New York, NY Pe r m i t N o . 7 5 2 8
At the Mint Theater, 311 West 43rd St, 3rd floor
j o n at h a n b a nk
pa i d
February 1, 2014 through March 30, 2014
non - profit u . s . postage
866-811-4111 or minttheater.org
P RODUCI N G a r t i s t i c d i r e c t o r
Finance & Product ion
S H ERRI K OTI M S K Y
February 1 - THROUGH -
March 30
Special Discount Offer!
Save 10% February 1 through March 2 Pay only $49.50 (use code Mint49) (Regular Price $55; $2.75 per ticket service charge applies to all orders.)
PERFORMANCES Tue, Wed & Thu at 7pm Fri & Sat at 8pm, Sat & Sun at 2pm Wed. Matinees: 2/19, 3/12 at 2pm No performances: 2/18, 2/25, 3/11
FOR TICKETS Online: minttheater.org Phone: 866.811.4111 M-F 9 to 9, S-S 10 to 6 In person: 311 W. 43rd St, Ste 307 M-F 12-6pm
By
John Van Druten Davis McCallum Directed By
SAVE EVEN MORE WITH CHEAPTIX: You don’t have to be a cheapskate to appreciate a bargain. We offer a limited number of half-price tickets ($27.50) for every performance. How many CheapTix are available? About 10 per night, sometimes less—and once they’re gone, they’re gone. Do I get to choose where I sit? No. We assign your seats the night of the performance, but don’t worry, our theater only has 100-seats. Will I sit with my friends? Yes, we won’t ever split your party. Limit 4 CheapTix per order.
with -
Julia Coffey Katie Gibson Matthew Gumley Jonathan Hogan Laurie Kennedy Elise Kibler Stephen Plunkett Christopher Sears Alex TroW
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Mint’s First-Priority Club
First-Priority Club Members get the best seats at the best price. BE THE FIRST TO KNOW:
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First-Priority Club Members have the first chance to order tickets. PAY LESS FOR TICKETS:
First-Priority Club Members pay only $38.50 per ticket. You save 30%. NEVER PAY SERVICE CHARGES:
First-Priority Club Members pay no service charges no matter how you order. RECEIVE PERSONAL ATTENTION:
First Priority Club Members call the Mint directly and not the Ovation call center. ATTEND READINGS FOR FREE:
First-Priority Club Members are invited to attend readings and other special events FREE. Minimum tax-deductible contribution: $150 For more information call us at 212.315.0231
311 W. 43rd St. 3rd Floor New York, NY 10036
First-Priority Club members receive advance notification of all of our productions and events. Our newsletter is packed with information and insight.
Sets Marion Williams Costumes Martha Hally Lights Nicole Pearce Sound Jane Shaw Props Joshua Yocum Casting Judy Bowman Production Manager Sherri Kotimsky Production Stage Manager Allison Deutsch Assistant Stage Manager Andrea Jo Martin Illustration Stefano Imbert Graphics Hey Jude Design, Inc. Advertising The Pekoe Group Press David Gersten & Associates
866-811-4111or minttheater.org
“AN ABSOLUTE CHARMER… CHARTS THE DILEMMAS OF THE SINGLE OFFICE GIRL WITH WRY HUMOR AND RARE INSIGHT.” The Arts Desk
“RIVETINGLY ENTERTAINING” The Guardian
LONDON WALL premiered in 1931 at the Duke of York’s Theatre, one of five plays by John Van Druten that enjoyed success in London in the early 30’s. This romantic drama charts the lives and loves of the women employed as shorthand typists in a bustling City law firm. It was acclaimed for its deftly etched characters and richly detailed atmosphere and ran for 170 performances before being made into a movie called “After Office Hours” featuring most of its West End cast. LONDON WALL tells the story of Pat Milligan, a naïve young typist who falls for the charms of a predatory junior lawyer. Watching with concern is the firm’s senior secretary, her too-timid suitor, and several others in the office. Presiding over all is Mr. Walker, gamely trying to navigate a new kind of office where men and women must work side by side. “Amid the drudgery of everyday tasks there are flashes of passion and aspiration...It’s a gossipy, competitive environment, which is evoked in a wry, elegant and often very funny style that invites comparisons with Mad Men.” (The Evening Standard) LONDON WALL had its first London revival last year when an enthusiastically received production had a brief, sold-out run at the tiny Finborough Theatre before transferring. “Comes up fresh as paint,” hailed Charles Spencer of The Telegraph, “a fascinating and sometimes deeply touching play…A piece that proves both dramatically engaging and a fascinating theatrical time-capsule.” “Set in the 1930s, the extraordinary thing is that 80 years on, notwithstanding bursts of feminism, the Pill and loosening of social corsets in all directions, much of the discussion between its workers could still be transplanted to the present day. Lowly paid employees (more often than not female) still scurry, obeying a “lord and master” in fear of losing their jobs. Talk over lunch and tea breaks is still of who is going out with whom, who may be near to getting their man to the altar, and who has just been jilted. It could be Mad Men but 20 years earlier.” (The Arts Desk)
“A WELL-MADETimeAND INSIGHTFUL PLAY” Out London
John Van Druten Best known today for such midcentury Broadway hits as Old Acquaintance, The Voice of the Turtle, I Remember Mama, Bell, Book and Candle, and I Am a Camera (which inspired the classic Broadway musical Cabaret), John Van Druten wrote deftly observed, character-driven plays that ranged from the realistic atmosphere of his early West End plays, to the sentimental charm of his wartime hits, to the daring allurements of his final works. Born on June 1, 1901, Van Druten grew up in a cultured middle-class London household. Though a precociously well-read and stage-struck youth, who scrawled his first play at the age of seven (on Mary, Queen of Scots), Van Druten dutifully obeyed his father and studied law. After earning his law degree in 1922, Van Druten qualified as a solicitor of the Supreme Court Judicature. During this time, he continued to write plays, and with Young Woodley, the 24 yearold Van Druten realized his dream of writing professionally