The interview series from which almost all the excerpts in the book are drawn began in the fall of 1992, with Horton Foote, at the Dramatists Guild’s headquarters in New York City. The two exceptions to this are Athol Fugard and David Ives, who were interviewed at McCarter Theatre and Drew University, respectively. All the Guild sessions have been either published in full or summarized in issues of the Dramatists Guild Quarterly between 1993 and 1996.
The following entries about the sixteen playwrights must necessarily include only a representative sampling of their achievements.
Edward Albee is the author of many plays, including The Zoo Story, The Death of Bessie Smith, The Sandbox, The American Dream, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1963 New York Drama Critics Circle Award), Tiny Alice, A Delicate Balance (1967 Pulitzer Prize), All Over, Seascape (1976 Pulitzer Prize), The Man Who Had Three Arms, Marriage Play, and Three Tall Women (1994 Pulitzer Prize). He is a member of the Dramatists Guild Council, P.E.N. American, and the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, which also awarded him its Gold Medal in Drama.
Lee Blessing’s numerous plays include A Walk in the Woods, Down the Road, Fortinbras, Two Rooms, Eleemosynary, Nice People Dancing to Good Country Music, Lake Street Extension, and Patient A. In New York, the entire 1992–93 Signature Theatre Company season consisted of productions of his plays. A recipient of grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim, McKnight, and Jerome Foundations, he has had plays developed at the Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, the Sundance Institute, New Dramatists, and the Playwrights’ Center, Minneapolis.
Horton Foote has written plays for both Broadway and off-Broadway, including The Trip to Bountiful, The Chase, The Roads to Home, The Traveling Lady, and The Young Man from Atlanta (1995 Pulitzer Prize). His screenplays include To Kill a Mockingbird (1963 Academy Award), Tender Mercies (1983 Academy Award), The Chase, The Trip to Bountiful, Baby, the Rain Must Fall, Valentine’s Day, 1918, Courtship, Of Mice and Men, and Old Man.
Athol Fugard is acclaimed as the leading South African dramatist of his generation. His plays include Sizwe Bansi Is Dead, The Island, The Blood Knot, Hello and Goodbye, Boesman and Lena, A Lesson from Aloes, Master Harold … and the boys, Playland, A Place with the Pigs, The Road to Mecca, My Children! My Africa, Valley Song, and The Captain’s Tiger—all originally produced in South Africa and subsequently produced worldwide.
John Guare’s plays include The House of Blue Leaves (1971 New York Drama Critics Circle Award), Rich and Famous, Marco Polo Sings a Solo, Landscape of the Body, Bosoms and Neglect, the book for Two Gentlemen of Verona (1972 Tony Award), Women and Water, Gardenia, Lydie Breeze, Six Degrees of Separation (1990 New York Drama Critics Circle Award; Obie Award), and Four Baboons Adoring the Sun. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild Council.
Tina Howe is the author of The Nest, Birth and After Birth, Museum, The Art of Dining, Painting Churches, Coastal Disburbances, Approaching Zanzibar, One Shoe Off, and Pride’s Crossing. She is the recipient of a 1983 Obie Award for Distinguished Playwriting, an Outer Critics Circle Award, and an American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Award in Literature. A member of the Dramatists Guild Council, she has held fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Guggenheim Foundation.
David Ives has written numerous one-act plays, including “Sure Thing,” “Philip Glass Buys a Loaf of Bread,” “Foreplay, or the Art of the Fugue,” and “Universal Language.” An evening of his one-acts, All in the Timing, won the Outer Critics Circle Award and the John Gassner Playwriting Award. His full-length plays include Lives and Death of the Great Harry Houdini, Ancient History, Don Juan in Chicago, and The Red Address. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship.
Romulus Linney is the author of over thirty plays, including The Sorrows of Frederick, Holy Ghosts, Child Byron, Heathen Valley, April Snow, F.M., The Love Suicide at Scholfield Barracks, 2, and True Crimes. His awards include the 1992 Obie for Sustained Excellence in Playwriting, a 1980 Obie for Tennessee, and the 1984 Award in Literature from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild Council.
