DIRECTOR'S NOTES

BCC's new theater director, Katherine Bacon, said that she chose "Look Homeward, Angel" for her first production at BCC because "college theater students would certainly understand this timeless coming-of-age story and at the same time be introduced to a great American novelist. We carefully studied passages from the novel so that the actors could experience Thomas Wolfe and imbue their performances with the culture of the early twentieth century." Adapted in 1958 by Ketti Frings from Thomas Wolfe's famous novel of the same name, the play became an instant success, was nominated for numerous Tony Awards, including one for Anthony Perkins in the leading role, and won a Pulitzer Prize and New York Critic's Award.

An authentic American classic about a youth coming of age, the story so powerfully depicts the dynamics of a dysfunctional family that the novel has not been out of print since it's publication in 1929. The book made Wolfe an instant success but was banned in his hometown of Asheville, North Carolina for seven years because of the thinly disguised portraits of family, friends and Asheville residents -- that is until fellow author F. Scott Fitzgerald presented several copies to the town library in 1936. Wolfe died tragically in 1938 of tubercular meningitis just short of his 38th birthday.

As a junior in college that Wolfe went home to Asheville to be with his beloved brother Ben when he died of a severe case of pneumonia at the age of 25. Ben's untimely passing severed Wolfe's closest tie with his family. Although Wolfe confided to his sister the following quote, he gave Ben another life as the unforgettable character in his famous story:

"I think the Asheville I knew died for me when Ben died. I have never forgotten him and I never shall. I think that his death affected me more than any other event in my life . . . . Ben-he was one of those fine people who want the best and highest out of life, and who get nothing-who die unknown and unsuccessful. "

It was just after he completed his Master's degree at Harvard that Wolfe's colorful and tortured father, depicted as W.O. in the play, lay dying of cancer. Wolfe never made it to North Carolina in time to see his father before he died. It was at this point he worked on a play titled Welcome to Our City and it was here he first used the name "Altamont" for Asheville and created the characters that would appear in Look Homeward, Angel.

Wolfe's mother, immortalized as Eliza Gant in the play, lived in the "Old Kentucky Home" until her death on December 7, 1945. Four years later her surviving sons and daughters sold the house to a private organization, the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Association, and it first opened to the public as a house museum on July 19, 1949. The Thomas Wolfe Memorial is now a National Historic Landmark.

Ketti Frings is also the author of the book Hold Back the Dawn that was made into a motion picture by Paramount. She is one of the few screenwriters who successfully adapted plays to the screen, among them Come Back, Little Sheba and The Shrike. Her heritage, background, and much of her life was similar to Thomas Wolfe's and it took her a year to write the play version of Look Homeward, Angel in the 1950s.