The
Theater in 1959, in Pictures
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Geraldine Page won
Variety's annual best-actress award for
her portrayal of a nerve-strained,
middle-aged movie queen in Tennessee
Williams' powerful drama Sweet Bird
of Youth. Paul Newman played her
pathetically confused, young lover. The
play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on
March 10. |
The Tenth Man,
a comdey-drama by Paddy Chayefsky, opened
at the Booth Theatre on November 5.
Despite mixed reviews it became one of
1959's big hits. |
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Anne Bancroft played
Annie Sullivan and Patty Duke played
Helen Keller in William Gibson's play The
Miracle Worker, which opened at the
Playhouse Theatre on October 19. |
Lorraine Hansberry's
drama of Negro family life in Chicago,
Illinois, A Raisin in the Sun,
won the New York Drama Critics' Circle
award for best U.S. play. The play
premiered at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre
on March 10, and opened to the public on
March 11. |
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A complex lighting
system in a Dallas theater allowed
original stage effects, such as this rear
scrim projection used in the adaptation
of Thomas Wolfe's Of Time and the
River. |
Rashomon,
adapted from a Japanese motion picture
screenplay by Fay and Michael Kanin,
provided Broadway audiences with a
provocative fantasia of Japanese-styled
lust and murder. Claire Bloom, Oscar
Homolka, and Rod Steiger played the
leading roles. It opened at the Music Box
Theatre on January 27, and closed there
on June 13. |
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In
the Year 1959
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