Addresses: Agent: c/o Elaine Markson, 44 Greenwich Avenue, New York, NY, 10011; Agent: 222 N. Canon Drive, Beverly Hills, CA, 90210.
"I am not sure whether I became devoted to the theatre when I was six and sawMary Martin in Peter Pan or when I was three and witnessed an actor make an entrance through the house at the 92nd Street Y in The Emperor's New Clothes. In any event, by the time I was sixteen and understood that I would never play the piano as well as Artur Schnabel, there were only three things I wanted to do with my life: work on a newspaper, work in the theatre, and make movies. I have abandoned each any number of times but have inevitably been drawn back.
"When I began writing theatrical criticism, I was a dogmatic exponent of ritualistic theatre. When I began writing plays, they turned out to be realistic.I am no longer dogmatic. I like to think of my writing as musical, as much influenced by Beethoven as Chekhov. I am not sure this matters to anyone but me. My plays seem to be about the specifics of American professional life andabout the difficulty of acting morally in a time without moral standards. I collect American hard-boiled fiction, spend as much time in the kitchen as possible, and tell stories to six-year olds."
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