Appendix Plays Discussed in This Book
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Appendix Plays Discussed in This Book Abe Lincoln in Illinois, Robert Sherwood. 1938 Broadway run: 472 performances. 1993 Lincoln Center revival: 27 previews, 40 performances. Abraham Lincoln, John Drinkwater. 1919 Broadway run: 193 per- formances. 1929 Broadway revival: 8 performances. Abraham Lincoln’s Big Gay Dance Party, Aaron Loeb. 2008 San Francisco. 2010 off-Broadway run. American Iliad, Donald Freed. 2001 Burbank, California. As the Girls Go, William Roos (book), Jimmy McHugh (music), Harold Adamson (lyrics). 1948 Broadway run: 414 performances. Assassins, John Weidman (book), Stephen Sondheim (music and lyrics). 1990 off-Broadway run: 73 performances. 1992 London revival. 2004 Broadway revival: 26 previews, 101 performances. The Best Man, Gore Vidal. 1960 Broadway run: 520 performances. 2000 Broadway revival: 15 previews, 121 performances. Bloody, Bloody Andrew Jackson, Alex Timbers (book), Michael Friedman (music and ly73rics). 2008 Los Angeles. 2009 and 2010 off-Broadway runs. Buchanan Dying, John Updike. 1976 Franklin and Marshall College. Bully! Jerome Alden. 1977 Broadway run: 8 previews, 8 performances. 2006 off Broadway revival. The Bully Pulpit, Michael O. Smith. 2008 off-Broadway. Camping with Henry and Tom, Mark St. Germain. 1995 off- Broadway run: 105 performances. Numerous regional theater revivals since then. An Evening with Richard Nixon, Gore Vidal. Broadway run: 14 previews, 16 performances. First Lady, Katherine Dayton and George S. Kaufman. 1935 Broadway run: 246 performances. 1952 off-Broadway revival. 1980 Berkshire Theater Festival revival. 1996 Yale Repertory Theatre revival. First Lady Suite, Michael John LaChiusa. 1993 off-Broadway run: 32 performances. Revivals include Los Angeles 2002, off Broadway 2004, and London 2009. 160 Appendix Frost/Nixon, Peter Morgan. 2006 London. 2007 Broadway run: 23 previews, 137 performances. The Gang’s All Here, Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee. 1959 Broadway run: 132 performances. Give ’em Hell, Harry! Samuel Gallu. 1975 premiere in Hershey, Pennsylvania followed by three-week Washington, DC, run, six- city tour. 2008 off-Broadway revival. The Heavens Are Hung in Black, David Selby. 2009 Washington, DC, run. Hope: The Obama Musical Story, Randall Hutchins. 2010 Berlin run. I’d Rather Be Right, George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart (book), Richard Rodgers (music), Lorenz Hart (lyrics). 1937 Broadway run: 290 performances. 2008 Los Angeles revival. If Booth Had Missed, Arthur Goodman. 1931 Broadway run: 1 performance. 1932 Broadway run: 21 performances. In Time to Come, Howard Koch and John Huston. 1941 Broadway run: 40 performances. Jackie, Gip Hoppe. 1997 Broadway run: 34 previews, 128 perfor- mances. Several regional revivals since then. The Last Days of Lincoln, Mark Van Doren. 1961 Florida State University. 1965 off-Broadway run: 1 performance. Let ’em Eat Cake, George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind (book), Ira Gershwin (lyrics), George Gershwin (music). 1933 Broadway run: 90 performances. 1978 Berkshire Theater Festival revival. Lincoln, Benjamin Chapin. 1906 Broadway run: 21 performances. 1909 Broadway revival: 17 performances. Lincoln, Saul Levitt. 1976 off-Broadway run: 32 performances. The Lincoln Mask, V. J. Longhi. 1972 Broadway run: 19 previews, 8 performances. MacBird!, Barbara Garson. 1967 off-Broadway run: 386 perfor- mances. 2006 Washington, DC, revival. A Man of the People, Thomas Dixon, Jr. 1920 Broadway run: 15 performances. Mister Lincoln, Herbert Mitgang. 1980 Washington, DC, premiere. 1980 Broadway run: 5 previews, 16 performances. 1995 off- Broadway revival. Mr. President, Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse (book), Irving Berlin (music and lyrics). 1963 Broadway run: 4 previews, 265 performances. 2001 off-Broadway revival with significant revisions. Nixon’s Nixon, Russell Lees. 1994 off-Broadway run: 125 perfor- mances. 2006 off-Broadway revival. Appendix 161 November, David Mamet. 2007 Broadway run: 33 previews, 205 performances. Obama on My Mind, Teddy Hayes. 2009 London run. 2009 Seattle run. Of Thee I Sing, George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind (book), Ira Gershwin (lyrics), George Gershwin (music). 1931 Broadway run: 441 performances. 1952 Broadway revival: 72 performances. 1969 off-Broadway revival. Poker Night at the White House, Sean Benjamin. 2007 Chicago run. The Patriots, Sidney Kingsley. 1943 Broadway run: 173 performances. President Harding Is a Rock Star, Kyle Jarrow. 2003 off-off Broadway run. 2008 Washington, DC, revival. Prologue to Glory, Ellsworth P. Conkle. 1938 Broadway run: 161 performances. The Rivalry, Norman Corwin. 1959 Broadway run: 81 performances. 2008 Los Angeles revival: 5 performances. 2009 off-Broadway revival. Secret Honor, Donald Freed and Arnold Stone. 1983 off-Broadway run: 47 performances. 