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The Guys

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About this listen

 First performed in a hit off-off-Broadway production, and soon to be a film starring Sigourney Weaver and Anthony LaPaglia, The Guys is a timeless drama about the surprising truths people can discover in ordinary lives, and the connections we make with others and ourselves in times of tragedy.

Paralyzed by grief and unable to put his thoughts into words, Nick, a fire captain, seeks out the help of a writer to compose eulogies for the colleagues and friends he lost in the catastrophic events of September 11, 2001. As Joan, an editor by trade, draws Nick out about “the guys,” powerful profiles emerge, revealing vivid personalities and the substance and meaning that lie beneath the surface of seemingly unremarkable people. As the individual talents and enthusiasms of the people within the small firehouse community are realized, we come to understand the uniqueness and value of what each person has to contribute. And Nick and Joan, two people who under normal circumstances never would have met, jump the well-defined tracks of their own lives, and so learn about themselves, about life, and about the healing power of human connection, through talking about the guys.©2002 Anne Nelson; (P)2002 Random House, Inc.
One passage of the play, "The Science of Pain," was adapted from the book Listening to Prozac, by Peter D. Kramer
Original jacket photograph courtesy of Content Film Drama & Plays Entertainment & Performing Arts United States World Literature Theatre Entertainment

Critic reviews

“The Guys cannot but hit home.”
—New York magazine

“A stark and simple, potent and poignant play, brimming with edgy humanity.”
—New York Post

“The Guys is not an ordinary night in the theater....What comes through is that humanity can be exalted by expression as well as the other way around.”
—The New York Times

“New York’s most cathartic theater event.”
—Entertainment Weekly

“[The Guys] goes beyond theater. It’s not just entertainment. It [is] a real, moving document.” —Robert Altman
All stars
Most relevant
A wonderful telling of a tragic story. We all know the details or so we think until the men came alive in the narrative. Well performed and emotional.

Heartwarming

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