The Prisoner of Second Avenue Book

Comedy / Characters: 2 males, 4 females

Scenery: Interior

Mel Edison is a well paid executive of a high-end Manhattan firm which has suddenly hit the skids and he gets the ax. His wife Edna takes a job to tide them over, then she too is sacked. Compounded by the air-pollution killing his plants, and with the walls of the apartment paper-thin, allowing him a constant earfull of his neighbors private lives things can't seem to get any worse...then he's robbed and his psychiatrist dies with $23,000 of his money. Mel does the only thing left for him to do-he has a nervous breakdown and it's the best thing that ever happened to him...

"A gift for taking a grave subject and, without losing sight of its basic seriousness, treating it with hearty but sympathetic humor...A talent for writing a wonderful funny line...full of humor and intelligence. Fine fun."-New York Post

"Creates an atmosphere of casual cataclysm, an everyday urban purgatory of copelessness from which laughter seems to be released like vapor from the city's manholes."-Time

Library Journal

Richard Dreyfuss, Marsha Mason, and other cast members performed this play for the L.A. Theatre Works audience shortly after a successful revival in London's West End. The story revolves around Mel and Edna Edison, trapped by circumstance in an apartment on Second Avenue, New York City, in 1974. Add a cellular phone or two, and it's life in 2000. Simon takes a good look at apartment life, career and role reversals, a nervous breakdown, and the love, torture, care, or inertia that somehow keeps a couple in a relationship for many years. At points, it's laugh-out-loud funny; at other times, it offers sensitive insight into the human condition. Fast-moving dialog with nonstop Simon quips and jokes performed extremely well by two fine actors: who could ask for more? This is classic American comedy produced, acted, recorded, and packaged in an exemplary manner. Sound effects, music, and simulated radio news broadcasts add to the atmosphere. Highly recommended for adult audiences and drama and theater collections.--Cliff Glaviano, Bowling Green State Univ. Libs., OH Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.