Recommendations based on Into the Woodsby Stephen Sondheim

* statistically, based on millions of data-points provided by fellow humans

  1. Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

    by Stephen Sondheim
    A vengeful barber and his accomplice bake their victims into pies in 19th century London.

    According to legend, Sweeney Todd had his barber shop at number 186 Fleet Street, next door to St. Dunstan's Church, just a few blocks away from the Royal Courts of Justice. On this site, they say, ... (Goodreads)

  2. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

    by Tom Stoppard
    A humorous exploration of fate and free will, seen through the eyes of two minor characters in Shakespeare's "Hamlet".

    Hamlet told from the worm's-eye view of two minor characters, bewildered Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Echoes of Waiting for Godot resound, reality and illusion mix, and where fate leads heroes to a ... (Goodreads)

  3. August: Osage County

    by Tracy Letts
    A darkly comic and dramatic family reunion, exposing dysfunction and tensions.

    The action takes place over the course of several weeks in August inside the three-story home of Beverly and Violet Weston outside Pawhuska, Oklahoma . Prologue The play opens with Beverly Weston, a ... (Wikipedia)

  4. West Side Story

    by Irving Shulman
    A modern retelling of Romeo and Juliet set in 1950s New York City, exploring the rivalry between two street gangs and the love between their members.

    From the silver screen to the Great White Way—one of the greatest stories of all time.,They came together through love but violence threatened to tear them apart. Maria was young and innocent and had ... (Barnes & Noble)

  5. Proof

    by David Auburn
    A young woman struggles to prove her mathematical genius, while dealing with a troubled past.

    The play concerns Catherine, the daughter of Robert, a recently deceased mathematical genius in his fifties and professor at the University of Chicago , and her struggle with mathematical genius and ... (Wikipedia)

  6. Fiddler on the Roof

    by Joseph Stein
    A poor Jewish milkman in pre-revolutionary Russia tries to uphold his traditions and marry off his daughters.

    The full text and complete lyrics, as well as photographs from the original production. One of the great works of the American musical theatre. It is darling, touching, beautiful, warm, funny and ... (Goodreads)

  7. Noises Off

    by Michael Frayn
    A play within a play, following the chaotic and hilarious antics of a dysfunctional theater troupe.

    Each of the three acts of Noises Off contains a performance of the first act of a play within a play , a sex farce called Nothing On . The three acts of Noises Off are each named "Act One" on the ... (Wikipedia)

  8. Hero

    by Perry Moore
    A young superhero struggles with his sexuality and the expectations of his superhero father.

    Thom Creed is a 16-year-old high school basketball star, who has a tendency to get into trouble. His mother abandoned the family several years ago, and his father Hal, a publicly disgraced ... (Wikipedia)

  9. Steel Magnolias

    by Robert Harling
    A group of Southern women bond and support each other through life's joys and tragedies.

    Presents the script of a 1988 play about a group of women in Chinquapin, Louisiana, who learn to draw upon their underlying strength and love to meet the challenges of life. ... (Goodreads)

  10. Wicked - Piano/Vocal Arrangement

    by Stephen Schwartz
    Musical adaptation of the classic tale of a misunderstood witch and her unlikely friendship with a young girl.

    Nominated for a whopping 10 Tony Awards in 2005, Wicked is an undeniable Broadway smash! A prequel to the all-American classic The Wizard of Oz, this new musical is a character study of Elphaba and ... (Goodreads)

  11. A Midsummer Night's Dream

    by William Shakespeare
    Comedy of mistaken identities, love and dreams set in a mythical forest.

    The play consists of four interconnecting plots, connected by a celebration of the wedding of Duke Theseus of Athens and the Amazon queen, Hippolyta , which are set simultaneously in the woodland and ... (Wikipedia)

  12. Arsenic and Old Lace

    by Joseph Kesselring
    Dark comedic tale of two elderly sisters who commit murder out of kindness.

    The play is a farcical black comedy revolving around the Brewster family, descended from the, Mayflower, settlers but now composed of maniacs, most of them homicidal. The hero, Mortimer Brewster, is ... (Wikipedia)

  13. True West

    by Sam Shepard
    Two estranged brothers reunite and clash over their conflicting lifestyles and aspirations in the American West.

    True West is about the sibling rivalry between two estranged brothers who have reconnected. The play begins with brothers Austin and Lee sitting in their mother's house. This is the first time ... (Wikipedia)

  14. Hedda Gabler

    by Henrik Ibsen
    A woman's struggle against societal expectations and a search for freedom.

    Hedda, the daughter of an aristocratic and enigmatic general, has just returned to her villa in Kristiania (now Oslo) from her honeymoon. Her husband is George Tesman, a young, aspiring, and reliable ... (Wikipedia)

  15. Long Day's Journey into Night

    by Eugene O'Neill
    Tragic story of a family's struggles with addiction, emotions and guilt.

