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Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

The iron will of Horton Foote

January 2, 2015 by Terry Teachout

In today’s Wall Street Journal “Sightings” column I look at the long career of Horton Foote, who struggled in obscurity for decades before establishing himself as a major playwright. Here’s an excerpt.

* * *

Horton Foote’s “The Traveling Lady” opened on Broadway in October of 1954 and closed three weeks later. Forty-three years later, “The Young Man from Atlanta” made it to Broadway after having had a solid off-Broadway run and won the Pulitzer Prize. In between…nothing. Not only were none of Foote’s three dozen other plays produced on Broadway during that time, but none of them received major productions anywhere in America between 1954 and 1984. Yet by the time he died in 2009 at the august age of 92, he was recognized as one of this country’s greatest playwrights, and today everyone in the world of theater knows and esteems his work.

horton_footeLast September, Marion Castleberry, a professor of theater arts at Baylor University, brought out “Blessed Assurance: The Life and Art of Horton Foote,” a richly comprehending biography that tells you everything you need to know about the author of “The Trip to Bountiful,” the 1952 play that first brought Foote’s name to the attention of the general public. But because “Blessed Assurance” was brought out by Georgia’s Mercer University Press, not a New York-based trade publisher, it failed to receive the recognition it deserved. As a result, few of Foote’s admirers know of its existence, much less that it answers a question that had long puzzled me: How did he stay afloat during the long, cruelly demoralizing years of obscurity? What kept him at work day after day, writing the plays that would secure his reputation as a great dramatic artist?

The answer is that Foote, for all his oft-remarked gentleness of manner, was an extraordinarily determined man who persisted in believing in his own talent when everyone else doubted it….

* * *

Read the whole thing here.

A rare kinescope of the Studio One version of Horton Foote’s The Traveling Lady, starring Kim Stanley, directed by Robert Mulligan, and telecast on CBS in 1957:

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Terry Teachout

Terry Teachout, who writes this blog, is the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal and the critic-at-large of Commentary. In addition to his Wall Street Journal drama column and his monthly essays … [Read More...]

About

About “About Last Night”

This is a blog about the arts in New York City and the rest of America, written by Terry Teachout. Terry is a critic, biographer, playwright, director, librettist, recovering musician, and inveterate blogger. In addition to theater, he writes here and elsewhere about all of the other arts--books, … [Read More...]

About My Plays and Opera Libretti

Billy and Me, my second play, received its world premiere on December 8, 2017, at Palm Beach Dramaworks in West Palm Beach, Fla. Satchmo at the Waldorf, my first play, closed off Broadway at the Westside Theatre on June 29, 2014, after 18 previews and 136 performances. That production was directed … [Read More...]

About My Podcast

Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I are the panelists on “Three on the Aisle,” a bimonthly podcast from New York about theater in America. … [Read More...]

About My Books

My latest book is Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington, published in 2013 by Gotham Books in the U.S. and the Robson Press in England and now available in paperback. I have also written biographies of Louis Armstrong, George Balanchine, and H.L. Mencken, as well as a volume of my collected essays called A … [Read More...]

The Long Goodbye

To read all three installments of "The Long Goodbye," a multi-part posting about the experience of watching a parent die, go here. … [Read More...]

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