David Kranes: Selected Plays

Over a 30-year career, local playwright, author and former University of Utah professor David Kranes has published many novels, but only three of his more than 40 plays have been published—in three different Best American Short Plays editions—although productions of them have starred well-known actors such as Chris Cooper, John Ritter and Kevin Bacon.

“Plays are meant to be visual, kinetic and spatial. When someone just reads the words and doesn’t ‘see’ the 3-D play, they get only the least important layer,” Kranes says. However, he adds, having a catalog of a playwright’s works—Shakespeare or Tennessee Williams, for example—enriches and furthers the form. Five plays were carefully culled for Selected Plays, from Nevada (1977) to House, Bridge, Fountain, Gate (2001). In the foreword, Jon Tuttle says, “They depend for their force on an accumulation of meaning … a condition that then deepens and changes and colors, and along the way we realize we are changing as well.” (Austen Diamond)

David Kranes: Selected Plays @ The King’s English Bookshop, 1511 S. 1500 East, 801-484-9100, Aug. 9, 7 p.m., free, KingsEnglish.com