Staging Emily Dickinson

Biographer Grant Hayter-Menzies lives in British Columbia. His works include biographies of Charlotte Greenwood, Princess Der Ling, Sarah Pike Conger, Pauline Benton, and Lillian Carter, along with the life of a dog, military mascot Rags of the First Division in World War I. He is the literary executor of playwright William Luce.

• Table of ContentsForeword by Jordan R. YoungPrologueAcknowledgments1. Sober ecstasy2. Julie3. Charles and Bill4. “Bitchy little spinster”5. The play6. Miracle on West 48th Street7. Tour and television8. Dickinson’s letter to the world9. Play in a time of plague: The Belle navigating ­Covid-1910. Julie: “A thousand summers”11. Charles: “Save it for the stage”12. William Luce, “Playwrote”Epilogue: I will not let thee goAppendix. Helen Kingsley Krauss: Her letter to the worldChapter NotesBibliographyIndex

“The Belle of Amherst, which follows the life of Emily Dickinson at her home in Amherst, MA, between 1845 and 1886, has been delighting audiences and defying critics around the world since its less than auspicious Broadway opening at the Longacre Theatre in April 1976. This one-person show was the work of three talented individuals: playwright William Luce, actress Julie Harris, and director Charles Nelson Reilly, who, respectively, had never written a play, never performed in a one-person show, and never directed a stage performance. Although the play ran less than four months on Broadway, it won Harris a Best Actress Tony Award. Biographer Hayter-Menzies (Muggins), Luce’s mentee/literary executor and friend of Harris and Reilly, relates the story of the play from its inception to its status as an American theater classic. The book also contains heartfelt portraits of the play’s creators. The play has often been the target of academics, and Hayter-Menzies provides an informative survey of scholarly writing about Dickinson so that readers can draw their own conclusions. Bursting with anecdotes, personal stories, and careful research, this is an important contribution to American theater history. Readers who cannot imagine a life without stage performances will thoroughly enjoy this book.”—Library Journal; “Grant Hayter-Menzies was the companion, caretaker, and archivist of a great American playwright, but he is also a writer of uncommon perceptiveness and grace. In this book, Grant gives us a probing backstage look at William Luce's most celebrated work; at the same time, he shows us a literary friendship that is in itself worthy of a play.”—James Gavin, author of Stormy Weather: The Life of Lena Horne and Is That All There Is? The Strange Life of Peggy Lee