Jeffrey Sweet
Encyclopedia
Jeffrey Sweet is an American
writer
, journalist
, songwriter
and theatre
historian
. Sweet's father was the late James Sweet, a science writer for the University of Chicago
who aided Supreme Court
chief justice Earl Warren
in drafting two anti-McCarthy
speeches; his mother is violinist Vivian Sweet.
Sweet has been a playwright
, screenwriter
, lyricist
, critic
, journalist
, teacher
, theatre historian, and sometime songwriter
and director. He is a resident member of Chicago
's Victory Gardens Theater
, where thirteen of his plays—including Flyovers, The Action Against Sol Schumann, The Value of Names, Berlin '45, With and Without, Court-Martial at Fort Devens
, and Bluff have been produced. His most recent play, Class Dismissed, opened there in March, 2009 under the direction of artistic director Dennis Zacek.
His involvement with musical theatre includes writing the book to a musical version of Murray Schisgal
's play Luv with lyrics by Susan Birkenhead
and music by Howard Marren. Originally produced off-Broadway under the title Love, it won Outer Critics Circle prizes for best book and best score. It was subsequently revived off-Broadway at the York Theatre
in New York, directed by Patricia Birch
, under the title What About Luv? and was later produced in London and Tokyo. He also collaborated with Melissa Manchester
on a musical
called I Sent a Letter to My Love based on the novel
by Bernice Rubens
. Sweet is also the author of Something Wonderful Right Away (an oral history
of Chicago's The Second City
troupe), The Dramatist's Toolkit and Solving Your Script (two texts on dramatic writing).
Sweet's plays fall into two groups—those inspired by historical-political subjects and those springing from more personal impulses. The most produced of the former is The Value of Names, a story set against the backdrop of the aftermath of the blacklist. In it, a young actress finds herself facing the prospect of working with the director who named her father to HUAC during the McCarthy era. Since its 1983 premiere at the Actors Theatre of Louisville
, Names has been revived a number of times in the past few years, most notably in a series of productions starring Jack Klugman
(the most recent at the Falcon Theatre was nominated for "best play" in the Ovation Awards
of Los Angeles; it was a remounting of the 2006 production directed by James Glossman at the George Street Playhouse
in New Brunswick, NJ). Other actors who have played in it include Howard Morris
, Ed Asner
, Garry Marshall
, Hector Elizondo
, Shelley Berman
, Byrne Piven
, Warren Mitchell
, Allen Swift
, Robin Groves, Helen Hunt
, Sally Murphy
and Larry Block
.
Flyovers, which premiered at Victory Gardens in 1998, represents a more personal project. The story of a film critic who returns to the small town in Ohio where he grew up and encounters threats he thought he left behind years ago, the play anticipated the confrontation between red state and blue state cultures. The original production, directed by Dennis Zacek, starred William Petersen
, Amy Morton
, Marc Vann
and Linda Reiter. Gary Cole
and Teddi Sidall took over for Petersen and Morton when the run was extended. The play won a Joseph Jefferson Award for its script, and it was recently published in Victory Gardens Theater Presents Seven New Plays From the Playwrights Ensemble, an anthology from Northwestern University Press
. A showcase production in New York in 2009, produced by Artistic New Directions, 78th Street Theatre Lab and Jeff Landsmann, starred Richard Kind
, Michele Pawk
, Kevin Geer and Donna Bullock. Northwestern University Press
also published an anthology containing nine of his scripts in under the title The Value of Names and Other Plays by Jeffrey Sweet; Chicago Tribune
theatre critic emeritus Richard Christiansen wrote the foreword.
Sweet has also written for other media, including hundreds of hours of television as well as radio adaptations of some of his plays. His work for the soap opera One Life to Live
resulted in a Writers Guild of America
Award for writing for a daytime serial in 1992 and an Emmy nomination. Under the title of "creative consultant," he also co-wrote the adaptation of Hugh Whitemore
's Pack of Lies
for the Hallmark Hall of Fame
. The script, officially credited to the pseudonym Ralph Gallup, was nominated for an Emmy, and the show won a Peabody Award
.
Sweet serves as a member of the Council of the Dramatists Guild, is a member of Ensemble Studio Theatre
, and is an alumnus of New Dramatists. He contributes a regular column to the magazine, Dramatics.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
, journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
, songwriter
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
and theatre
Theatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...
historian
Historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...
