Theater gift guide 2008

Desperately seeking Stephen
Sure, the first career-retrospective box set of pioneering composer Stephen Sondheim is an amazing survey of the last five decades of Broadway, dating back to his lyrics for West Side Story and Gypsy. But even more amazing is the outrageous assemblage of actors who pop up to sing on Stephen Sondheim: The Story So Far. Linda Lavin, playwright Christopher Durang, Anthony A-Boy’s-Best-Friend-Is-His-Mother Perkins and Vogue-era Madonna all make vocal contributions alongside Sondheim usual suspects like Elaine Stritch, Angela Lansbury, Mandy Patinkin and Barbara Cook. Music from plenty of projects you’ve never heard of and extensive liner notes make for any musical-theater geek’s wet dream. Available at Amazon.com, $54.98.

Remember the thrill of seeing Tracy Letts’s Pulitzer winner August: Osage County for the first time? Remember the is-it-soap-opera-or-is-it-art controversy surrounding its literary merit? The bad news is that the recently published version of the play does nothing to clear up the controversy. The good news is that, unlike a lot of stage plays, it’s just as much fun to read as it was to watch. Available at amazon.com, $13.95.