Lost in Yonkers (Drama, Plume)

New
Paperback
1993
$10.34

What happens to children in the absence of love? That is the question that lies at the heart of this funny and heartrending play by one of America's most acclaimed and beloved playwrights. Winner of four Tony Awards, including Best Play, and the Pulitzer Prize, Lost in Yonkers is Neil Simon's moving drama about the cruelties and painful memories that scar a family. It is New York, 1942. After the death of their mother, two young brothers are sent to stay with their formidable grandmother for the longest ten months of their lives. For Grandmother Kumitz is a one-woman German front - a refugee and a widow who has steeled her heart against the world. Her coldness and intolerance have crippled her own children: the boys' father has no self esteem...their Aunt Gert has an embrassing speech impediment...their Uncle Louie is a small-time gangster...and their Aunt Bella has the mentality of a child. But it is Bella's hunger for affection and her refusal to be denied love that saves the boys - that leads to an unforgettable, wrenching confrontation with her mother. Filled with laughter, tears, and insight, Lost in Yonkers is yet another heartwarming testament to Neil Simon's talent.

Synopsis

What happens to children in the absence of love? That is the question that lies at the heart of this funny and heartrending play by one of America's most acclaimed and beloved playwrights. Winner of four Tony Awards, including Best Play, and the Pulitzer Prize, "Lost in Yonkers" is Neil Simon's moving drama about the cruelties and painful memories that scar a family. It is New York, 1942. After the death of their mother, two young brothers are sent to stay with their formidable grandmother for the longest ten months of their lives. For Grandmother Kumitz is a one-woman German front - a refugee and a widow who has steeled her heart against the world. Her coldness and intolerance have crippled her own children: the boys' father has no self esteem...their Aunt Gert has an embrassing speech impediment...their Uncle Louie is a small-time gangster...and their Aunt Bella has the mentality of a child. But it is Bella's hunger for affection and her refusal to be denied love that saves the boys - that leads to an unforgettable, wrenching confrontation with her mother. Filled with laughter, tears, and insight, "Lost in Yonkers" is yet another heartwarming testament to Neil Simon's talent.

$10.34

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 128
Edition: Reprint
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 28 Jan 1993
ISBN 10: 0452268834
ISBN 13: 9780452268838

Media Reviews

Praise for Neil Simon and Lost in Yonkers

Neil Simon has done it again, with a craftmanship and skill probably unmatched in the contemporary English-speaking theater. --Clive Barnes, New York Post

If Broadway ever erects a monument to a patron saint of laughter, Neil Simon will have to be it. --Time Magazine

Author Bio

Since 1960, a Broadway season without a Neil Simon comedy or musical has been a rare one. His first play was Come Blow Your Horn, followed by the musical Little Me. During the 1966-67 season, Barefoot in the Park, The Odd Couple, Sweet Charity, and The Star-Spangled Girl were all running simultaneously; in the 1970-71 season, Broadway theatergoers had their choice of Plaza Suite, Last of the Red Hot Lovers, and Promises, Promises. Next came The Gingerbread Lady, The Prisoner of Second Avenue, The Sunshine Boys, The Good Doctor, God's Favorite, California Suite, Chapter Two, the musical They're Playing Our Song, I Ought to Be in Pictures, Brighton Beach Memoirs (which won the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Play of 1983), Biloxi Blues (which won the Tony Award for Best Play of 1985), and the female version of The Odd Couple.

Mr. Simon began his writing career in television, writing The Phil Silvers Show and Sid Caesar's Your Show of Shows. He also wrote the screen adaptations of Barefoot in the Park, The Odd Couple, Plaza Suite, The Prisoner of Second Avenue, The Sunshine Boys, California Suite, Chapter Two, and I Ought to Be in Pictures. His original screenplays include The Out-of-Towners, The Heartbreak Kid, Murder by Death, The Goodbye Girl, The Cheap Detective, Seems Like Old Times, Only When I Laugh, Max Dugan Returns, and The Slugger's Wife. He received the Tony Award and the Pulitzer Prize in 1991 for Lost in Yonkers. He died in 2018.