When you contract to present a script you contract to present the script as written, the script the licensing company issues. From a strictly financial point of view, copyrighting a "new" version extends the amount of time until the play goes to public domain. I say pay your royalties, then perform whichever version you want. Inge is either represented by his estate or his publisher. Some plays have "reading" versions that are not intended for performance. There are often many versions of older plays out there. Subject: Updated Version of Picnic Not Good Has anyone produced Picnic and encountered the same struggle and what did you do? How can you "update" a pulitzer prize winning play without the playwright's permission after they are dead? Why add paint to the Mona Lisa?ĭramatists has nothing on their website about this revised edition, so when you order the script you believe you are getting the original version. So here are my concerns and questions, and I would love feedback. My students are disappointed and want to produce the original script because they feel the poetry of the words, and the characters are more defined than the new script. As I said, the cast is capable but no one actor is really outstanding. Inge’s 1955 script has interesting characters and storyline and it has had many successful productions in the past, including the 1956 film starring Marilyn Monroe. Also, entire scenes have been virtually re-written (and not for the better). Eclipse Theatre’s production of Bus Stop has many ingredients for a successful production. This new version attempts to be more relevant to contemporary audiences (I am assuming) in that several period details and idioms have been changed or omitted.
The scripts we received were updated in 1981, and 1983 (10 years after Inge had passed). While reading the script in the read-through for the first rehearsal, we all noticed that the original script is very different than the one Dramatists gives out. So I went to Dramatists to apply for the nonprofessional rights and ordered 15 scripts for myself, crew, and cast. While preparing my season I read the original 1953 version that was published by Grove Press called William Inge Four Plays ( Come Back Little Sheba, Picnic, Bus Stop, The Dark at the Top of the Stairs). I have recently stared work on our final production, William Inge's Picnic.
International Thespian Excellence Awards.