Thomas Babe
| Thomas Babe | |
|---|---|
| Born |
March 13, 1941 Buffalo, New York |
| Died | December 6, 2000 (aged 59) Stamford, Connecticut |
| Occupation | Playwright, screenwriter |
Thomas Babe (March 13, 1941 – December 6, 2000) was an American playwright, "one of Joseph Papp's most prolific resident playwrights at the New York Shakespeare Festival," with seven of his plays premiered at the Public Theatre. His work during the mid-1970s and through the 1980s explored many elements of American history and cultural mythology. He was fascinated by the concept of the traditional hero figure - and the reality behind it.
Thomas Babe was born in 1941 in Buffalo, New York, the son of Thomas James and Ruth Ina (née Lossie) Babe. He had two sisters, Mimi and Karen. Although he started writing at a young age, Bab did not go into theater until after earning other degrees at Harvard University, where he was Phi Beta Kappa; Cambridge, and Yale University Law School.
Babe's works were regularly produced in New York City by Joseph Papp's Public Theater, as well as regional theaters across the country. As noted below, seven of his plays were premiered at the Public Theater, where Babe was a resident playwright. His first major success there was Kid Champion (1975), starring Christopher Walken as a former rock star.
In addition to exploring the concept of hero and its mythology, Babe often featured strained family relationships, specifically focusing on fathers and daughters, love and individual rights. These themes come together in Babe's 1977 play, A Prayer for My Daughter, starring Alan Rosenberg and Laurence Luckinbill, and directed by Robert Allan Ackerman. It was described as a "close-quartered, deeply psychological interrogation in a police station", that was "strange and compelling", and "unsuspectingly, delivers swift body punches."
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