Public Perspective is the PittsburghPublicTheater's newslettertorsubscribers andfriends.
September-October 1BBB
iforld Premiere By Horton ~oote
Do We Have A Cast For You!
Opens Public's New Season The Habitation Of Dragons by the award-winning playwright, screenwriter and director Horton Foote will receive its world premiere at the Pittsburgh Public Theater. Previews begin September 20, with a September 28 opening. The play, which will be directed by Mr. Foote, is a bold and absorbing Texan family drama. Themes of profound love, unbearable loss, divided loyalties and, ultimately, triumphant forgiveness resound through this portrait of a proud and troubled Southern family. Horton Foote, best known for his Academy Award-winning films To Kill A Mockingbird, The Trip To Bountiful and Tender Mercies, is the author of several Broadway and Off-Broadway plays as
well as numerous PBS television dramas. Twenty actors have been cast making this the most ambitious and exciting project the Public Theater has undertaken. "Large cast plays are extremely costly," says Producing Director Bill Gardner. "They're rare events these days, but when an extraordinary play like this comes along, it's a risk well worth taking." The Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, in recognition of the enormous scope and artistic merit of The Habitation Of Dragons, has awarded the Public Theater a special grant of $38,350.00 for the production. D. Trevor O'Donnell
"Most of my plays have taken place in the imaginary town of Harrison, Texas, and it seems to me a more unlikely subject could not be found in these days . . .than this attempt of mine to recreate a small Soulhem town and ils people. But Idid not choose this task, this place, or these people ta Mite about so much as they chose me.'' Horton Faate
Hallie Foote (with Matthew Broderick) played the title role in her father's play, The Widow Claire, and will appear at the Public in The Habitation of Dragons. Over 150 actors were auditioned in New York and Pittsburgh for the Public's season opener The Habitation Of Dragons, a world premiere written and directed by Academy Award-winner Horton Foote. The result is a powerful cast, assembled from among the best talent in the American theater, many of whom will be familiar to Public Theater audiences through their work in films, television and on Broadway. Marco St. John (Leonard Tolliver) has appeared in leading roles in eleven Broadway productions including Forty Carats. His film credits include Tightrope with Clint Eastwood, Contract on Cherry Street with Frank Sinatra and The Next Man with Sean Connery. He has made many guest appearances on such television series as Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer, Remington Steele and The Equalizer. Distinguished actress Eugenia Rawls (Miss Helen) made her Broadway debut in Lillian Hellman's The Children's Hour, and later played Tallulah Bankhead's daughter Alexandra in Miss Hellman's The Little Foxes, which toured to the Nixon Theater. Other Broadway credits include The Great Sebastians with Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne, and Noel Coward's Private Lives. She has performed her four one-woman shows, which she also authored and directed, throughout America and abroad . She
performed Tallulah, A Memory, which was inspired by her close and lasting friendship with Miss Bankhead, and Women of the West at The Valley Players in Ligonier in 1982. Also in starring roles are Horton Foote's daughter and son, Hallie Foote (Margaret Tolliver) and Horton Foote, Jr. (George Tolliver). This will not be the first time the Foote family has collaborated. Foote's plays Courtship, Valentine's Day and 1918 starred Hallie in a role based on her grandmother, and Horton Jr. in v_~rious supporting roles. The trilogy was filmed for a three part series, The Story of a Marriage, and was seen last year on PBS's American Playhouse. Hallie's New York credits include the title role in the long running The Widow Claire (opposite Matthew Broderick) at Circle in the Square. Her television credits include a regular spot on the new ABC series Hothouse, as well as appearances in last year's NBC Movie-of-theWeek The Little Matchgirl, and Miami Vice. Horton Jr.'s New York credits include The Widow Claire, HB Playwrights' The Old Friends and The Man Who Climbed The Pecan Trees at the Marathon 88 for Ensemble Studio Theatre. He will soon be seen in the film Blood Red with Eric Roberts and Dennis Hopper. Continued on page 2
Marco St. John and Horton Foote, Jr. play lawyer brothers In Habitation.
...s,0
E Q) ~ "(
,;::."
-!!!
:§1 ~ -" 0 0
.c
-.,
] a: ·c:"'
Q)
Cl
::,
w E
_g 0
0
~
a..
Habitation actress Eugenia Rawls with Tallulah Bankhead in The Little Foxes, 1941.
Public Perspective . Pittsburgh Public Theater . Page 1