About The Book

Called a “cunning and elegant play . . . [with] deft storytelling” (John Lahr, The New Yorker), Ten Unknowns, John Robin Baitz’s latest work, is an explosive drama about art–and what happens when it becomes commerce

Malcolm Raphelson is a painter who was at the top of the art world–until the critical vogue turned from realism to abstract expressionist work. He has been in self-imposed exile in Mexico for decades, until dealer Trevor Fabricant decides it’s time for a retrospective. Trevor sends Judd, a talented and tormented young painter, to serve as Malcolm’s assistant and unofficial minder. When they are joined by a beautiful young student, their tense equilibrium is upset. In Ten Unknowns, Baitz portrays, in the words of Linda Winer of Newsday, “a world conflicted with questions about the tyranny of art, fashion, and quality, about the benefits and blind spots in the outsider sensibility, about the warring American impulses for good and for meddling.”

Praise

“Jon Robin Baitz has a singular talent as a playwright for combining smart and biting social criticism with humor and tenderness.” –Sean Mitchell, The Los Angeles Times

“Baitz has penned an operatic script in which ideas ricochet around like atoms in a chain reaction” –Bill Hirschman, The Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel