Blue-grass and BroadwayMaria Thompson DaviessOmniClassics · Literature
Blue-grass and Broadway
Maria Thompson DaviessA Kentucky playwright's hopes collide with a producer's plan to use her play as a lesson for his temperamental star.
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About the book
Patricia Adair sends her play to Broadway believing that producer Godfrey Vandeford will recognize and protect her work. Vandeford initially sees a different opportunity: staging an inexpensive failure might humble Violet Hawtry, the star whose demands have become intolerable. His assistant's enthusiasm for the manuscript introduces another possibility into this cynical calculation. Patricia's arrival brings the expectations of her Kentucky background into contact with theatrical contracts, casting, publicity, and personal rivalries. Daviess builds the romance around the making of a production, so artistic ambition is constantly negotiated through money and professional influence. The contrast between Patricia's trust and the producer's original intentions makes the developing relationship depend on more than admiration; it also requires a reconsideration of how her talent is being used.
- Art and commerce
- Trust and manipulation
- Regional identity
Why read it
The producer's initially cynical motive gives the backstage romance a concrete conflict over responsibility to an inexperienced writer.
English text of the April 1919 Century edition