About the Book:

HARD TO FIND BOOK, only a very limited number of copies are still available.

The complete screenplays of the cult favourite films from the legendary Charles Busch, the genius campmeister who has been called "a first-class satirist and farceur" (The New Yorker).

This volume of the shooting scripts of two cult classics, Die, Mommie, Die! and Psycho Beach Party, both adaptations from his original plays of the same title, will provide endless enjoyment to fans and students of film. His films, which he wrote but did not direct, attracted talented actors willing to take a few risks but were smart enough to recognize a unique and competent script.

Psycho Beach Party, a genre-bending spoof of 1960s surfer movies, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2000 with a cast of TV actors (among them stars of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Sabrina the Teenage Witch) and, of course, Charles Busch as Detective Monica Stark. It's the story of Chicklet, an aspiring wave rider whose girl-next-door image masks a foul-mouthed alter ego, and who may also be responsible for a rash of gruesome Malibu murders.

Die, Mommie, Die!, a fresh, funny spoof of the women-centered melodramas of classic Hollywood – everything from Mildred Pierce to Imitation of Life to What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? – premiered at the Sundance Festival in 2003. It is the tale of an ex-diva (the cross-dressing Busch), ploting to kill her Hollywood producer husband (Philip Baker Hall), her suspicious kids (Natasha Lyonne and Stark Sands) and her gigolo lover (Jason Priestley). Writer-star Charles Busch also won a special-jury prize for outstanding performance.

Renowned playwright and filmmaker Charles Busch, whose work has graced the stage from experimental edge off-off Broadway to commercial venues on Broadway, provides commentary on the making of these two films and discusses what it's like to be both behind the camera and to star as a leading lady.

What people say:

"Blend a 50's psychodrama, a 60's beach movie and a 70's slasher film. Result: Psycho Beach Party, a campy smoothie." — Mademoiselle

"Die Mommie Die! wishes to spoof Hollywood's melodramas of the Fifties, those women's weepies of luxurious sets and household intrigue. This is the kind of movie Charles Busch was born to make." — The Austin Chronicle

About the Screenwriter:

Charles Busch is an American actor, screenwriter, playwright and female impersonator, known for his appearances on stage in his own camp style plays and in film and television. He is the author of the award-winning Broadway play The Tale of the Allergist's Wife, and Our Leading Lady. He starred in such plays as The Lady in Question, Red Scare on Sunset, and Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, which ran for five years Off-Broadway. In 2003, Busch received a special Drama Desk award for career achievement as both a performer and a playwright.