autobiographical
An autobiography, sometimes informally called an autobio, is a self-written account of one's own life.
It is a form of biography.
Definition
The word "autobiography" was first used deprecatingly by William Taylor in 1797 in the English p ...
play by
Neil Simon
Marvin Neil Simon (July 4, 1927 – August 26, 2018) was an American playwright, screenwriter and author. He wrote more than 30 plays and nearly the same number of movie screenplays, mostly film adaptations of his plays. He has received mo ...
, the first chapter in what is known as his
Eugene trilogy __NOTOC__
The Eugene Trilogy refers to three plays written by Neil Simon, the "quasi-autobiographical trilogy" '' Brighton Beach Memoirs'', '' Biloxi Blues'' and '' Broadway Bound''.
History
The trilogy tells the story of Eugene Jerome from his ado ...
''Brighton Beach Memoirs'' had a pre-Broadway engagement at the
Ahmanson Theatre
The Ahmanson Theatre is one of the four main venues that compose the Los Angeles Music Center.
History
The theatre was built as a result of a donation from Howard F. Ahmanson Sr, the founder of H.F. Ahmanson & Co., an insurance and savings an ...
in Los Angeles on December 10, 1982, and following an additional pre-Broadway engagement at the Curran Theatre in San Francisco, the play premiered on Broadway at the Alvin Theatre on March 27, 1983 and transferred to the
46th Street Theatre
The Richard Rodgers Theatre (formerly Chanin's 46th Street Theatre and the 46th Street Theatre) is a Broadway theater at 226 West 46th Street in the Theater District of Midtown Manhattan in New York City. Opened in 1925, it was designed by He ...
Željko Ivanek
Željko Ivanek (né Šimić-Ivanek; ; ; born August 15, 1957) is an American actor, known for his role as Ray Fiske on ''Damages'', for which he won a Primetime Emmy Award. Ivanek is also known for his role of Ed Danvers on '' Homicide: Life on th ...
(Stanley Jerome), Jodi Thelen (Nora Morton) and Joyce Van Patten (Blanche Morton). Van Patten joined the cast after
Piper Laurie
Piper Laurie (born Rosetta Jacobs; January 22, 1932) is an American actress. She is known for her roles in the films '' The Hustler'' (1961), '' Carrie'' (1976), and '' Children of a Lesser God'' (1986), all of which brought her Academy Award n ...
was let go during rehearsals. Scenic design was by David Mitchell, Costumes were by Patricia Zipprodt and lighting was by
Rich, Frank
Frank Hart Rich Jr. (born 1949) is an American essayist and liberal op-ed columnist, who held various positions within '' The New York Times'' from 1980 to 2011. He has also produced television series and documentaries for HBO.
Rich is curren ...
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
Jon Cryer
Jonathan Niven Cryer (born April 16, 1965) is an American actor, writer, director and producer. Born into a show business family, he made his motion picture debut as a teenage photographer in the 1984 romantic comedy '' No Small Affair''; his br ...
Josh Hamilton
Joshua Holt Hamilton (born May 21, 1981) is an American former professional baseball player. He played in Major League Baseball as an outfielder from to , most prominently as a member of the Texas Rangers teams that won two consecutive Americ ...
,
Stanley Tucci
Stanley Tucci Jr. ( ; born November 11, 1960) is an American actor and filmmaker. Involved in acting from a young age, he made his film debut in John Huston's ''Prizzi's Honor'' (1985), and continued to play a variety of supporting roles in film ...
,
Anita Gillette
Anita Gillette ( Luebben; born August 16, 1936) is an American actress. She had numerous roles on Broadway, American television, and in feature films. She also made many appearances as a celebrity guest on television game shows.
Early life
Gill ...
, Patrick Breen, Dick Latessa and Verna Bloom in other roles. ''Brighton Beach Memoirs'' is the last non-musical play to run over 1,000 consecutive performances on Broadway.
