The Dream Machine.

Drama criticism; Theater history; Theatrical financing; American theater

This article traces the history of the new play movement in the U.S. One of the problems that confronts anyone who tries to write or think about the American theatre is the immense size of the industry. It is hard to see what is really going on. A common perception is that there is not enough financial support for new work, that somehow foundations and executive officers of major companies have failed to bankroll what we like to call research and development. Another strong belief is that there are too few premieres. Prior to 1957, there were but two notable attempts to encourage writing for the theater. The Federal Theatre Project in the 1930s fostered ensemble creation, its Living Newspaper technique anticipating the collective approaches of the 1960s. Its life span was a brief four years. The commercial theater, in a bout of uncharacteristic generosity, provided the seed money for a writers workshop in 1949. But the modern history of the movement begins in 1957, when real passion and real money for new work appeared in the guise of W. MacNeil Lowry of the Ford Foundation. He single-handedly underwrote the decentralization of the American Theatre, and in so doing created a vast new market for the American playwright. By 1964, the process of decentralization is inextricably linked with the growth of this golden goose, the new American play. It is difficult to say which came first: the great infusion of money into this aspect of the industry, or the sudden awareness of a moral imperative to do new plays.