John Lahr - Tennessee Williams Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh: A Biography
The definitive biography of America’s most impassioned and lyrical twentieth century playwright from acclaimed theatre critic John Lahr
On 31 March 1945 the curtain rose on the opening night of The Glass Menagerie. Tennessee Williams, the show’s thirty four year old playwright, sat hunched, looking, according to one paper, ‘like a farm boy in his Sunday best’. The Broadway production went on to be an instant sell-out with the opening night closing to thunderous applause as the cast took an astonishing twenty-four curtain calls. Finding purchase with an American public recently liberated from years of wartime hardship, Tennessee Williams’s work, famous for its tense emotional truths and spiritual transformation of the self, ushered in – as Arthur Miller declared – 'a revolution’ in American theatre.
John Lahr’s gripping and insightful biography considers the man, his psychology and his plays, including his early breakdown in 1935; ‘the blue devils’ of depression that would dog him; his turbulent struggle with his own sexuality; and how the ghosts of his past were reworked into his cast of characters: his absent father, his prim mother trapped in a toxic marriage, and – ‘the great psychological trauma’ of Williams’s life – the family tragedy of his ‘mad’ sister Rose, victim to one of the first lobotomies performed in America.
Theatre critic for The New Yorker for 20 years, John Lahr was the first theatre critic to win a Tony award for his work and is the author of, among many plays and biographies, Prick up your Ears, the biography of Joe Orton, which was made into a film in collaboration with Alan Bennett. The estate of Tennessee Williams chose John Lahr to write the definitive biography of Tennessee Williams.
‘This is a masterpiece about a genius. What a marvellous read, with brilliantly detailed research.’ Helen Mirren
After the talk why not enjoy a screening of Tennessee Williams film classic Cat on a Hot Tin Roof?
You can buy a combo ticket for the talk and the screening of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at the Showroom Box Office for £14 / £9.60 concessions. Tickets for the talk or film individually are available in the usual way.
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