;Broadway revival
A revival opened on Broadway on October 25, 2009 at the Nederlander Theatre. Directed by David Cromer, the cast featured
Laurie Metcalf
Laura Elizabeth Metcalf (born June 16, 1955) is an American actress. Often described as a character actor, she's known for her complex and versitile roles across the stage and screen. She has received various accolades throughout her career s ...
as Kate Jerome and
Dennis Boutsikaris
Dennis Boutsikaris (; born December 21, 1952) is an American character actor who has won the Obie Award twice. He is also a narrator of audiobooks, for which he has won 13 Golden Earphone Awards and 8 Audie Awards. He won Best Audiobook of the ...
Gracie Bea Lawrence
Lawrence is a US-based soul-pop group founded by New York City-raised sibling duo Clyde and Gracie Lawrence, who have been singing, performing, and writing songs together since their early childhood. Today, Lawrence is an eight-piece band tha ...
as Laurie, Noah Robbins as Eugene and Alexandra Socha as Nora.
The production was planned to run in repertory with '' Broadway Bound'', which was to feature the same cast with the exception of Josh Grisetti, who was to assume the role of the "older" Eugene (played by Noah Robbins in the earlier play) and Allan Miller in the role of Ben. The two plays were produced and promoted as "The Neil Simon Plays". Despite generally positive reviews from New York critics, ''Brighton Beach Memoirs'' closed on November 1, 2009 after 9 performances and 25 previews due to weak ticket sales. Subsequently, the planned production of '' Broadway Bound'' was cancelled.
''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', in analyzing the revival's failure, wrote that "What went wrong with 'Brighton Beach Memoirs' is a case study in success and failure on Broadway today. There were no big stars like Jude Law in the current commercial hit 'Hamlet,' there was no marketing campaign that framed the Simon play as a can’t-miss theatrical event, and there was no wow factor that brought the period piece to life, like the breakneck pacing of the popular farce 'Boeing-Boeing' last year. But the failure also reflects America’s evolving sense of humor and taste... It actually received good reviews, but the play was shuttered because people, for whatever reason, did not want to see the Simon show about a Depression-era family laughing through the tears. The show cost $3 million to produce but never grossed more than $125,000 a week in ticket sales during preview performances — or 15 percent of the maximum possible — an amount that did not even cover running costs."
Plot overview
Set in the
Brighton Beach
Brighton Beach is a neighborhood in the southern portion of the New York City borough of Brooklyn, within the greater Coney Island area along the Atlantic Ocean coastline. Brighton Beach is bounded by Coney Island proper at Ocean Parkway to the ...
section of
Brooklyn, New York
Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, behi ...
in September 1937 during
The Great Depression
The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagion ...
, this
coming-of-age
Coming of age is a young person's transition from being a child to being an adult. The specific age at which this transition takes place varies between societies, as does the nature of the change. It can be a simple legal convention or can b ...
Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
American
teenager
Adolescence () is a transitional stage of physical and psychological development that generally occurs during the period from puberty to adulthood (typically corresponding to the age of majority). Adolescence is usually associated with the ...
who experiences
puberty
Puberty is the process of physical changes through which a child's body matures into an adult body capable of sexual reproduction. It is initiated by hormonal signals from the brain to the gonads: the ovaries in a girl, the testes in a b ...
, sexual awakening, and a search for identity as he tries to deal with his family, including his older brother Stanley, his parents Kate and Jack, Kate's sister Blanche, and her two daughters, Nora and Laurie, who come to live there after their father's death. The new living arrangement is taking its toll on Jack's health, as he has to work two stressful jobs to support the extended family. Meanwhile Aunt Blanche is interested in dating their neighbor, who has a drinking problem, despite Kate's objections; Stanley faces problems with his own job, when he stands up to his somewhat tyrannical boss, and later resorts to some shady means to support the family's struggle; cousin Nora, whom Eugene has a crush on, is eager to be a paid dancer in a Broadway musical, even though the family's circumstances might not allow it, much to her dismay; and cousin Laurie, who has heart problems and requires frequent doctor visits, is a source of annoyance for Eugene. All the while the family has other relatives living in Poland, which is under invasion, and they are worried about what might happen if they remain there, or how they'll be able to put them up if they escape and come to Brooklyn.