    Eugene O'Neill's autobiographical play Long Day's Journey into Night is regarded as his finest work. First published by Yale University Press in 1956, it won the Pulitzer Prize in 1957 and has since ... (Goodreads)

  16. Much Ado About Nothing

    by William Shakespeare
    A comedic romance of misunderstandings and eventual triumph of love over deception.

    In Much Ado About Nothing, Shakespeare includes two quite different stories of romantic love. Hero and Claudio fall in love almost at first sight, but an outsider, Don John, strikes out at their ... (Goodreads)

  17. Wit

    by Margaret Edson
    A professor's journey of self-discovery as she faces her own mortality.

    Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the New York Drama Critics Circle Award, the Drama Desk Award, the Outer Critics Circle Award, the Lucille Lortel Award, and the Oppenheimer Award,Margaret Edson’s ... (Goodreads)

  18. The Pillowman

    by Martin McDonagh
    A darkly comic tale of a writer accused of murder, testing the limits of storytelling.

    Ariel and Tupolski interrogate Katurian in a police room, adopting a good cop/bad cop routine with Ariel happily playing the bad cop. At first Katurian does not know why he is being questioned, and ... (Wikipedia)

  19. The Poetry of Robert Frost

    by Robert Frost
    Collection of masterfully crafted poems examining the beauty, challenges and complexities of life.

    A feast for lovers of American literature-the work of our greatest poet, redesigned and relaunched for a new generation of readers No poet is more emblematically American than Robert Frost. From "The ... (Barnes & Noble)

  20. As You Like It

    by William Shakespeare
    A romantic comedy about love, disguise, and mistaken identity in the Forest of Arden.

    Readers and audiences have long greeted As You Like It with delight. Its characters are brilliant conversationalists, including the princesses Rosalind and Celia and their Fool, Touchstone. Soon ... (Goodreads)

  21. Life, the Universe and Everything

    by Douglas Adams
    An intergalactic quest to find the answer to the ultimate question of life.

    After being stranded on pre-historic Earth after the events in, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, , Arthur Dent is met by his old friend Ford Prefect , who drags him into a space-time eddy , ... (Wikipedia)

  22. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

    by Edward Albee
    A darkly comedic exploration of a troubled couple's tumultuous marriage.

    George and Martha engage in dangerous emotional games. George is an associate professor of history and Martha is the daughter of the president of the college where George teaches. After they return ... (Wikipedia)

  23. A Streetcar Named Desire

    by Tennessee Williams
    A woman's struggle to come to terms with her past and present in a post-war New Orleans.

    After the loss of her family home to creditors, Blanche DuBois travels from the small town of Laurel, Mississippi , to the New Orleans French Quarter to live with her younger married sister, Stella , ... (Wikipedia)

  24. All the Bright Places

    by Jennifer Niven
    Two teens struggling to find hope in the face of depression and grief, discovering the power of love.

    Theodore Finch and Violet Markey are two teenagers who badly want to escape from their small Indiana town. Violet is a popular girl who is secretly dealing with survivor's remorse, and Finch is a boy ... (Wikipedia)

  25. The Lorax

    by Dr. Seuss
    A story of environmental stewardship and warning of the consequences of greed.

    A young unnamed boy living in a polluted area visits a strange isolated man called the Once-ler on the Street of the Lifted Lorax. The boy pays the Once-ler fifteen cents, a nail, and the shell of a ... (Wikipedia)

  26. Pygmalion / My Fair Lady

    by George Bernard Shaw
    A phonetics professor transforms a Cockney flower girl into a refined lady, but struggles with the consequences of his experiment.

    George Orwell claimed that "The central plot of Shaw's play, Pygmalion , is lifted out of Peregrine Pickle [by Tobias Smollett ], and I believe that no one has ever pointed this out in print, which ... (Wikipedia)

  27. The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

    by Douglas Adams
    An eccentric space adventure filled with comedic misadventures and cosmic revelations.

    At last in paperback in one complete volume, here are the five novels from Douglas Adams's Hitchhiker series. "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" Seconds before the Earth is demolished for a ... (Goodreads)

  28. Oedipus Rex

    by Sophocles
    Tragic tale of a man's inescapable destiny and the consequences of his actions.

    Oedipus, King of Thebes, sends his brother-in-law, Creon, to ask advice of the oracle at Delphi , concerning a plague ravaging Thebes. Creon returns to report that the plague is the result of ... (Wikipedia)

  29. The Calling

    by James Frey
    A young man struggles with addiction and finds himself in a mysterious rehab center where he discovers a supernatural purpose for his life.

    Twelve thousand years ago, they came. They descended from the sky amid smoke and fire, and created humanity and gave us rules to live by. They needed gold and they built our earliest civilizations to ... (Goodreads)

  30. The Glass Menagerie

    by Tennessee Williams
    A young woman's struggle to find her place in society, while being held back by her family.

    The play is introduced to the audience by Tom, the narrator and protagonist, as a memory play based on his recollection of his mother Amanda and his sister Laura. Because the play is based on memory, ... (Wikipedia)