The Heidi Chronicles
Encyclopedia
The Heidi Chronicles is a 1988 play
by Wendy Wasserstein
. The play won the 1989 Pulitzer Prize for Drama
.
was held in April 1988, directed by Daniel J. Sullivan
.
The play premiered off-Broadway
at Playwrights Horizons
on November 18, 1988 and closed on February 19, 1989 after 99 performances. It then transferred to Broadway
at the Plymouth Theatre, opening on March 9, 1989 and closing on September 1, 1990, after 622 performances. Both productions were directed by Sullivan, with a cast that starred Joan Allen
as Heidi, Boyd Gaines
as Peter, and Peter Friedman
as Scoop. Sarah Jessica Parker
was featured in three small roles off-Broadway; those roles were played by Cynthia Nixon
for the Broadway run.
Replacement actors on Broadway included Christine Lahti
, Brooke Adams, and Mary McDonnell
as Heidi, David Hyde Pierce
as Peter, and Tony Shalhoub
as Scoop.
Two Broadway Heidis married the actor who played opposite them as Scoop: Joan Allen
and Peter Friedman
(now divorced) and Brooke Adams and Tony Shalhoub
.
The first major production mounted after Wasserstein's death in January 2006 was at the Berkshire Theatre Festival
during the summer of 2006.
On September 30, 2011, produced by The English Theatre of Rome and directed by Gaby Ford, the play premiered in Italy, at Rome's Teatro dell'Arciliuto near Piazza Navona, to wide acclaim.
more than twenty years later. The play's main themes deal with the changing role of women during this time period, describing both Heidi's ardent feminism
during the 1970s and her eventual sense of betrayal during the 1980s. Though most of the characters are women, there are two important male characters; Peter Patrone, a gay
pediatrician
who is arguably Heidi's best friend, and Scoop Rosenbaum, a magazine editor who marries and has many affairs, and with whom Heidi has a tense friendship.
critic Mel Gussow
wrote of the Playwrights Horizon production: "Ms. Wasserstein has always been a clever writer of comedy. This time she has been exceedingly watchful about not settling for easy laughter, and the result is a more penetrating play. This is not to suggest, however, that The Heidi Chronicles is ever lacking in humor."
and starred Jamie Lee Curtis
and Tom Hulce
in the leading roles.
Drama Desk Award
New York Drama Critics Circle
Play (theatre)
A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...
by Wendy Wasserstein
Wendy Wasserstein
Wendy Wasserstein was an American playwright and an Andrew Dickson White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University...
. The play won the 1989 Pulitzer Prize for Drama
Pulitzer Prize for Drama
The Pulitzer Prize for Drama was first awarded in 1918.From 1918 to 2006, the Drama Prize was unlike the majority of the other Pulitzer Prizes: during these years, the eligibility period for the drama prize ran from March 2 to March 1, to reflect the Broadway 'season' rather than the calendar year...
.
Production history
A workshop production at Seattle Repertory TheatreSeattle Repertory Theatre
Seattle Repertory Theatre is a major regional theatre located in Seattle, Washington, at the Seattle Center. It is a member of Theatre Puget Sound and Theatre Communications Group. Founded in 1963, it is led by Artistic Director Jerry Manning and Managing Director Benjamin Moore...
was held in April 1988, directed by Daniel J. Sullivan
Daniel J. Sullivan
Daniel J. Sullivan is an American theatre and film director and playwright.-Life and career:Sullivan was born in Wray, Colorado, the son of Mary Catherine and John Martin Sullivan. He was raised in San Francisco, where he graduated from San Francisco State University...
.
The play premiered off-Broadway
Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...
at Playwrights Horizons
Playwrights Horizons
Playwrights Horizons is a not-for-profit Off-Broadway theater located in New York City dedicated to the support and development of contemporary American playwrights, composers, and lyricists, and to the production of their new work....
on November 18, 1988 and closed on February 19, 1989 after 99 performances. It then transferred to 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...
at the Plymouth Theatre, opening on March 9, 1989 and closing on September 1, 1990, after 622 performances. Both productions were directed by Sullivan, with a cast that starred Joan Allen
Joan Allen
Joan Allen is an American actress. She worked in theatre, television and film during her early career, and achieved recognition for her Broadway debut in Burn This, winning a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play in 1989.She has received three Academy Award nominations;...
as Heidi, Boyd Gaines
Boyd Gaines
Boyd Payne Gaines is an American stage, film, and television actor.Gaines was born in Atlanta, Georgia, to Ida and James Gaines. He has appeared in a number of films and television shows, including Fame, L.A...
as Peter, and Peter Friedman
Peter Friedman
Peter Friedman is an American stage, film and television actor.Born in New York City, Friedman graduated from Hofstra University before making his Broadway debut in The Great God Brown in 1972...
as Scoop. Sarah Jessica Parker
Sarah Jessica Parker
Sarah Jessica Parker is an American film, television, and theater actress and producer.She is best known for her leading role as Carrie Bradshaw on the HBO television series Sex and the City , for which she won four Golden Globe Awards, three Screen Actors Guild Awards, and two Emmy Awards...
was featured in three small roles off-Broadway; those roles were played by Cynthia Nixon
Cynthia Nixon
Cynthia Ellen Nixon is an American actress, known for her portrayal of Miranda Hobbes in the HBO series Sex and the City . She has received two Screen Actors Guild Awards, two Emmy Awards, a Tony Award, and a Grammy Award....
for the Broadway run.