. Sweet's father was the late James Sweet, a science writer for the University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
who aided Supreme Court
Supreme court
A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of many legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, instance court, judgment court, high court, or apex court...
chief justice Earl Warren
Earl Warren
Earl Warren was the 14th Chief Justice of the United States.He is known for the sweeping decisions of the Warren Court, which ended school segregation and transformed many areas of American law, especially regarding the rights of the accused, ending public-school-sponsored prayer, and requiring...
in drafting two anti-McCarthy
McCarthy
McCarthy may refer to:* McCarthy * McCarthy, Alaska* McCarthy , an indie pop band* MacCarthy , a Bordeaux wine* McCarthy Tétrault, a Canadian law firm...
speeches; his mother is violinist Vivian Sweet.
Sweet has been a 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...
, screenwriter
Screenwriter
Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...
, lyricist
Lyricist
A lyricist is a songwriter who specializes in lyrics. A singer who writes the lyrics to songs is a singer-lyricist. This differentiates from a singer-composer, who composes the song's melody.-Collaboration:...
, critic
Critic
A critic is anyone who expresses a value judgement. Informally, criticism is a common aspect of all human expression and need not necessarily imply skilled or accurate expressions of judgement. Critical judgements, good or bad, may be positive , negative , or balanced...
, journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
, teacher
Teacher
A teacher or schoolteacher is a person who provides education for pupils and students . The role of teacher is often formal and ongoing, carried out at a school or other place of formal education. In many countries, a person who wishes to become a teacher must first obtain specified professional...
, theatre historian, and sometime songwriter
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
and director. He is a resident member of Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
's Victory Gardens Theater
Victory Gardens Theater
Victory Gardens Theater is a theater in Chicago, Illinois dedicated to the development and production of new plays and playwrights. The theater was founded in 1974 when seven Chicago artists, Warren Casey, Cordis Heard, Roberta Maguire, Mac McGuinnes, Cecil O'Neal, June Pyskaček, and David Rasche...
, where thirteen of his plays—including Flyovers, The Action Against Sol Schumann, The Value of Names, Berlin '45, With and Without, Court-Martial at Fort Devens
Fort Devens
Fort Devens is an active United States military installation in the towns of Ayer and Shirley, in Middlesex County and Harvard in Worcester County in the U.S. state of Massachusetts. It was named after jurist and Civil War general Charles Devens. The nearby Devens Reserve Forces Training Area is...
, and Bluff have been produced. His most recent play, Class Dismissed, opened there in March, 2009 under the direction of artistic director Dennis Zacek.
His involvement with musical theatre includes writing the book to a musical version of Murray Schisgal
Murray Schisgal
Murray Schisgal is an American playwright and screenwriter.Native New Yorker Schisgal won his first recognition for the 1963 off-Broadway double-bill The Typists and The Tiger, which won him the Drama Desk Award. His 1965 Broadway debut, Luv, earned him Tony Award nominations for Best Play and...
's play Luv with lyrics by Susan Birkenhead
Susan Birkenhead
Susan Birkenhead is an American lyricist.Birkenhead made her Broadway debut as one of a team of songwriters contributing to Working , for which she received her first Tony Award nomination. Her second was earned for Jelly's Last Jam , which won her the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Lyrics and a...
and music by Howard Marren. Originally produced off-Broadway under the title Love, it won Outer Critics Circle prizes for best book and best score. It was subsequently revived off-Broadway at the York Theatre
York Theatre
The York Theatre is an Off-Broadway theatre at 619 Lexington Avenue at the corner of 54th Street in the East Midtown section of Manhattan, New York City. It is dedicated to the production of new musicals and concert productions of forgotten musicals from the past. Each season consists of three or...
in New York, directed by Patricia Birch
Patricia Birch
Patricia Birch is an American choreographer and director for musical theatre and film.Born in Englewood, New Jersey, Birch began her career as a dancer in Broadway musicals, including Brigadoon, Goldilocks, and West Side Story . She has directed and choreographed music videos for Cyndi Lauper, the...
, under the title What About Luv? and was later produced in London and Tokyo. He also collaborated with Melissa Manchester
Melissa Manchester
Melissa Manchester is an American singer-songwriter and actress. Beginning in the 1970s, she has recorded generally in the adult contemporary genre. She has also appeared as an actress on television, in films, and on stage....
on a musical
Musical theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...
called I Sent a Letter to My Love based on the novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
by Bernice Rubens
Bernice Rubens
Bernice Rubens was a Booker Prize-winning Welsh novelist.-Background:She was of Russian Jewish descent and born in Cardiff, Wales where she attended Cardiff High School. She came from a very musical family, both her brothers becoming well-known classical musicians. She was married to Rudi...
