sean F. Edgecomb focuses on the neo-Ridiculous artists Charles Busch, Bradford Louryk, and Taylor Mac to trace the connections between Ludlam’s legacy and their performances, using alternative queer models such as kinetic kinship, lateral historiography, and a new approach to camp. Charles Ludlam Lives! demonstrates that the queer legacy of Ludlam is one of distinct transformation—one where artists can reject faithful interpretations in order to move in new interpretive directions.

“Ludlam’s is a dazzling and significant body of work, and it should be accorded a place of greatest regard and honor in the American dramatic literary canon. The plays are funny, erudite, poetic, transgressive, erotic, moving, and so theatrical they seem the Platonic ideal of everything we mean when we use that word. The plays are the sublime expressions of what Ludlam insisted was not an aesthetic, but a moral vision: anti-Puritan, unsentimentally utopian, sexually destabilizing—a transporting, a transcendence by means of deflation, a joyous and subversive, even dangerous revelry leading to revelation, a wise and ecstatic celebration of the world.” –Tony Kushner (from his Preface) Artistic director, playwright, director, designer and star of New York's acclaimed Ridiculous Theatrical Company, the late Charles Ludlam ransacked theatrical and literary history in an evolutionary quest for a modern art of stage comedy. His more than 30 plays are among the most thought-provoking entertainments in the modern repertoire. As Ludlam himself put it, "This is farce, not Sunday school." This collection includes an introduction by Tony Kushner alongside Ludlam's most famous and celebrated works for the stage: The Mystery of Irma Vep: Ludlam's most famous play, this is a hilarious send up of Daphne de Maurier, Jane Eyre and Victorian cross dressing. One of the most produced plays in the United States, The Mystery of Irma Vep is “the most perfect expression of Ludlam’s approach to theatre: a play that simultaneously provokes terror, laughter and a grotesque mockery of all gender, literary and special boundaries” (Village Voice). Camille: based on La Dame aux Camélias, this satirical take on the tubercular courtesan brings any audience “to unexpected heights of pathos and laughter” (San Francisco Chronicle). Galas: the life of opera singer Maria Callas imagined as a modern tragedy, in which Ludlam himself assayed the part of the diva. Stage Blood: Ludlam's take on Shakespeare, with actors putting on Hamlet both on stage and back stage; somehow, in this tragedy, everything comes out for the best. Bluebeard: somewhat based on H.G. Wells' Island of Dr. Moreau, Bluebeard tells the story of a mad vivisectionist in search of a third sex.

Ludlam (1943-1987) first brought his unique brand of theater to New York audiences in the late 1960s. Based in part on traditional comic characters, his ridiculous school included such inspirations as Hollywood B movies, camp, drag, opera and theatrical artifice. The author provides an overview of Ludlam's life, exploring the theatrical underpinnings of his work and then the whole Ludlam canon. A look at Ludlam's work in the 1980s concludes the work. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Theatre of the Ridiculous is a significant movement that highlighted the radical possibilities inherent in camp. Much of contemporary theatre owes this form a great debt but little has been written about its history or aesthetic markers. This book offers a comprehensive overview of the important practitioners, along with critical commentary of their work. Beginning with Ridiculous' most recognizable name, Charles Ludlam, the author traces the development of this campy, queer genre, from the B movies of Maria Montez to the Pop Art scene of Andy Warhol to the founding of the Play-House of the Ridiculous and the dawn of Ludlam's career and finally to the contemporary theatre scene.

Recovers the hidden history of theater professionals who transgressed the gendered expectations of their time

Beyond Ridiculous tells the story of Theatre-in-Limbo, a downtown band of actors formed in 1984 by director Kenneth Elliott and playwright and drag legend Charles Busch. They launched Vampire Lesbians of Sodom at the Limbo Lounge, a raffish club in the fringes of the East Village, but it would later become the longest-running non-musical in off-Broadway history. From 1984 to 1991, Busch starred in eight Limbo productions, always in outrageously fabulous drag. In Beyond Ridiculous, Elliott narrates in first-person the company’s Cinderella tale of fun, heartbreak, and dishy drama. At the center of the book is a young Charles Busch, an unforgettable personality fighting to be seen, be heard, and express his unique style as a writer-performer in plays such as Psycho Beach Party and The Lady in Question. The tragedy of AIDS among treasured friends in the company, the struggle for mainstream acceptance of LGBTQ+ theatre during the reign of President Ronald Reagan, and the exploration of new ways of being a gay theatre artist make the book a bittersweet and joyous ride.

Brings together the voices of scholars, critics, and artists to celebrate the genius of Taylor Mac

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Moon illuminates the careers of James, Warhol, and others by examining the imaginative investments of their protogay childhoods in their work in ways that enable new, more complex cultural readings.