Replacement actors on Broadway included Christine Lahti
Christine Lahti
Christine Lahti is an American actress and film director. Lahti has had a successful career in television and film. Throughout her career she has garnered 2 Golden Globe Awards from 8 Nominations, An Emmy Award from 6 Nominations and 2 Academy Award nominations...
, Brooke Adams, and Mary McDonnell
Mary McDonnell
Mary Eileen McDonnell is an American film, stage, and television actress. She received an Academy Award nomination for her role as Stands With A Fist in Dances with Wolves, and she is also very well known for her performance as President Laura Roslin in Battlestar Galactica, the President's wife...
as Heidi, David Hyde Pierce
David Hyde Pierce
David Hyde Pierce is an American actor and comedian best known for playing psychiatrist Dr. Niles Crane on the NBC sitcom Frasier, for which he received many accolades including four Emmy Awards for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series.-Early life:Pierce, the youngest of four siblings,...
as Peter, and Tony Shalhoub
Tony Shalhoub
Anthony Marcus "Tony" Shalhoub is an American actor of Lebanese descent. His television work includes the roles of Antonio Scarpacci on Wings and sleuth Adrian Monk on the TV series Monk. He has won three Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe for his work in Monk...
as Scoop.
Two Broadway Heidis married the actor who played opposite them as Scoop: Joan Allen
Joan Allen
Joan Allen is an American actress. She worked in theatre, television and film during her early career, and achieved recognition for her Broadway debut in Burn This, winning a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play in 1989.She has received three Academy Award nominations;...
and Peter Friedman
Peter Friedman
Peter Friedman is an American stage, film and television actor.Born in New York City, Friedman graduated from Hofstra University before making his Broadway debut in The Great God Brown in 1972...
(now divorced) and Brooke Adams and Tony Shalhoub
Tony Shalhoub
Anthony Marcus "Tony" Shalhoub is an American actor of Lebanese descent. His television work includes the roles of Antonio Scarpacci on Wings and sleuth Adrian Monk on the TV series Monk. He has won three Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe for his work in Monk...
.
The first major production mounted after Wasserstein's death in January 2006 was at the Berkshire Theatre Festival
Berkshire Theatre Festival
The Berkshire Theatre Festival is one of the oldest professional performing arts venues in the Berkshires, celebrating its 80th anniversary season in 2008.-History:...
during the summer of 2006.
On September 30, 2011, produced by The English Theatre of Rome and directed by Gaby Ford, the play premiered in Italy, at Rome's Teatro dell'Arciliuto near Piazza Navona, to wide acclaim.
Synopsis
The plot follows Heidi Holland from high school in the 1960s to her career as a successful art historianArt history
Art history has historically been understood as the academic study of objects of art in their historical development and stylistic contexts, i.e. genre, design, format, and style...
more than twenty years later. The play's main themes deal with the changing role of women during this time period, describing both Heidi's ardent feminism
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...
during the 1970s and her eventual sense of betrayal during the 1980s. Though most of the characters are women, there are two important male characters; Peter Patrone, a gay
Gay
Gay is a word that refers to a homosexual person, especially a homosexual male. For homosexual women the specific term is "lesbian"....
pediatrician
Pediatrics
Pediatrics or paediatrics is the branch of medicine that deals with the medical care of infants, children, and adolescents. A medical practitioner who specializes in this area is known as a pediatrician or paediatrician...
who is arguably Heidi's best friend, and Scoop Rosenbaum, a magazine editor who marries and has many affairs, and with whom Heidi has a tense friendship.
Critical responses
The New York TimesThe New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
critic Mel Gussow
Mel Gussow
Melvyn H. Gussow was an American theater critic, movie critic, and author who wrote for The New York Times for 35 years.-Biography:...
wrote of the Playwrights Horizon production: "Ms. Wasserstein has always been a clever writer of comedy. This time she has been exceedingly watchful about not settling for easy laughter, and the result is a more penetrating play. This is not to suggest, however, that The Heidi Chronicles is ever lacking in humor."
Film adaptation
In 1995, the play was adapted as a television film. It was directed by Paul BogartPaul Bogart
Paul Bogart is an American television and film director. He directed episodes of the television series "Coronet Blue" in 1967 Get Smart and All In The Family from 1976 to 1979...
and starred Jamie Lee Curtis
Jamie Lee Curtis
Jamie Lee Curtis is an American actress and author. Although she was initially known as a "scream queen" because of her starring roles in several horror films early in her career, such as Halloween, The Fog, Prom Night and Terror Train, Curtis has since compiled a body of work that spans many...
and Tom Hulce
Tom Hulce
Thomas Edward "Tom" Hulce is an American actor and theater producer. As an actor, he is perhaps best known for his Oscar-nominated portrayal of Mozart in the movie Amadeus and his role as "Pinto" in National Lampoon's Animal House. Additional acting awards included a total of four Golden Globe...
in the leading roles.
Awards and nominations
Tony AwardTony 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...
- Best Play (winner)
- Best Actress in a Play (Allen) (nominee)
- Best Featured Actor in a Play (Gaines) (winner)
- Best Featured Actress in a Play (Joanne Camp)(nominee)
- Best Scenic Design (Thomas Lynch)(nominee)
- Best Direction of a Play (nominee)
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...
- Best New Play (winner)
- Outstanding Actor in a Play (Friedman)
- Outstanding Actress in a Play (Allen) (nominee)
- Outstanding Featured Actress in a Play (Joanne Camp)(nominee)
- Outstanding Director of a Play (nominee)
- Outstanding Set Design (nominee)
New York Drama Critics Circle
- Best Play (winner)