Alfred Uhry | |
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| Born | Alfred Fox Uhry December 3, 1936 Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. |
| Education | Brown University (BA) |
| Notable awards | Pulitzer Prize for Drama (1988) |
| Spouse | Joanna Kellogg |
Alfred Fox Uhry (born December 3, 1936) is an American playwright and screenwriter. He has received an Academy Award, two Tony Awards and the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for dramatic writing for Driving Miss Daisy . He is a member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers.
Uhry was born in Atlanta, Georgia, the son of Alene (Fox), a social worker, and Ralph K. Uhry, a furniture designer and artist. He was born into a German Jewish family with one sister, the author Ann Uhry Abrams. [1] Uhry graduated from Druid Hills High School in 1954 and went on to graduate from Brown University in 1958 [2] where he wrote two original musicals with Brownbrokers. Druid Hills High School's Uhry Theater is named in honor of Uhry. During his first years in New York City, learning the craft of lyric-writing, Uhry received a stipend from Frank Loesser; [2] after his eventual success, Uhry often praised Loesser's generosity and encouragement.
Uhry's early work for the stage was as a lyricist and librettist for a number of commercially unsuccessful musicals, including a revival of Little Johnny Jones starring Donny Osmond (1982) which ran for one performance on Broadway. [3]
His first collaboration with Robert Waldman was the 1968 musical Here's Where I Belong , which closed after one performance (and 20 previews) on Broadway. [4] They had considerably better success with The Robber Bridegroom , which premiered on Broadway in both 1975 and 1976, [5] had a year-long national tour, and garnered Uhry his first Tony Award nomination, for best book of a musical in 1976. [6]
America's Sweetheart, with music by Robert Waldman and with the book co-written by Uhry with John Weidman, ran at the Hartford Stage, Hartford, Connecticut in March 1985 to April 1985, and then at the Coconut Grove Playhouse, Miami, Florida, where it closed. [7]
The Robber Bridegroom was revived Off-Broadway in March 2016 at the Roundabout Theatre Company and directed by Alex Timbers. [8] This production won three Lucille Lortel Awards including Outstanding Revival. [9]
Driving Miss Daisy (1987) is the first in what is known as his "Atlanta Trilogy" of plays, all set during the first half of the 20th century. Produced Off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons, the play earned him the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. [10] It deals with the relationship between an elderly Jewish woman and her black chauffeur. The character “Daisy” was based on the friendship between Uhry’s grandmother and her driver. He adapted it into the screenplay for a 1989 film starring Jessica Tandy and Morgan Freeman, an adaptation which was awarded the Academy Award for Writing Adapted Screenplay, in addition to the Academy Award to Tandy for best actress. [11]
The second of the trilogy, The Last Night of Ballyhoo (1996), is set in 1939 during the premiere of the film Gone with the Wind . It deals with a Jewish family during an important social event. [12] It was commissioned for the Cultural Olympiad in Atlanta which coincided with the 1996 Summer Olympics, [13] and received the Tony Award for Best Play when produced on Broadway in 1997. [14]
The third is the 1998 musical Parade , about the 1913 trial of Jewish factory manager Leo Frank. The libretto earned him a Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical. [15] The music was written by Jason Robert Brown. [16]
Uhry's play Edgardo Mine is based on the true story of Edgardo Mortara, an Italian child taken by police from his Jewish family in 1858 because one of their domestic servants had baptized him. The play, directed by Doug Hughes, opened at Hartford Stage, Hartford, Connecticut in November 2002. [17]
The Manhattan Theatre Club produced Uhry's musical LoveMusik on Broadway in 2007. The story depicts the relationship between composer Kurt Weill and his wife, Lotte Lenya, using Weill's music. [18] [19]
Apples & Oranges premiered on October 10, 2012, at the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta. This new play is about the rediscovery of a sibling relationship. [20]
Angel Reapers, a collaboration with director/choreographer Martha Clarke, ran Off-Broadway at the Signature Theatre from February 2 to March 20, 2016. [21] This production won the Lucille Lortel Award for "Outstanding Alternative Theatrical Experience". [22]
Uhry wrote the screenplay for the 1989 film version of Driving Miss Daisy [23] and for the 1992 film Rich in Love ; [24] he co-wrote the screenplay for the 1988 film Mystic Pizza . [25]
Uhry was married to Joanna Kellogg, Ed.D., from 1959 until her death on August 26, 2019, at age 82 from complications of Parkinson's disease and Lewy Body Dementia. Dr. Kellogg Uhry was a professor at Fordham University. [26] They had four daughters and lived in New York City. [13]
Donald Margulies is an American playwright and academic. In 2000, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Dinner with Friends.
Paula Vogel is an American playwright. She is known for her provocative explorations of complex social and political issues. Much of her work delves into themes of psychological trauma, abuse, and the complexities of human relationships. She has received the Pulitzer Prize as well as nominations for two Tony Awards. In 2013 she was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.
Playwrights Horizons is a not-for-profit American Off-Broadway theater located in New York City dedicated to the support and development of contemporary American playwrights, composers, and lyricists, and to the production of their new work.
Parade is a musical with a book by Alfred Uhry and music and lyrics by Jason Robert Brown. The musical is a dramatization of the 1913 trial and imprisonment, and 1915 lynching, of Jewish American Leo Frank in Georgia.
The Last Night of Ballyhoo is a play by Alfred Uhry that premiered in 1996 in Atlanta. The play is a comedy/drama, which is set in Atlanta, Georgia, in December 1939.
