Arthur Hopkins
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Arthur Hopkins (October 4, 1878 – March 22, 1950) was a well-known Broadway theater director and producer in the early twentieth century. Between 1912 and 1948, he produced and staged more than 80 plays – an average of more than two per year – occasionally writing and directing as well. His repertoire included plays by playwrights in American Expressionist theater, including
Elmer Rice Elmer Rice (born Elmer Leopold Reizenstein, September 28, 1892 – May 8, 1967) was an American playwright. He is best known for his plays ''The Adding Machine'' (1923) and his Pulitzer Prize-winning drama of New York tenement life, '' Street Sce ...
,
Sophie Treadwell Sophie Anita Treadwell (October 3, 1885 – February 20, 1970) was an American playwright and journalist of the first half of the 20th century. She is best known for her play ''Machinal'' which is often included in drama anthologies as an exampl ...
, and
Eugene O'Neill Eugene Gladstone O'Neill (October 16, 1888 – November 27, 1953) was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into the U.S. the drama techniques of realism, earlier ...
.


Biography

Hopkins was born on October 4, 1878, in
Cleveland Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...
. He was the youngest of ten children born to a Welsh couple, David and Mary Jane Hopkins. His autobiography is titled ''To a Lonely Boy''. After leaving high school, he began life as a reporter and then worked for a while as a theater press agent. This led to his writing a play, ''The Fatted Calf'' (1912) and to producing a show, ''Poor Little Rich Girl'', in 1913; it was a hit and launched his
Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street **Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...
career. Arthur Hopkins married Australian actress Eva MacDonald in August 1915. At the time she declared that she had retired from the stage, but in 1919 she appeared as Natasha in ''Night Lodging'', produced by Hopkins.''New York Times'' (December 2, 1915) He was one of Broadway's most admired producers with credits including ''What Price Glory'', and ''Anna Christie''. He also co-wrote ''
Burlesque A burlesque is a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects.
'' (1927), which he staged again twenty years later; it ran from Christmas 1946 to January 1948. He directed
Philip Barry Philip Jerome Quinn Barry (June 18, 1896 – December 3, 1949) was an American dramatist best known for his plays ''Holiday (play), Holiday'' (1928) and ''The Philadelphia Story (play), The Philadelphia Story'' (1939), which were both made into ...
's 1928 play ''
Holiday A holiday is a day set aside by custom or by law on which normal activities, especially business or work including school, are suspended or reduced. Generally, holidays are intended to allow individuals to celebrate or commemorate an event or tra ...
'' at the
Plymouth Theatre Plymouth Theatre or Plymouth Theater may refer to: * Plymouth Theatre (Boston) * Plymouth Theatre (Worcester) * Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre, New York City, formerly the Plymouth Theatre * H Street Playhouse The H Street Playhouse was a black box ...
, where it ran for 229 performances. His last production – ''The Magnificent Yankee'', based on the life of the
Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...
Justice
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (March 8, 1841 – March 6, 1935) was an American jurist and legal scholar who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1902 to 1932.Holmes was Acting Chief Justice of the Un ...
, in 1946 – was another hit. Hopkins arguably was one of two key people who helped make
Humphrey Bogart Humphrey DeForest Bogart (; December 25, 1899 – January 14, 1957), nicknamed Bogie, was an American film and stage actor. His performances in Classical Hollywood cinema films made him an American cultural icon. In 1999, the American Film In ...
a star. In 1934, Hopkins heard the
Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street **Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...
play ''Invitation to a Murder'', in which Bogart was starring, from off-stage. Hopkins was very interested in Bogart for the role of the escaped murderer Duke Mantee in
Robert E. Sherwood Robert Emmet Sherwood (April 4, 1896 – November 14, 1955) was an American playwright and screenwriter. He is the author of '' Waterloo Bridge, Idiot's Delight, Abe Lincoln in Illinois, Rebecca, There Shall Be No Night, The Best Years of Our ...
's new play, ''The Petrified Forest'', which Hopkins was directing.Sperber, A.M. and Eric Lax. ''Bogart''. New York: William Morrow & Co., 1997. p. 45 . Bogart accepted the role. The play had 197 performances at the
Broadhurst Theatre The Broadhurst Theatre is a Broadway theatre, Broadway theater at 235 West 44th Street (Manhattan), 44th Street in the Theater District, Manhattan, Theater District of Midtown Manhattan in New York City. Opened in 1917, the theater was designed ...
in New York in 1935. and Bogart's performance was acclaimed: ''
New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' critic
Brooks Atkinson Justin Brooks Atkinson (November 28, 1894 – January 14, 1984) was an American theatre critic. He worked for ''The New York Times'' from 1922 to 1960. In his obituary, the ''Times'' called him "the theater's most influential reviewer of his ...
said, "a peach ... a roaring Western melodrama ... Humphrey Bogart does the best work of his career as an actor." Bogart said that the play "marked my deliverance from the ranks of the sleek, sybaritic, stiff-shirted, swallow-tailed 'smoothies' to which I seemed condemned to life. The following year
Warner Brothers Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Warner Bros. or abbreviated as WB) is an American Film studio, film and entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios, Burbank, Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, Califo ...
bought the movie rights, but the little-known Bogart, wasn't the studio's first choice for Mantee. Hopkins' inadvertent co-conspirator, Leslie Howard, made his participation in the film contingent on Bogart's, and Bogie became a bona fide star when the movie was a big hit in 1936. His wife Eva died in 1938. Hopkins wrote, produced and directed a few films. For example, he produced (uncredited) and directed ''
His Double Life ''His Double Life'' is a 1933 American pre-Code comedy-drama film directed by Broadway theatrical impresario and first time film director Arthur Hopkins with directorial input from the experienced William C. deMille, Cecil's older brother. It s ...
'' (1933). From April 19, 1944, to January 3, 1945, Hopkins produced ''Arthur Hopkins Presents'', a one-hour dramatic anthology program on
NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...
radio. He also wrote a few television plays and episodes.


Productions

''The Claw'' (1922)


Further reading



References


External links

* * * * *
Arthur Hopkins papers, 1908–1954
held by the Billy Rose Theatre Division,
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, at 40 Lincoln Center Plaza, is located in Manhattan, New York City, at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts on the Upper West Side, between the Metro ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hopkins, Arthur 1878 births 1950 deaths American theatre directors American theatre managers and producers