Lips Together, Teeth Apart: A Play

By Terrence McNally

Book Overview

Drama Desk Award Winner for Outstanding New Play

"One of Mr. McNally's finest plays--and one that hasn't dated, despite its apparently topical subject matter."--The New York Times

"McNally's wit and wild comedy invariably score, and his darker intentions resonate, making Lips Together one of his most accomplished plays."--New York Daily News

"A brilliant comedy."--The New Yorker

At the heart of this haunting play is a dramatically incisive portrait of two married couples--the Trumans and the Haddocks. Uncomfortable with themselves and each other, they are forced to spend a Fourth of July weekend at the Fire Island house that the brother of one of the women left his sister when he died of AIDS. Though the house is beautiful, it is as empty as their lives and marriages have become, a symbol of their failed hopes, their rage, their fears, and of the capricious nature of death. Acerbic and haunting, Lips Together, Teeth Apart probes the stifled lives of people and their prejudices with a stunning clarity that resonates long after.

The author of such critically acclaimed plays as The Lisbon Traviata and Frankie and Johnnie in the Clair de Lune, Terrence McNally has graced the American theater with a voice that captures our fear of intimacy in the modern age with dead-on insight, wit, and poignancy. But never has he blended these disparate elements into such a brilliantly cohesive whole as he has in Lips Together, Teeth Apart, hailed by Frank Richard of the New York Times as McNally's "most ambitious and most accomplished play yet."

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0452268079
• ISBN13: 9780452268074
• Release Date: May 1992
• Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
• Length: 112 Pages
• Weight: 0.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 5.3" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

this play should not be taken at face value

You will read lots of reviews from people telling you this play deals with homosexuality and AIDS, and 'isn't it a tough subject?' They're wrong. This play is about fear. If you can see that, you will fall in love with this play.

Terrence McNally = Art

Terrence McNally is Art. He's never failed to astound me, be it in the way he deals with sensitive topics with humor, or the way he conveys the humanity is a comical situation. Lips is an amazing play that deals with tough issues, such as AIDS, extramarital affairs, homosexuality, and acceptance. It shows how people naturally want to sweep difficult issues under the rug and never really want to accept that which is hard for them to deal. All taking place on a 4th of July Weekend, Lips Together, Teeth Apart follows two couples staying at the home of a gay man who died of AIDS, and how they are unable to talk about it. Each of them has a story to tell, and a personal issue to deal with, though none of them like to discuss their problems with their companions. This is a play about coming to terms with yourself and those around you, lay all your cards on the table, and those who stick around, stick around. I reccomend this strongly to anyone in theatre and even anyone interested in reading a compassionate play.

Lips is a play that define the rat race we live in!

Lips Together, Teeth Apart is a play that shows the fast pace society that we call America. Touching on issues such as extramarital affairs, homosexuality, and AIDS, McNally exhibits a culture that we know exists, but want to deny the facts. It may take another read or two in order to see the humor in the dialogue. Having read other plays such as Angels in America, Lips treats society with a kind hand and a turn of the cheek. Each character has a problem, resulting in their own monologue to find their true personality. Read it with an open mind and an open heart!