| Come Back, Little Sheba | |
|---|---|
 Publicity photo of Shirley Booth in the 1950 Broadway production, for which she received aTony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play | |
| Written by | William Inge |
| Date premiered | 1950 (1950) |
| Place premiered | Westport Country Playhouse |
Come Back, Little Sheba is a1950 play by the American dramatistWilliam Inge. Inge wrote the play while he was a teacher atWashington University in St. Louis.
Set in theMidwestern house of Lola and Doc Delaney, the plot centers on how their life is disrupted by the presence of a boarder, Marie, a college art student who has a keen interest in the young men around her.
Middle-aged Lola engages in mild flirtations with the milkman and the mailman. She sees in Marie a younger version of herself and encourages her pursuit of her hometown boyfriend, the wealthy Bruce, but also her classmate, the athletic Turk.
Doc, a chiropractor, abandoned a different career in medicine when he married a pregnant Lola, who subsequently lost the baby.
A recovering alcoholic, Doc maintains a precarious sobriety. To him, Marie represents youth and opportunities long gone; seeing her with Turk brings out resentments against Lola for ruining his life. Ultimately these feelings cause him to fall off the wagon, and act violently toward Lola. Frightened, she calls Doc'sAlcoholics Anonymous sponsor, who comes to collect Doc and take him to a state asylum where he can be sobered up. When he comes back four days later, Marie has married Bruce and left, and he and Lola reconcile.
The title refers to Lola's missing dog, who disappeared before the play's opening and remains gone throughout the story. Lola hopes for the puppy's return throughout the play by calling "Come back, little Sheba" daily from the front door, but eventually faces reality and gives up on Sheba's return.
The play premiered at theWestport Country Playhouse. Presented by theTheatre Guild and directed byDaniel Mann, the first Broadway production premiered at theBooth Theatre on February 15, 1950, and ran 190 performances. The opening night cast includedShirley Booth as Lola,Sidney Blackmer as Doc, andJoan Lorring as Marie. Booth won theTony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play, and Blackmer wonBest Actor.
Reprising her Broadway role, Booth starred oppositeBurt Lancaster as Doc andTerry Moore as Marie in a1952 film adaptation. Booth won both the 1953Academy Award for Best Actress and Best Actress - Drama Golden Globe for her portrayal of Lola.
In 1974, Clint Ballard Jr. and Lee Goldsmith adapted the play for the musical stage.Kaye Ballard portrayed Lola in the Chicago tryout, but the production never reached Broadway as planned. In 2001, it was revived under the titleCome Back, Little Sheba at the White Barn Theatre in Westport, Connecticut, withDonna McKechnie as Lola. A recording of this production was released by Original Cast Records.[1]
A1977 television version starredLaurence Olivier as Doc,Joanne Woodward as Lola, andCarrie Fisher as Marie.Granada Television produced the film as part of itsLaurence Olivier Presents anthology series. In 2006, Acorn Media released the film as part of a DVD set with six other productions from the series.
In 1984, theRoundabout Theatre Company mounted anOff Broadway revival, directed by Paul Weidner and starringShirley Knight as Lola,Philip Bosco as Doc,Mia Dillon as Marie,Steven Weber as Bruce, andKevin Conroy as Turk.[2] In his review inTime, William A. Henry III observed: "Like all of Inge's best plays,Sheba is slight of plot but musky with atmosphere...Middle age is portrayed as a time of aching sexual frustration, made more acute by the close-at-hand vision of youth...Inge did not transform his characters: they end where they began. But he understood them. In their interplay was genuine life, often blunted but ever resilient".[3]
A Broadway revival of the Inge play opened on January 24, 2008, at theBiltmore Theatre. Directed byMichael Pressman, it starredS. Epatha Merkerson as Lola,Kevin Anderson as Doc, andZoe Kazan as Marie, and ran through March 16.[4] In his review forThe New York Times,Ben Brantley called it a "deeply felt revival" and a "revitalizing production of a play often dismissed as a soggyperiod piece" and added "Ms. Merkerson allows a kind of intimate access traditionally afforded by cinematic close-ups, when the camera finds shades of meaning in impassive faces. She rarely signals what Lola's feeling; she just seems to feel, and we get it, instantly and acutely. Such emotional sincerity is the hallmark of this revival from theManhattan Theater Club, directed with gentle compassion by Michael Pressman and featuring first-rate performances from Kevin Anderson and Zoe Kazan. The production's commitment to its characters uncovers surprising virtues in William Inge's play".[5]
In 2017, theTransport Group put up a productionCome Back, Little Sheba, which won theObie Award for performance byHeather MacRae.[6]
