(Soloski’s article appeared in the Guardian, 11/17.)
The playwright Wendy Wasserstein had some tart words about artistic precocity. "Because of Mozart, it's all over after the age of seven," she quipped. Wasserstein herself first tasted success reasonably young. By the time she was 27, her play Uncommon Women and Others had received a major off-Broadway production. Though she was 39 by the time she authored her best regarded play, The Heidi Chronicles.
Wasserstein died at the age of 55 and in the wake of her passing, the Theatre Development Fund (TDF) established the Wasserstein prize, "given to encourage the work of a young, woman playwright" and accompanied by a cheque for $25,000 (£15,700). This year they decided not to give it, although after considerable outcry in the American theatrical community, they are rethinking that decision.
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