1986 Washington, DC, revival. 1988 San Francisco revival. 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Alan Jay Lerner (book and lyrics), Leonard Bernstein (music). 1976 Broadway run: 13 previews, 7 performances. 1992 Washington, DC, revival. Revived as A White House Cantata in London 1997 and off-Broadway 2008. State of the Union, Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse. 1945 Broadway run: 765 performances. 2006 and 2008 Washington, DC, revivals. Stuff Happens, David Hare. 2004 London premiere. U.S. premiere, Los Angeles 2005. 2008 off-Broadway run. Sunrise at Campobello, Dore Schary. 1958 Broadway run: 556 performances. Occasional regional revivals since. Teapot Scandals, Jon Steinhagen. 2007 Chicago run. Teddy and Alice, Jerome Alden (book), John Philip Sousa (music), Hal Hackady (lyrics). 1987 Broadway run: 11 previews, 77 perfor- mances. 1996 Waterbury, Connecticut revival. Teddy Tonight! Laurence Luckinbill. 2002 off-Broadway run. That Awful Mrs. Eaton, John Farrar and Stephen Vincent Benét. 1924 Broadway run: 16 performances. The White House, A. E. Hotchner (books and lyrics), Lee Holby (music). 1964 Broadway run: 1 preview, 23 performances. 162 Appendix You’re Welcome America: A Final Night With George W. Bush, Will Ferrell. 2009 Broadway run: 18 previews, 46 performances. Note These plays are listed alphabetically by title, followed by authors, informa- tion about the original run, and a listing of the most prominent revivals, if any. Notes Introduction 1. For example, see the collection Hollywood’s White House, Peter C. Rollins and John E. O’Connor (eds.), Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky Press, 2003. 2. Patrick Julian, “A Touch Too Cracker Barrel Folksy: The Mythic Portrayal of Harry S. Truman in Give ’em Hell, Harry!” Philological Papers 44 (1998): 113. 3. Christian Moe, Scott J. Parker and George McCalmon, Creating Historical Drama: A Guide for Communities, Theatre Groups and Playwrights, Second Edition, Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois Press, 2005: 5. 4. Quoted in Casper H. Nannes, Politics in the American Drama, Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1960: 13. 5. Nannes: 24. 1 Plays about Abraham Lincoln 1. Merrill D. Peterson, Lincoln in American Memory, New York: Oxford University Press, 1994: 389. 2. Marcus Cunliffe, George Washington: Man and Monument, Boston: Little Brown and Co., 1958: 5. 3. Quoted in Cunliffe: 14. 4. Cunliffe: 13. 5. Garry Wills, Cincinnatus: George Washington and the Enlightenment, Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Co., 1984: xxi–xxii. 6. Christian H. Moe, Scott J. Parker, and George McCalmon, Creating Historical Drama: A Guide for Communities, Theater Groups, and Playwrights, Second Edition, Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois Press, 2005: 16. 7. Maxwell Anderson, Valley Forge, in Stanley Richards (ed.), America on Stage: Ten Great Plays of American History, Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Co., 1976: 145–56. 8. Anderson: 184. 9. Anderson: 248. 10. Joseph Wood Krutch, “Drama: Red—and White and Blue,” Nation 139 (Dec. 26, 1934): 750. 164 Notes 11. Brooks Atkinson, “Philip Merivale in ‘Valley Forge,’ ” New York Times, Dec. 11, 1934: 28. 12. David Turley, “A Usable Life: Popular Representations of Abraham Lincoln,” in David Ellis (ed.), Imitating Art: Essays in Biography, London: Pluto Press, 1993: 60. 13. Peterson: 27, 395–7. 14. Peterson: 35. 15. Benjamin Chapin, “Lincoln in the Hearts of the People,” The Independent 66 (Feb. 11, 2009): 305–8. 16. “To Portray Lincoln on the Stage,” New York Times, Feb. 6, 1906: X4. 17. “Abraham Lincoln as a Stage Figure,” New York Times, Jan. 1, 1906: XI. 18. “Mr. Chapin as Lincoln,” New York Times, Feb. 6, 1909: 9. 19. Peterson: 202. 20. Peterson: 170. 21. “The Negro a Menace, Says Thomas Dixon,” New York Times, Jun. 9, 1903: 2. 22. Thomas Dixon, A Man of the People: A Drama of Abraham Lincoln, New York: D. Appleton and Co., 1920: ix. The edition used was reprinted by Kessinger Publishing. 23. Dixon: 31–2. 24. Dixon: 47–49. 25. Dixon: 53–60. 26. Dixon: 105. 27. “Lincoln Again Play Hero,” New York Times, Sept. 8, 1920: 18 (Section: Amusements); and Anthony Slide, American Racist: The Life and Films of Thomas Dixon, Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 2004: 69. 28. Lerone Bennet, Jr., “Was Abe Lincoln a White Supremacist?” Ebony, Feb. 1968: 35–42. 29. Two useful summaries of this debate are Arthur Zilversmit, “Lincoln and the Problem of Race: A Decade of Interpretations,” Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 2 (1980) Issue 1: 22–45; and Martin D. Tullai, “Abraham Lincoln: Racist, Bigot or Misunderstood?” Lincoln Herald 103 (2001) Issue 2: 85–92. 30. Raymond A. Cook, Thomas Dixon, New York: Twayne Publishers, 1974: 107. 31. Brook Thomas, “Thomas Dixon’s A Man of the People: How Lincoln Saved the Union by Cracking Down on Civil Liberties,” Law and