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Lecture

Professor David Peimer
The Theater of David Mamet: Myths and Reality in Urban American Culture

Saturday 13.02.2021

Summary

David Peimer discusses the works and themes of American playwright, screenwriter, and director David Mamet, focusing on his plays Glengarry Glen Ross (1984) and Speed the Plough (1988) and Mamet’s use of satire, irony, and competition to portray human nature and society’s values.

Professor David Peimer

head and shoulders portrait of david peimer looking at camera, smiling

David Peimer is a professor of theatre and performance studies in the UK. He has taught at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and New York University (Global Division), and was a Fulbright Scholar at Columbia University. Born in South Africa, David has won numerous awards for playwriting and directing. He has written eleven plays and directed forty in places like South Africa, New York, Brussels, London, Berlin, Zulu Kingdom, Athens, and more. His writing has been published widely and he is the editor of Armed Response: Plays from South Africa (2009) and the interactive digital book Theatre in the Camps (2012). He is on the board of the Pinter Centre in London.

I don’t think so. He usually wrote about the best con artist, the best hustler, the best grifter. You leave one of his plays craving human empathy. And I think that’s absolutely intentional.