Here in America
'I'm saying there's someone who could stop this madness. If you stood up, and said "no".'
On a rainswept afternoon in 1952, Hollywood and Broadway's leading director Elia Kazan met his closest collaborator, the playwright Arthur Miller. As the anti-Communist crusade of McCarthyism blacklisted hundreds of their colleagues, Kazan and Miller faced a stark choice. Should they betray their friends, or risk never working again?
David Edgar's play Here in America is a compelling drama that imagines a confrontation between two giants of stage and screen, both passionately involved with an actress about to become the most famous movie star in the world. It was first performed at the Orange Tree Theatre, London, in 2024, directed by James Dacre.
David Edgar is a multi-award-winning playwright whose plays – including Maydays, Pentecost, The Prisoner’s Dilemma, Playing with Fire and Written on the Heart – have been performed on many of the UK’s main stages, including the Royal Shakespeare Company and National Theatre.