Moonchildren is a play by Brooklyn

Brooklyn

Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...

-based playwright

Playwright

A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

 Michael Weller

Michael Weller

Michael Weller is a Brooklyn-based playwright who is best known for his plays Moonchildren and Loose Ends. Weller is one of the founders of the Cherry Lane Theatre's acclaimed Mentor Project, which pairs pre-eminent playwrights with emerging playwrights for a season-long mentorship...

. The play chronicles a year in the life of the "moonchildren" referred to in the title: eight college students living communally together in an off-campus attic in the mid 1960s.

Performances

The work was first performed in 1971 with the title Cancer in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 at the Royal Court Theater under the direction of Martin Rosen

Martin Rosen (director)

Martin Rosen is an American film and theater director, producer and writer. Rosen is known for the animated adaptation of Richard Adams's Watership Down.He is founder and owner of film/theater company Nepenthe.-Career:...

. Weller changed the name to Moonchildren shortly thereafter for the work's American premiere at the Arena Stage

Arena Stage

Arena Stage is a not-for-profit regional theater based in Southwest Washington, D.C. Its declared mission"is to produce huge plays of all that is passionate, exuberant, profound, deep and dangerous in the American spirit. Arena has broad shoulders and a capacity to produce anything from vast epics...

 in November 1971, which was directed by Alan Schneider

Alan Schneider

Alan Schneider was an American theatre director and mentor responsible for more than 100 theatre productions. In 1984 he was honored with a Drama Desk Special Award for serving a wide range of playwrights...

.

The Arena Stage production moved to the Royale Theatre on Broadway

Broadway theatre

Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

 the following year, giving its first of 28 performances on February 11, 1972. The cast included Kevin Conway as Mike, Maureen Anderman

Maureen Anderman

Maureen Anderman is an American actress best known for her work on the stage. She has appeared in eighteen Broadway shows over the last four decades earning several Drama Desk Award and Tony Award nominations.-Career:...

 as Ruth, Edward Herrmann

Edward Herrmann

Edward Kirk Herrmann is a U.S. television and film actor. He is best known for his Emmy-nominated portrayals of Franklin D...

 as Cootie, Christopher Guest

Christopher Guest

Christopher Haden-Guest, 5th Baron Haden-Guest , better known as Christopher Guest, is an American screenwriter, composer, musician, director, actor and comedian. He is most widely known in Hollywood for having written, directed and starred in several improvisational "mockumentary" films that...

 as Norman, Stephen Collins

Stephen Collins

Stephen Weaver Collins is an American actor, writer, and singer. He is perhaps best known for playing the role of Eric Camden on the long running television series 7th Heaven and more recently as Dr. Dayton King on the ABC TV series No Ordinary Family.-Early life:Collins was born in Des Moines,...

 as Dick, Jill Eikenberry

Jill Eikenberry

Jill Eikenberry is an American film, stage, and television actress. She is best known for her role as lawyer Ann Kelsey in L.A. Law...

 as Kathy, James Woods

James Woods

James Howard Woods is an American film, stage and television actor. Woods is known for starring in critically acclaimed films such as Once Upon a Time in America, Salvador, Nixon, Ghosts of Mississippi, Casino, and in the television legal drama Shark. He has won three Emmy Awards, and has gained...

 as Bob Rettie, Cara Duff-MacCormick

Cara Duff-MacCormick

Cara Duff-MacCormick is a Canadian actress best known for her work within the American theatre.-Career:Born in Woodstock, Ontario, Duff-MacCormick studied acting at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City before making her professional debut Off-Broadway in December 1969 at the...

 as Shelly, Donegan Smith as Ralph, Robert Prosky

Robert Prosky

Robert Prosky was an American stage, film, and television actor.-Life and career:Prosky, a Polish American, was born Robert Joseph Porzuczek in the Manayunk neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Helen and Joseph Porzuczek. His father was a grocer and butcher...

 as Mr. Willis, Ron McLarty

Ron McLarty

Ron McLarty is an American actor, playwright and author. He began his career in theatre during the early 1970s with one his earliest professional performances being the role of Lucky in Michael Weller's Moonchildren for the play's American premiere at the Arena Stage in Washington D.C. in November...

 as Lucky, Louis Zorich

Louis Zorich

Louis Zorich is an American actor. He is well-known for his portrayal of Paul Reiser's father "Burt Buchman" in the NBC series Mad About You. He played the role from 1993 to 1999.-Life and career:...

 as Bream, Peter Alzado as Effing, Salem Ludwig

Salem Ludwig

Salem Ludwig was an American character actor and acting instructor.Born in Brooklyn, New York, Ludwig was blacklisted in 1957 and could only find minimal stage work. He had many film and television credits and remained active, even after his 90th birthday, until his death at age 91...

 as Uncle Murry, George Curley as Cootie's Father, and Michael Tucker

Michael Tucker (actor)

Michael Tucker is an American actor and author, most widely known for his role in L.A. Law, a portrayal for which he received Emmy nominations three years in a row....

 as Milkman. Duff-MacCormick garnered a Tony Award

Tony Award

The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway...

 nomination for best Featured Actress in a play and Weller won a Drama Desk Award

Drama Desk Award

The Drama Desk Awards, which are given annually in a number of categories, are the only major New York theater honors for which productions on Broadway, Off-Broadway, Off-Off-Broadway compete against each other in the same category...

 for Most Promising Playwright. Anderman, Duff-MacCormick, and Woods all won Theatre World Awards for their portrayals.

Reviews

The play has been deemed a "seminal work" for Weller and is according to one reviewer:

a stunning work, one that has weathered the years to become that rarity, a contemporary play that, while rooted in the era in which it was written, remains contemporary because its underlying themes are universal and unchanging.

According to a review in the New York Times, Weller wrote this play about the generation that came of age during the Vietnam War

Vietnam War

The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...

"with a discerning eye and a journalist's detachment".