for the West End theatre. In his early West End plays, Van Druten became noted for his sensitive portrayals of young romantics and would-be bohemians, as well as for the “truthful naturalism” of his settings. Van Druten’s most successful plays during this era include the domestic drama After All (1931), London Wall (1931), for which he drew upon his personal experience working in a legal office, and the romantic comedy There’s Always Juliet (1932). Van Druten enjoyed a transatlantic success that carried him to Hollywood, where he co-wrote such classics as Gaslight, and also contributed (uncredited) to the screenplay of Gone with the Wind. Van Druten enjoyed phenomenal Broadway success in the WWII era, with a string of critically acclaimed hits. After the effervescent Old Acquaintance (1940), he wrote the three-character romantic comedy The Voice of the Turtle (1943), which ran for a stunning 1,557 performances. The Voice of the Turtle struck resonant wartime chords that continued to appeal in 2001, when it was revived by the Keen Company and later presented at the Mint: “Van Druten’s writing is both impressively unpretentious and deeply respectful of the characters,” observed The New York Times’ Bruce Weber. The nostalgic I Remember Mama, based on Kathryn Forbes’ novel Mama’s Bank Account, similarly moved wartime audiences as an impressionistic “family album” (the play will be revived by the Transport Group in March of 2014). Van Druten – who had emigrated to the United States in 1940 –became a naturalized American citizen in 1944. The hits continued with Bell, Book and Candle (1950), about a seductive witch secretly practicing sorcery in modern Manhattan. The play was not only a “wonderfully suave and impish fancy” that served as an inspiration for TV’s “Bewitched,” but a subtle affirmation of Van Druten’s homosexual identity in the midst of the McCarthy-era gay witch hunts (the play was revived, to glowing reviews, at Hartford Stage in 2012). A gay subtext similarly informed 1951’s I Am a Camera, adapted from his close friend Christoper Isherwood’s The Berlin Stories, and which provided an iconic role for Julie Harris as the decadent Weimar party girl Sally Bowles. Appreciated in his own lifetime for his “amusing, touching plays, written lightly and expertly, and with beguiling style” (as described by The New York Times’ Brooks Atkinson), Van Druten is in the midst of an exciting resurgence sure to stir vivid theatrical memories, as well as to enchant new generations of theater-goers. Maya Cantu
enrichMINT events
EnrichMINT Events are supported in part by a grant from the Michael Tuch Foundation. All events take place immediately after the performance and usually last about fifty minutes. They are free and open to the public. Speakers and dates subject to change without notice.
Saturday, February 8 after the matinee: Maya Cantu John van Druten: Sex and the Single Girl Maya Cantu is a dramaturg, scholar and theater historian devoted to the revitalization of forgotten classics. She is currently completing her Doctor of Fine Arts degree at Yale School of Drama. Maya is Mint Theater’s Dramaturgical Adviser and the author of the van Druten biography that appears in our program.
Sunday, February 9 after the matinee: William J. Mann author of Behind the Screen: How Gays and Lesbians Shaped Hollywood John vVan Druten’s identity as both a gay man and talented playwright led to his becoming part of a circle of eminent gay writers living in California during the 1940s and 50s, gathered around British author Christopher Isherwood. William J. Mann will discuss Van Druten’s identity and significance as a gay writer. Mann is a novelist, biographer and historian. His biography Kate: The Woman Who Was Hepburn was named one of the 100 Notable Books of 2006.
Saturday, February 15 after the matinee: Julie K. Berebitsky author of Sex and the Office: A History of Gender, Power and Desire LONDON WALL offers a look at women’s continuing fight to be seen as professional equals in the workplace. Professor Berebitsky’s new book, Sex and the Office: A History of Gender, Power and Desire is the first monograph to historicize our understanding of sexual harassment in the workplace. She currently holds positions as Professor of History and Director of the Women’s Studies Program at Sewanee: The University of the South.
Sunday, February 16 after the matinee: Margaret Boe Birns author of “John van Druten” in The Columbia Encyclopedia of Modern Drama Margaret Boe Birns is a lecturer on English, American and European Literature of the 20th and 19th Centuries. She teaches the courses ‘The Novel Today” and “Masterpieces of 19th Century Fiction” at New York University and “19th Century Masterpieces: Three Great Social Novels” at The New School. She is also a published poet.
SaTURday, February 22, after the matinee: Judith R. Walkowitz author of Nights Out: Life in Cosmopolitan London The typists of LONDON WALL muse upon nights “up west” as they manage relationship and workplace pressures. Professor Walkowitz will discuss the lives—and night lives—of London shorthand typists between the wars. Her book Nights Out: Life in Cosmopolitan London reveals how London’s Soho district became a showcase for a new cosmopolitan identity in the early to mid-twentieth century. Walkowitz teaches courses in British history and women’s history at Johns Hopkins.
March 17th at 6pm The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Bruno Walter Auditorium, 65th & Amsterdam JOHN VAN DRUTEN: A WRITER’S WRITER Featuring treasures from the John van Druten Papers Mint Theater Company and the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts collaborate on an intimate celebration of playwright John Van Druten. Excerpts from the author’s unpublished essays, letters, diary and plays will be read, revealing Van Druten’s relationship with such literary peers as Tennessee Williams, Christopher Isherwood, and Rogers & Hammerstein. This event is open to the public, no reservations required.