THE LIVE WIRE:
A Comedy In Three Acts

by Garson Kanin

New York: Dramatist Play Service, Inc. (1951).

First edition, first printing.

Film Agency copy with printed "Submitted by William Morris Agency..." bookplate to the front end-paper.

Many of Kanin's plays were adapted to film, though he is best remembered for the George Cukor directed comedy screenplays he co-wrote with his wife, Ruth Gordon; three of which starred Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn.

Illustrated with a stage-scene design on a black-and-white plate to the rear.

This comedy features a group of young actors who pooled their resources, dreams and hopes together to live in a Quonset hut in the Broadway theater district.  They learn to appreciate their shared lives together in spite of a disruptive "live wire" member.

The comedy was presented by Michael Todd at the Playhouse Theater in NYC on August 17, 1950.

It had a sixteen member cast, including Jack Gilford, who was blacklisted shortly after this play, in 1953 after being specifically named a communist sympathizer by choreographer Jerome Robbins, and testifying before the House Un-American Activities Committee.

After McCarthyism had faded, Gilford made a comeback in 1962, co-starring with also blacklisted, Zero Mostel in FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM.

Jack Gilford was a highly acclaimed comedian who is most remembered for his Academy Award-nominated supporting role in the film SAVE THE TIGER with Academy Award-winning Jack Lemmon.

A significant play featuring New York theater actors written by Kanin, a significant film and theater director, and screenwriter and playwright.

Very slight lean, else fine in fresh blue linen with gilt embossed titles to the spine; in a very nearly fine dust jacket with a few very short edge tears and a small square yellow shadow to the front panel where a price sticker once resided; original $2.25 price still intact to the front inner flap.

A beautiful book in a beautifully preserved dust jacket.


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