Stagestruck: Theater, Aids, and the Marketing of Gay America

Sarah Schulman is an award-winning playwright, novelist, and non-fiction writer. She is the author of seven novels, including" After Delore"s, " People in Troubl"e, " Rat Bohemi"a, and, most recently, " Shimme"r, and the nonfiction work" My American History: Lesbian and Gay Life during the Reagan/Bush Year"s. A longtime activist, Schulman was one of the first members of ACT UP in New York and a co-founder of the Lesbian Avengers. Over the past twenty years she has contributed to numerous publications, including th"e Village Voic"e, th"e Natio"n, the" New York Time"s, " Gay Community New"s, and" Intervie"w. A recipient of the 1997 Stonewall Award, Schulman lives in New York City.

"Sarah Schulman is one of this country's best cultural critics and novelists, and what she has to say in this book needs to be hear." Alexander Doty, author of Making Things Perfectly Queer. Sarah Schulman writes from a highly scorned community whose members are generally cast as anonymous freaks in someone else's play. As Stagestruck makes clear, the titillating history and ideas of those "freaks" are consistently stolen and then corrupted by uptown "art" marketeers out to make a quick buck. But you cannot change the story without changing the moral of the story. "Soul stealing" is punishable in older societies. It is time we caught up." Diamanda Galas, performer and composer. "Utterly engrossing ... startling and scary ... I have never read a more persuasive account - a wonderfully written one, too - of the commodification that has overtaken us, and the disparity of power between the haves and the have nots ... Stagestruck establishes beyond cavil the gross colonisation by yuppie straight America of all that is special about gay life. Sarah Schulman remains what she has been: a rare, fearless teller of unpleasant truths." Martin Duberman, author of In White America and Stonewall.