News
Amid Boston Overdose Crisis, a Pair of Harvard Students Are Bringing Narcan to the Red Line
News
At First Cambridge City Council Election Forum, Candidates Clash Over Building Emissions
News
Harvard’s Updated Sustainability Plan Garners Optimistic Responses from Student Climate Activists
News
‘Sunroof’ Singer Nicky Youre Lights Up Harvard Yard at Crimson Jam
News
‘The Architect of the Whole Plan’: Harvard Law Graduate Ken Chesebro’s Path to Jan. 6
William Alfred, mild-mannered English professor at a great eastern university, slipped into the off-Broadway American Place Theater last Thursday evening. Three hours later, out strode a hit playwright with the best notices of the season for Hogan's Goat.
"I feel like someone in a Thirties movie, the overnight wonder," Alfred said yesterday, as he tried to give a senior tutorial without interruptions.
Alfred glanced at his desk, which was covered with congratulatory telegrams. "I must have received a thousand telephone calls today. It's disrupting my entire academic life," he moaned.
His agent was one of the day's callers telling Alfred about three offers to produce the play on Broadway when its present run ends on Dec. 4. He has granted the book rights to Farrar, Straus, and Ginoux, the publishers of Robert Lowell's The Old Glory.
It was Lowell who persuaded Alfred to submit the play for production last spring. Lowell had borrowed the manuscript to show producers on his own, and then asked Alfred to come to New York and read the first act.
There are two more plays on Alfred's schedule, but his immediate concern in Hogan's transfer to Broadway. He refuses to sell the rights to anyone who changes his hand-picked cast and director.
Despite his new responsibilities to the theater world, Alfred plans no reduction in his Harvard chores. A New York Times interview Saturday said that he would take a six-mouth leave every two years. But he doesn't want to, even though Harvard would let him.
Want to keep up with breaking news? Subscribe to our email newsletter.