Emily Mann is the artistic director of McCarter Theatre, in Princeton, N.J., and the author of Annulla, An Autobiography, Still Life (1981 Obie Award), Execution of Justice, Having Our Say, and Greensboro: A Requiem. A member of the Dramatists Guild Council, she is the recipient of the Helen Hayes Award and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation.
Terrence McNally’s numerous plays include Corpus Christi, Master Class (1995 Tony Award), Love! Valour! Compassion! (1994 Tony Award), A Perfect Ganesh, Lips Together, Teeth Apart, The Lisbon Traviata, Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, It’s Only a Play, The Ritz, Bad Habits, and Where Has Tommy Flowers Gone? He was librettist for The Ritz, Kiss of the Spider Woman (1993 Tony Award), and Ragtime. A recipient of two Guggenheim fellowships, a CBS fellowship, and a citation from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, he has been the vice president of the Dramatists Guild since 1981.
Arthur Miller is the author of many now-classic plays, including The Man Who Had All the Luck, All My Sons (1947 New York Drama Critics Circle Award), Death of a Salesman (1949 Pulitzer Prize; New York Drama Critics Circle Award), The Crucible, A View from the Bridge, Incident at Vichy, After the Fall, The Price, The Creation of the World and Other Business, The American Clock, The Ride Down Mount Morgan, The Last Yankee, and Broken Glass. His screenplays include The Misfits, Everybody Wins, Playing for Time, and The Crucible. He has written short stories, several novels, and an autobiography, Timebends.
Marsha Norman is the author of ’night, Mother (1983 Pulitzer Prize), Getting Out, Third and Oak, The Laundromat, The Pool Hall, The Holdup, Traveler in the Dark, Sarah and Abraham, and Loving Daniel Boone. She is the librettist of The Secret Garden (1991 Tony Award) and The Red Shoes. The recipient of grants from the National Endowment, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, she is a member of the Dramatists Guild Council.
John Patrick Shanley’s numerous plays include The Big Funk, Savage in Limbo, Beggars in the House of Plenty, Danny and the Deep Blue Sea, Italian-American Reconciliation, Welcome to the Moon, Four Dogs and a Bone, and Psychopathia Sexualis. His screenplays include Moonstruck (1987 Academy Award; Writers Guild Award) and Joe Versus the Volcano. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild Council.
Wendy Wasserstein is the author of An American Daughter, The Sisters Rosensweig, The Heidi Chronicles (1989 Pulitzer Prize; Tony Award; New York Drama Critics Circle Award), Uncommon Women and Others, Isn’t It Romantic?, and the book for the musical Miami. Her other awards include the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, Drama Desk Award, and Outer Critics Circle Awards. She is a member of the Dramatists Guild Council.
Michael Weller’s plays include Now There’s Just the Three of Us, Moon-children (1971 Drama Desk Award), Fishing, 23 Years Later, Loose Ends (1976 Outer Critics’ Circle Award), Dwarfman, Master of a Million Shapes, Ghost on Fire, Spoils of War, Lake No Bottom, !Help!, and Buying Time. His screenplays include Hair, Ragtime, Lost Angels, and Getting Rid of Alex. He is the recipient of a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation and serves on the Council of both the Dramatists Guild and Theatre Communications Group.
Lanford Wilson’s plays include Redwood Curtain, Burn This, Balm in Gilead, The Rimers of Eldritch, Lemon Sky, Serenading Louie, The Hot L Baltimore (1973 New York Drama Critics Circle Award), The Mound Builders, Angels Fall, and the Talley cycle: Talley’s Folly (1980 Pulitzer Prize; New York Drama Critics Circle Award), Talley & Son, and Fifth of July. He is the recipient of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Award, the Vernon Rice Award, and three Obie Awards, and is a member of the Dramatists Guild Council.