Paula Vogel’s 1997 play How I Learned to Drive is poised after almost two decades to make it Broadway premiere via Manhattan Theatre Club. The production, directed by original director Mark Brokaw, will feature its original stars Mary-Louise Parker and David Morse. The show will begin previews at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre on Friday, March 27, 2020 and will officially open on April 22.
Playwright Paula Vogel won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for How I Learned to Drive, a “moving memory play about a woman coming to terms with a charismatic uncle who impacts her past, present and future life.” Vogel is the celebrated playwright behind such other honored titles as Indecent, The Baltimore Waltz, The Mineola Twins, The Long Christmas Ride Home, Hot ‘N’ Throbbing, Desdemona, And Baby Makes Seven.
Mary-Louise Parker is a Tony Award-winning actress for her work in the play Proof. She will appear on Broadway this fall in Adam Rapp’s The Sound Inside. Other Broadway credits include Prelude to a Kiss, Bus Stop, Reckless, Hedda Gabler, The Snow Geese, and Heisenberg. She also starred in the long-running Showtime series Weeds, and in the films Fried Green Tomatoes, The Client, and Bullets Over Broadway.
Television audiences will recognize David Morse for his recurring role on the 1980s television drama St. Elsewhere and for playing George Washington in the TV miniseries John Adams. On Broadway, Morse has appeared in On the Waterfront, The Seafarer, and The Iceman Cometh. Among his many film credits, Morse has appeared in 12 Monkeys, The Green Mile, The Hurt Locker, and World War Z.
How I Learned to Drive was originally produced by the Vineyard Theatre in 1997, and transferred to a commercial Off-Broadway production by Daryl Roth and Roy Gabay. Additional to the aforementioned Pulitzer Prize for Drama; How I Learned to Drive received an array of accolades including the New York Drama Critics Award for Best Play; Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play; OBIE Awards for David Morse, Mary-Louise Parker, Mark Brokaw, Paula Vogel; Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Play, Outstanding Director, Outstanding Lead Actor, Outstanding Lead Actress; Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Play; Drama Desk Award for Outstanding New Play, Outstanding Actor in a Play and Outstanding Director of a Play.
Mark Robinson is the author of the two-volume encyclopedia The World of Musicals, The Disney Song Encyclopedia, and The Encyclopedia of Television Theme Songs. His forthcoming book, Sitcommentary: The Television Comedies That Changed America, will hit the shelves in October, 2019. He maintains a theater and entertainment blog at markrobinsonwrites.com.