March 22, 2007
New Mark Twain comedy headed to Broadway in fall
 "Is He Dead?" a new comedy by Mark Twain, will hit the Broadway stage in October, Playbill reports.
The new play was written in 1898 -- but lost to the Twain archives stored with the University of California at Berkeley. Twain scholar Shelley Fisher Fishkin found the three-act comedy just four years ago.
When the University of California Press first published the play in 2003, it said the work had not been previously published or produced on stage. It summarized the play this way:
Richly intermingling elements of burlesque, farce, and social satire with a wry look at the world market in art, Is He Dead? centers on a group of poor artists in Barbizon, France, who stage the death of a friend to drive up the price of his paintings. In order to make this scheme succeed, the artists hatch some hilarious plots involving cross-dressing, a full-scale fake funeral, lovers' deceptions, and much more. Its website quotes favorable reviews from Booklist and actor Hal Holbrook, who portrayed Twain on Broadway in a one-man show in 2005.
"Is he Dead?" will come to Broadway under the direction of Michael Blakemore and with David Ives handling script revision. Bob Boyett and Bill Haber are producing, a team whose current Broadway load consists of "The Coram Boy," "Journey's End," "Inherit the Wind," "The Drowsy Chaperone" and "Spamalot."
Earlier: Broadway buzz for 2007-2008: 'Equus' to 'Xanadu'
March 22, 2007 08:02 AM in Broadway
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