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40.
THE CONNECTION + London Theatre programme.
NY: Grove Press (Evergreen Original), 1960. First edition. Wrps., 96pp. + 16pp. b/w photo-illustrations by John E. Wulp (including Warren Finnerty as Leach on the front cover). Preface by Kenneth Tynan.
Jack Gelber's depiction of the life of drug-addicted musicians was first performed by The Living Theatre in July 1959 and brought them their first real success. Designed by Julian Beck and directed by Judith Malina, it featured, among others, Freddie Redd, who wrote and performed the music with Jackie McLean, Larry Ritchie and Michael Mattos. In a letter from jail in 1965 to his friend Karl Bissinger, Beck wrote that "We felt compelled to do 'The Connection', not only because of our great admiration for Jack Gelber's accomplishments but also because we were still somehow bound to jail and the junkies there and hoped, naively, that a play might help set them free" (see item #48). The play also provided Beck and Malina with the first opportunity to apply their Artaudian principles.
Lettering to spine slightly faded, o/w a tight, Very Good plus copy.
Together with: original programme from a production of 'The Connection' directed by Nick Garland at the Duke of York's Theatre, London, February 1961. The cast included many of those from the original 1959 Living Theatre production in New York. Very Good.
