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(Playwright) A.R.
Gurney, less formally known as "Pete," is one
of the most prolific and produced playwrights in America. His work
focuses primarily on the issues and realities of middle-class American
life and has been produced on international theatre stages for
more than 30 years.
After receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree from
Williams College in 1952, Gurney joined the United States Navy during
the Korean War, writing shows to entertain the military personnel.
Following his discharge in 1955, he enrolled in the Yale School of
Drama where he received his Master's degree in playwriting. Later
he joined the faculty at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in
Cambridge where he taught until 1987.
In 1958, Gurney wrote Love in Buffalo,
which was the first musical everproduced at Yale. His first play, The
David Show, was produced in New York in 1968. In 1970, Scenes
from American Life received its world premiere at the Studio
Arena Theatre in Buffalo. During the 1970s, he wrote two novels and
several plays, including Children, which premiered
in London, England in 1974.
His breakthrough success came in 1982 with The
Dining Room. Other award-winning plays include The
Middle Ages, Richard Cory,
The Golden Age, What I Did Last Summer, The Wayside Motor Inn,
Sweet Sue, The Perfect Party. Another Antigone,
The Cocktail Hour, Love Letters, The Old Boy, The Fourth Wall,
Later Life, A Cheever Evening, Sylvia, Overtime, Let's Do It (a
Cole Porter musical), Labor Day, Far East, Darlene And
The Guest Lecturer, and Ancestral Voices.
Love Letters, written in 1989,
has enjoyed tremendous success for many years with its two-character
cast who read the play side by side at a desk. The characters
are a man and a woman who exchange letters in a warm and complicated
friendship lasting 50 years. The play's co-stars have included
Richard Thomas and Swoosie Kurtz, Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew
Broderick, and Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward among others. In 1991
he adapted his own novel, The Snow Ball, for the
stage; it premiered at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego. His other
novels include The Gospel According to Joe and Entertaining Strangers. In
the fall of 1999, Gurney wrote the libretto for "Strawberry
Fields" with music by Michael Torke, as part of the
Central Park Opera trilogy presented by the New York City Opera.
Gurney is the recipient of many awards, notably
a Drama Desk Award in 1971, a Rockefeller Award in 1977 and two Lucille
Lortel Awards in 1989 and 1994. He has also received awards
from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation,
and the New England Theatre Conference. He and his wife, Molly, have
four children and six grandchildren. |
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