. Sweet is also the author of Something Wonderful Right Away (an oral history
Oral history
Oral history is the collection and study of historical information about individuals, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews...
of Chicago's The Second City
The Second City
The Second City is a improvisational comedy enterprise which originated in Chicago's Old Town neighborhood.The Second City Theatre opened on December 16, 1959 and has since expanded its presence to several other cities, including Toronto and Los Angeles...
troupe), The Dramatist's Toolkit and Solving Your Script (two texts on dramatic writing).
Sweet's plays fall into two groups—those inspired by historical-political subjects and those springing from more personal impulses. The most produced of the former is The Value of Names, a story set against the backdrop of the aftermath of the blacklist. In it, a young actress finds herself facing the prospect of working with the director who named her father to HUAC during the McCarthy era. Since its 1983 premiere at the Actors Theatre of Louisville
Actors Theatre of Louisville
Actors Theatre of Louisville is a performing arts theater located in downtown Louisville, Kentucky. It was founded in 1964 by Louisville native Ewel Cornett, local producer Richard Block and actor Ken Jenkins of Scrubs fame, and was designated the "State Theater of Kentucky" in 1974. It is run as a...
, Names has been revived a number of times in the past few years, most notably in a series of productions starring Jack Klugman
Jack Klugman
Jacob Joachim "Jack" Klugman is an American stage, film and television actor known for his roles in sitcoms, movies, and television and on Broadway...
(the most recent at the Falcon Theatre was nominated for "best play" in the Ovation Awards
Ovation Awards
The Ovation Awards are a Southern California award for excellence in theatre, established in 1989. They are given out by the Los Angeles Stage Alliance and are the only peer-judged theatre awards in Los Angeles. They have been called the "...highest-profile contest for local theatre..." by the Los...
of Los Angeles; it was a remounting of the 2006 production directed by James Glossman at the George Street Playhouse
George Street Playhouse
George Street Playhouse is a theatre in New Brunswick, New Jersey, one of the state's preeminent professional theatres committed to the production of new and established plays....
in New Brunswick, NJ). Other actors who have played in it include Howard Morris
Howard Morris
Howard Morris was an American comic actor and director who was best known for his role as Ernest T. Bass on The Andy Griffith Show.- Life and career :...
, Ed Asner
Ed Asner
Edward Asner , commonly known as Ed Asner, is an American film, television, stage, and voice actor and former president of the Screen Actors Guild, primarily known for his Emmy Award-winning role as Lou Grant on both The Mary Tyler Moore Show and its spin-off series, Lou Grant...
, Garry Marshall
Garry Marshall
Garry Kent Marshall is an American actor, director, writer and producer. His notable credits include creating Happy Days and The Odd Couple and directing Nothing In Common, Pretty Woman, Runaway Bride, Valentine's Day, and The Princess Diaries.-Early life:Marshall was born in the New York City...
, Hector Elizondo
Hector Elizondo
Héctor Elizondo is an American actor. Elizondo's first major role was that of "God" in the play Steambath, for which he won an Obie Award...
, Shelley Berman
Shelley Berman
Sheldon "Shelley" Berman is an American comedian, actor, writer, teacher, lecturer, and poet.- Early life :Berman was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Irene and Nathan Berman.- Career :...
, Byrne Piven
Byrne Piven
Byrne Piven was an influential American stage actor, director, and co-founder of the Playwrights Theatre Club, a forerunner of The Second City.-Life and career:...
, Warren Mitchell
Warren Mitchell
Warren Mitchell is an English actor who rose to initial prominence in the role of bigoted cockney Alf Garnett in the BBC television sitcom Till Death Us Do Part , and its sequels Till Death... and In Sickness and in Health , all of which were written by Johnny Speight...
, Allen Swift
Allen Swift
Ira Stadlen , known professionally as Allen Swift, was an American voice actor, known for playing characters including Simon Bar Sinister and Riff-Raff on the Underdog cartoon show...
, Robin Groves, Helen Hunt
Helen Hunt
Helen Elizabeth Hunt is an American actress, film director, and screenwriter. She starred in the sitcom Mad About You for seven years, before being cast in the romantic comedy As Good as It Gets...
, Sally Murphy
Sally Murphy
Sally Murphy is an Australian children’s author and poet, who has had thirty books published, including verse novels, picture books, and educational titles.-Biography:...
and Larry Block
Larry Block
Lawrence Joel "Larry" Block is an American radio, TV, film and theater actor. In 1971, Block appeared on Sesame Street as Tom, who worked at Hooper's Store....
.
Flyovers, which premiered at Victory Gardens in 1998, represents a more personal project. The story of a film critic who returns to the small town in Ohio where he grew up and encounters threats he thought he left behind years ago, the play anticipated the confrontation between red state and blue state cultures. The original production, directed by Dennis Zacek, starred William Petersen
William Petersen
William Louis Petersen is an American actor and producer, best known for playing Dr. Gilbert "Gil" Grissom on the hit CBS series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. He portrayed President John F...