Martha Clarke is an American theater director and choreographer noted for her multidisciplinary approach to theatre, dance, and opera productions. Her best-known original work is The Garden of Earthly Delights, an exploration in theatre, dance, music and flying of the famous painting of the same name by Hieronymus Bosch. The production was honored with a Drama Desk Award for Unique Theatrical Experience, an Obie Award for Richard Peaslee's original score, and a Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award for choreography.
Manhattan Theatre Club (MTC) is a theatre company located in New York City, affiliated with the League of Resident Theatres. Lynne Meadow has been the company’s Artistic Director and visionary since 1972. Barry Grove joined the company in 1975 and was Meadow’s partner until 2023. Chris Jennings is now Executive Director. Manhattan Theatre Club has grown since its founding in 1970 from an Off-Off Broadway showcase into one of the country's most acclaimed theatre organizations.
Dana Ivey is an American actress. She is a five-time Tony Award nominee for her work on Broadway, and won the 1997 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actress in a Play for her work in both Sex and Longing and The Last Night of Ballyhoo. She originated the title role in Driving Miss Daisy and was nominated for a Drama Desk award for Best Actress in a Play. Her film appearances include The Color Purple (1985), Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988), The Addams Family (1991), Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (1992), Sleepless in Seattle (1993), Addams Family Values (1993), Two Weeks Notice (2002), Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde (2003), Rush Hour 3 (2007), and The Help (2011).
Alice Ripley is an American actress, singer, songwriter and mixed media artist. She is known, in particular, for her various roles on Broadway in musicals, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning Next to Normal and Side Show. She most recently played three roles in the short-lived Broadway musical, American Psycho. Alice Ripley has released albums with her band, RIPLEY, including the single, "Beautiful Eyes", released in February 2012. She also performs as a solo artist, while in February 2011 she released Alice Ripley Daily Practice, Volume 1, a stripped-down collection of acoustic rock covers.
Lynne Meadow is an American theatre producer, director and a teacher. She has been the artistic director of the Manhattan Theatre Club since 1972.
Robert Waldman is an American composer, musical arranger, and orchestrator. Waldman has collaborated with Alfred Uhry twice, on Here's Where I Belong, the disastrous 1968 adaptation of John Steinbeck's East of Eden that closed on opening night, and the considerably more successful The Robber Bridegroom, which was produced on Broadway in both 1975 and 1976, enjoyed a year-long US national tour, and has become a staple of regional theatres. It garnered Waldman a Drama Desk Award nomination for Outstanding Music.
Steven Pasquale is an American actor. He is best known for his role as the New York City Firefighter/Emergency Medical Technician Sean Garrity in the series Rescue Me. He made his television debut on the HBO series Six Feet Under, playing a love interest for David. He has also starred in the film Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem, and as Scott in American Son, on both stage and screen.
Christopher Akerlind is an American lighting designer for theatre, opera, and dance. He won the Tony Award for Best Lighting Design for Indecent. He also won the Tony Award for Best Lighting Design and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Lighting Design for Light in the Piazza and an Obie Award for sustained excellence for his work Off-Broadway.
Alex Timbers is an American writer and director best known for his work on stage and television. He has received numerous accolades including two Tony Awards, a Golden Globe Award, a Drama Desk Award, as well as nominations for a Primetime Emmy Award and a Grammy Award. Timbers received the Drama League Founder's Award for Excellence in Directing and the Jerome Robbins Award for Directing.
Quiara Alegría Hudes is an American playwright, producer, lyricist and essayist. She is best known for writing the book for the musical In the Heights (2007), and screenplay for its film adaptation. Hudes' first play in her Elliot Trilogy, Elliot, A Soldier's Fugue was a finalist for the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. She received the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for Water by the Spoonful, her second play in that trilogy.
Driving Miss Daisy is a play by American playwright Alfred Uhry, about the relationship of an elderly Southern Jewish woman, Daisy Werthan, and her African-American chauffeur, Hoke Coleburn, from 1948 to 1973. The play was the first in Uhry's Atlanta Trilogy, which deals with Jewish residents of that city in the early 20th century. The play won the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Brownbrokers is a student-run theater group at Brown University. Together with Brown's Theatre Arts and Performance Studies faculty, Brownbrokers develops and produces a full-length, student-written musical every other year. Founded in 1935, it is one of the oldest undergraduate producing bodies devoted to new student-written musical theatre, both comedic and dramatic, in the United States. The group is run by The Brownbrokers Board, an organization of self-elected students from the Brown student body. In addition to the biennial full-scale production, Brownbrokers produces smaller events such as the annual miniMUSICAL Festival and staged readings of the musicals in consideration for production the following year.
Daryl Roth is an American theatre producer who has produced over 90 productions on and off Broadway. Most often serving as a co-producer or investor, Roth has also been a lead producer of Broadway shows such as Kinky Boots, Indecent, Sylvia, It Shoulda Been You, and The Normal Heart.
Steven Levenson is an American playwright and television writer. He won the 2017 Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical for Dear Evan Hansen.
The Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Play was an award presented annually at the Lucille Lortel Awards to honor an actress for excellence in a leading role in an Off-Broadway production. The categories were split into Outstanding Lead Actress in a Play and Outstanding Lead Actress in a Musical in 2014. The acting categories were made gender-neutral in 2021.
Media related to Alfred Uhry at Wikimedia Commons
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