Thornton Wilder's one-act The Long Christmas Dinner is the center of a new holiday festival this year, with The Public Theater among more than 30 theaters, schools and bookstores in 20 states taking part.
The Wilder Estate is launching The Long Christmas Dinner Festival as a new holiday tradition. Some participants will stage full productions of the play. Others will hold a reading followed by a discussion, and many will pair professional actors with members of their own community.
In New York, the lineup includes The Public Theater, Fort Hamilton High School in Brooklyn, Rough Draft Bar & Books in Kingston and Vassar College in Poughkeepsie. Beyond the state it takes in the Goodman Theatre in Chicago, Seattle Rep, Pasadena Playhouse, Miami New Drama, Yale Repertory Theatre, Mixed Blood Theatre in Minneapolis and Rude Mechs in Austin, along with schools, libraries and community companies from Juneau, Alaska, to Phenix City, Alabama. The list is current as of October 7, and the festival page does not yet give dates for the individual events.
The play runs about 40 minutes and moves through 90 years of a single family's Christmas dinners, with four generations arriving and departing around one table. It was first performed on November 25, 1931, in a joint staging by the Yale Dramatic Association and the Vassar Philalethesis.
The Public has presented the play as a reading and conversation since 2013, and last year's edition was held at Symphony Space. The Educational Theatre Foundation is partnering on the festival to bring in high schools, and the estate is inviting other organizations to join through thorntonwilder.com.
