Williams, Tennessee. CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF. [Original Playscript], [n.d.] [c: 1954] Ts, 133 pp. [Typescript Carbon Original]. Acts I, II & III. Numbered internally by Act. Bound into a grey two hole duo tang style folder showing some use, with the red printed label of "Anne Meyerson Manuscript Typing And Mimeographing Service pasted onto the top left corner. Originally sold by Harvey Tucker of Black Sun Books in 1981 with his signed note on the title page: "This script of Tennessee Williams is from the collection of Audrey Wood, his agent, and is authentic". The play was dedicated by Williams to Audrey Wood his long-time literary agent. From 1939 Wood helped guide & focus Williams' writing. With her nurturing, he created some of his greatest works, including: Menagerie, Streetcar & Cat. An essentially fine copy of this rare playscript with holographic red pencil corrections [of uncertain origin, likely Williams or Wood's] suggesting a move of Brick's line: "I might be impotent - Maggie" from 3-39 to the close at 3-40, adding a line for Margaret [Maggie the cat]: "I'm not afraid" & then "Curtain"; the text unrevised or revised does not appear in any later published editions. This very early unsanitized pre-New York playscript contains the original lewd "Elephant Joke" [Texas 14, 15: Parker 484-5] 3-31 with Brick's uproarious laughter which Kazan gradually eliminated from successive drafts but which was incorporated into the original Philadelphia play tryouts. 'Cat's' Brick & Maggie originated in the short story "Three Players of a Summer Game," first published in The New Yorker, November 1, 1952 which Williams developed into the play. In late 1954, the Playwrights Company agreed to produce Cat on a Hot Tin Roof & named Elia Kazan as director who suggested revisions to the script, asking Williams to rewrite the third act for Broadway. The play opened March 25, 1955, & the revised ending has engendered an ongoing debate over its correctness that remains to this day. New Directions published the first edition in book form later that year with both Williams' original version of the third act & the Broadway version, with a "Note of Explanation" discussing the circumstances of the revision. The original Kazan directed theatrical performance, featured Ben Gazzara, Burl Ives, Barbara Bel Geddes, Pat Hingle, & blues greats Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee. Elizabeth Taylor & Paul Newman starred in the film version. A very early state of this Pulitzer winning Williams masterpiece. $39500.
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