Barrie Stavis (June 16, 1906 – February 2, 2007) was an American playwright. Educated at
New Utrecht High School
New Utrecht High School is a public high school located in Bensonhurst, a neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. The school is operated by the New York City Department of Education under District 20 and serves students of grades 9 to 12.
A tot ...
, Brooklyn, and Columbia University, he covered the
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...
from 1937 to 1939 as a foreign correspondent and served in the
US Army Signal Corps from 1942-1945 as a Technical-Sergeant. His marriage to Leona Heyert in 1925 ended in divorce in 1939. His second marriage to Bernice Coe (1950) lasted more than fifty years, until her death in 2001.
He wrote several plays about men struggling in the vortex of history. His subjects include scientist
Galileo
Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642), commonly referred to as Galileo Galilei ( , , ) or mononymously as Galileo, was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a poly ...
, abolitionist
John Brown, and labor leader
Joe Hill. His play, ''
Lamp at Midnight'', about Galileo's struggle with the
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
to get his ideas accepted, was performed and televised on the
Hallmark Hall of Fame
''Hallmark Hall of Fame'', originally called ''Hallmark Television Playhouse'', is an anthology program on American television, sponsored by Hallmark Cards, a Kansas City, Missouri, Kansas Citybased greeting card company. It is the longest-ru ...
in 1966.
Melvyn Douglas
Melvyn Douglas (born Melvyn Edouard Hesselberg, April 5, 1901 – August 4, 1981) was an American actor. Douglas came to prominence in 1929 as a suave leading man, perhaps best typified by his performance in the romantic comedy '' Ninotchka'' ( ...
starred as Galileo.
Stavis's plays can be done on a clean, simple stage. They have been translated into 28 languages and have been produced in dozens of major theaters around the world and in numerous college theaters.
Stavis was actively working until his death on February 2, 2007, at the age of 100.
Major plays
* ''Harpers Ferry'' (New York: A.S. Barnes, 1960, 67). First new play in a classical repertory
produced by the Guthrie Theater,
Minneapolis
Minneapolis is a city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 429,954 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the state's List of cities in Minnesota, most populous city. Locat ...
, 1967:
John Brown adopts guerrilla warfare to overthrow slavery. The raid on Harpers Ferry fails and he is executed, but slavery is eventually abolished.
* ''
Lamp At Midnight'' (New York: A.S. Barnes, 1966). First produced at New Stages, New York, 1947. Television adaptation Hallmark Hall of Fame, 1966:
Galileo
Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642), commonly referred to as Galileo Galilei ( , , ) or mononymously as Galileo, was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a poly ...
challenges religious dogma with science and finds enormous resistance to the truth.
* ''The Man Who Never Died'' (New York: A.S. Barnes, 1972).
Joe Hill confronts power by organizing a trade union and pays with his life. First produced at the
Jan Hus Theater, New York, 1958.
* ''The Raw Edge of Victory in Dramatics'' (Vol. 57, No. 8 and 9; April and May 1986):
George Washington
George Washington (, 1799) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797. As commander of the Continental Army, Washington led Patriot (American Revoluti ...
leads a revolution to establish national independence.
Honors
* The National Theater Conference honors an outstanding emerging playwright each year with the Barrie and Bernice Stavis Playwriting Award
Further reading
* Obituary for Stavis.
*
External links
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*
Staging History: Barrie Stavis and the Dramatization of John Brown's Raid on Harpers Ferry nline exhibitionfro
University of Delaware Library. Special CollectionsBarrie Stavis letters to Stanley Weintraubfro
University of Delaware Library. Special Collections
References
1906 births
2007 deaths
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
American men centenarians
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