Arthur Laurents

Playwright, screenwriter, and director Arthur Laurents writes about directing Broadway musicals, especially Gypsy and West Side Story, about other musicals and other directors, interacting with producers, writers, and actors, and about life with his late partner, Tom Hatcher.

This musical sets the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet against a backdrop of the rivalry of two street gangs, the Sharks and the Jets, in New York of the 1950s. A young woman who is sister to the Sharks leader has her first taste of love with the former head of the Jets.

"Two thrill-seeking friends (Granger and Dall) strangle a classmate and then hold a party for their victim's family and friends, serving refreshments on a buffet table fashioned from a trunk containing the lifeless body. When dinner conversation revolves around talk of the 'perfect murder,' their former teacher (Stewart) becomes increasingly suspicious that his students have turned his intellectual theories into brutal reality."--Container.

A lonely secretary travels to Venice on a vacation with the secret hope of falling in love.

Based on a play by Arthur Laurents, it recounts the story of a young black soldier who has suffered a nervous breakdown and developed psychosomatic paralysis. Crippled by rage and trauma, his condition was induced by experiences encountered during a reconnaissance mission combined with a lifetime of racial discrimination. He may be able to walk again, but only if he can overcome his anger and frustrations.