Broadway

Broadway (1926), a drama by Philip Dunning and George Abbott. [Broadhurst Theatre, 603 perf.] At the Paradise Night Club, Steve Crandall ( Robert Glecker) kills another gangster. Crandall's girlfriend, “Billie” Moore ( Sylvia Field), sees the body being carried out, but Crandall persuades her to claim she has seen nothing, telling her it was a drunken, though important politician. Roy Lane ( Lee Tracy), a hoofer at the club who loves Billie, reveals the truth about the murder. So Billie kills Crandall then goes off with Roy. Percy Hammond of the Herald‐Tribune called the Jed Harris mounting “the most completely acted and perfectly directed show I have seen in thirty years of professional playgoing.” A 1987 revival, staged by Abbott, failed to run. Philip DUNNING (1891–1968) was born in Meriden, Connecticut, and worked as an actor and stage manager before turning to playwriting. He originally wrote Broadway as A Little White Guy, then it was produced as The Roaring Forties, then as Bright Lights, before the play was put into final form by Abbott at Harris's suggestion. Dunning's other plays incude Lily Turner (1933), Page Miss Glory (1935), and Remember the Day (1941). On occasion he also produced shows, most memorably Twentieth Century (1934).