Characters
*Eugene Morris Jerome, almost 15
*Stanley Jerome, 18½: Eugene's older brother
*Blanche Morton, 38: Eugene's widowed aunt
*Nora Morton, 16½: Eugene's older cousin
*Laurie Morton, 13: Eugene's younger cousin, has heart problems
*with Kate Jerome, about 40: Eugene's mother, a strong Jewish matriarch
*and Jacob "Jack" Jerome, about 40: Eugene's father
Theatre World Award
The Theatre World Award is an American honor presented annually to actors and actresses in recognition of an outstanding New York City stage debut performance, either on Broadway or Off-Broadway. It was first awarded for the 1945–1946 theatre s ...
New York Drama Critics' Circle
The New York Drama Critics' Circle is made up of 22 drama critics from daily newspapers, magazines and wire services based in the New York City metropolitan area. The organization is best known for its annual awards for excellence in theater.Jone ...
Award for Best Play (winner)
Jewish culture
Because of Neil Simon’s Jewish background and upbringing, much of his work, ''Brighton Beach Memoirs'' being a clear example, is semi-autobiographical. Simon infused Jewish humor into ''Brighton Beach Memoirs'' and represented Jewish culture in a way that many Jews found comforting and reminiscent of their families. Through his characters, Simon also showed real American Jews what they looked like, offering "an unsettling mirror: one in which we watched our community identify as Jews only in the most cursory ways, through humor and cultural touchstones".
Reception
Reviews for the original Broadway production were mixed. Clive Barnes of the ''New York Post'' called ''Brighton Beach Memoirs'' Simon's "best play yet" but also "a slight disappointment" because the playwright "always pulls back from the jugular."
Frank Rich
Frank Hart Rich Jr. (born 1949) is an American essayist and liberal op-ed columnist, who held various positions within ''The New York Times'' from 1980 to 2011. He has also produced television series and documentaries for HBO.
Rich is curren ...
of the ''New York Times'' judged the play to be "a pleasant evening" that "never quite stops being nice and starts being either consistently involving or entertaining." Nevertheless, the play was popular with Broadway audiences and had a long and successful run. When the play was not nominated for the Tony Award for Best Play, producer Emanuel Azenberg called the snub "an outrageous injustice" and "a personal insult," and '' Variety'' published an editorial declaring "Neil Simon Deserves Better." In 1983 Dolores Dolan of ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' said that after it achieved popularity on Broadway, the community of
Brighton Beach
Brighton Beach is a neighborhood in the southern portion of the New York City borough of Brooklyn, within the greater Coney Island area along the Atlantic Ocean coastline. Brighton Beach is bounded by Coney Island proper at Ocean Parkway to the ...
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
Blythe Danner
Blythe Katherine Danner (born February 3, 1943) is an American actress. Accolades she has received include two Primetime Emmy Awards for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for her role as Izzy Huffstodt on ''Huff'' (2004–2006), and a ...
(Kate), Bob Dishy (Jack), Lisa Waltz (Nora), Brian Drillinger (Stanley), Stacey Glick (Laurie), and
Judith Ivey
Judith Lee Ivey (born September 4, 1951) is an American actress and theatre director. She has twice won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play: for '' Steaming'' (1981) and '' Hurlyburly'' (1984). She has also appeared in several fil ...
(Blanche). The film frequently breaks the
fourth wall
The fourth wall is a performance convention in which an invisible, imaginary wall separates actors from the audience. While the audience can see through this ''wall'', the convention assumes the actors act as if they cannot. From the 16th cent ...
by having Eugene speak directly to the camera.
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...
, in his review for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' wrote: "The movie feels so plotted, so constructed, so written, that I found myself thinking maybe they shouldn't have filmed the final draft of the screenplay. Maybe there was an earlier draft that was a little disorganized and unpolished, but still had the jumble of life in it.... The movie was directed by Gene Saks, who directs many of Simon's plays on both the stage and the screen, and whose gift is for the theater. His plays have the breath of life; his movies feel like the official authorized version. Everything is by the numbers."