Additional information
by Crystal Skillman (Author), Fred Van Lente (Author)
"Crystal Skillman and Fred Van Lente, the husband-and-wife playwrights behind 'King Kirby, ' know the score. She wrote the smart Off Off Broadway shows "Cut" and the fangirl-friendly 'Geek'; he was a co-author of the graphic novel 'Cowboys & Aliens, ' later adapted for a Hollywood sci-fi western. With this supple, informative and poignant portrait, they offer penetrating insight into the tirelessly prolific Kirby (1917-94), whose brawny and dynamic yet nuanced style dominated comics for more than 40 years. Their play (Kirby was known as the king) documents a creator who attained immortality even as his life ended amid a morass of corporate exploitation." - Andy Webster, The New York Times KING KIRBY is a play by the husband-and-wife team of New York Times bestselling comics writer Fred Van Lente and NYIT award-winning playwright Crystal Skillman about the life and times of Jack Kirby, the great comic book artist who created or co-created some of your favorite heroes on the page and screen, Captain America, the Avengers, Thor, Fantastic Four, the X-Men, Iron Man, Young Romance, the New Gods, Darkseid, The Demon... the list goes on and on. From the Jewish ghetto of New York's Lower East Side to the battlefields of France to the Senate hearings of 1950s, this is a hysterical and heartbreaking story about a man who pours his quintessentially Twentieth Century life into his comics, only to make the fateful mistake that sends him into obscurity while his creations become known to every person on Earth. A real-life "Adventures of Kavalier & Klay", King Kirby asks what happens when an artist doesn't own his own legacy? Can he ever get it back?
Author Biography
Crystal Skillman is the award-winning author of Wild (IRT Theater/SanguineTheatre in NYC; Kid Brooklyn Productions in Chicago); Geek (Vampire Cowboys/Incubator Arts, NYT and TONY Critics Pick); Cut (The Management, New York Times Critic's Pick); The Vigil or The Guided Cradle (ITG/The Brick Theater, NYIT Award Outstanding Play), Drunk Art Love (First Breath Reading Series, finalist for Harold Clurman Residency), and Another Kind of Love. Fred Van Lente is the Harvey Award-nominated, New York Times-bestselling comics Incredible Hercules, Marvel Zombies, and Cowboys & Aliens, the basis for the feature film, as well as the American Library Association- and Xeric Award-winning Action Philosophers. His other comics include Archer & Armstrong, The Comic Book History of Comics, Taskmaster, X Men Noir, The Amazing Spider-Man and Resurrectionists.
