1999 Broadway Debut
Williams had originally written Not about Nightingales for the Group Theatre in New York City. However, they rejected the play and it wasn’t produced until 1998.
The actress Vanessa Redgrave, who was preparing for a role in the 1989 revival of Orpheus Descending, another Williams classic, read an introduction by Williams which referred to the horrors of Not About Nightingales. Redgrave later said, “Basically, anybody could have found the play. I was the only person who was determined to find it.” She later contacted William’s literary executor Maria St. Just, who was able to unearth the manuscript.
Redgrave brought it to Trevor Nunn who agreed to direct the play. His production debuted in London on March 5, 1998, to very positive reviews. The world premiere in London of Not About Nightingales on March 5, 1998, was a collaboration of the Royal National Theatre of Great Britain and Corin and Vanessa Redgrave's Moving Theatre, in association with the Alley Theatre. The play moved to the Alley Theatre in Houston running from June 5 to July 3, 1998. Talkin’ Broadway called it “A World Class Production” and “A glimpse in the writing of Williams that would transform him from Tom to Tennessee”. The next year it opened at the Circle in the Square Theatre on February 25, 1999 and was nominated for six Tony awards, including best play.
Read more about this topic: Not About Nightingales
Famous quotes containing the words broadway and/or debut:
“Too many Broadway actors in motion pictures lost their grip on success—had a feeling that none of it had ever happened on that sun-drenched coast, that the coast itself did not exist, there was no California. It had dropped away like a hasty dream and nothing could ever have been like the things they thought they remembered.”
—Mae West (1892–1980)
“One should never make one’s debut with a scandal. One should reserve that to give an interest to one’s old age.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)