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February 07, 2007

Crash Course

Next weekend I will be immersed in nine hours of theater when I attend performances of The Coast of Utopia. The trilogy explores a group of friends who come of age under the Tsarist autocracy of Nicholas I. Playwright Tom Stoppard says it's not necessary to do any pre-theater study, but I'd like to have a fighting chance of taking in as much as I can when I actually attend the plays. Of course, I've had the tickets for some time but only now am I doing any reading.

Stoppard appears in tonight's Charlie Rose. Check your local PBS station for listings - the episode airs here at 12:30 a.m.

The official website for the plays also features some brief notes, and the current issue of the Lincoln Center Theater Review features a conversation with Stoppard as well as a few essays.

At some point I'd picked up a book on Russian history, but I've misplaced it during the move. It will suffice as post-theater reading.