, Amy Morton
Amy Morton
Amy Morton is an American actress best known for her work in theatre. A member of Steppenwolf Theater's core group of actors since 1997, Morton has spent most of her career working in the Chicago theater scene. She made her Broadway debut starring opposite Gary Sinise as Nurse Ratched in the Tony...
, Marc Vann
Marc Vann
Marc Vann , is an American actor. He is known for his role as Conrad Ecklie in the CBS television series, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. Although this role as the agitator of Gil Grissom has earned the character the dislike of CSI fans, Vann himself has a small, but growing fanbase...
and Linda Reiter. Gary Cole
Gary Cole
Gary Michael Cole is an American actor. Cole is known for his supporting roles in numerous film and television productions since the 1990s.-Early life:...
and Teddi Sidall took over for Petersen and Morton when the run was extended. The play won a Joseph Jefferson Award for its script, and it was recently published in Victory Gardens Theater Presents Seven New Plays From the Playwrights Ensemble, an anthology from Northwestern University Press
Northwestern University Press
Northwestern University Press is the university press of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, USA.- History :Northwestern University Press was founded in 1893, at first specializing in legal periodicals. Today, the Press publishes scholarly books of fiction, non-fiction, and literary...
. A showcase production in New York in 2009, produced by Artistic New Directions, 78th Street Theatre Lab and Jeff Landsmann, starred Richard Kind
Richard Kind
Richard John Kind is an American actor known for his roles in the sitcoms Mad About You and Spin City .- Early life :...
, Michele Pawk
Michele Pawk
Michele Pawk is an American actress and singer.-Biography:Born in Butler, Pennsylvania, Pawk attended Allegheny College and the College Conservatory of Music in Cincinnati, after which she spent a year working in a musical revue at Disney World...
, Kevin Geer and Donna Bullock. Northwestern University Press
Northwestern University Press
Northwestern University Press is the university press of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, USA.- History :Northwestern University Press was founded in 1893, at first specializing in legal periodicals. Today, the Press publishes scholarly books of fiction, non-fiction, and literary...
also published an anthology containing nine of his scripts in under the title The Value of Names and Other Plays by Jeffrey Sweet; Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...
theatre critic emeritus Richard Christiansen wrote the foreword.
Sweet has also written for other media, including hundreds of hours of television as well as radio adaptations of some of his plays. His work for the soap opera One Life to Live
One Life to Live
One Life to Live is an American soap opera which debuted on July 15, 1968 and has been broadcast on the ABC television network. Created by Agnes Nixon, the series was the first daytime drama to primarily feature racially and socioeconomically diverse characters and consistently emphasize social...
resulted in a Writers Guild of America
Writers Guild of America
The Writers Guild of America is a generic term referring to the joint efforts of two different US labor unions:* The Writers Guild of America, East , representing TV and film writers East of the Mississippi....
Award for writing for a daytime serial in 1992 and an Emmy nomination. Under the title of "creative consultant," he also co-wrote the adaptation of Hugh Whitemore
Hugh Whitemore
Hugh Whitemore is an English playwright and screenwriter.Whitemore studied for the stage at London's Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where he is now a Member of the Council. He began his writing career in British television with both original teleplays and adaptations of classic works by Charles...
's Pack of Lies
Pack of Lies
Pack of Lies is a 1983 play by English writer Hugh Whitemore.Based on a true story, the plot centres on Bob and Barbara Jackson and their teenage daughter Julie The Jacksons are friendly with their neighbours, Peter and Helen Kroger, until the couple is...
for the Hallmark Hall of Fame
Hallmark Hall of Fame
Hallmark Hall of Fame is an anthology program on American television, sponsored by Hallmark Cards, a Kansas City based greeting card company. The second longest-running television program in the history of television, it has a historically long run, beginning in 1951 and continuing into 2011...
. The script, officially credited to the pseudonym Ralph Gallup, was nominated for an Emmy, and the show won a Peabody Award
Peabody Award
The George Foster Peabody Awards recognize distinguished and meritorious public service by radio and television stations, networks, producing organizations and individuals. In 1939, the National Association of Broadcasters formed a committee to recognize outstanding achievement in radio broadcasting...
.
Sweet serves as a member of the Council of the Dramatists Guild, is a member of Ensemble Studio Theatre
Ensemble Studio Theatre
The Ensemble Studio Theatre is a membership-based, developmental theatre located in New York City. It has a dual mission of nurturing individual theatre artists and developing new American plays.-Overview:...
, and is an alumnus of New Dramatists. He contributes a regular column to the magazine, Dramatics.