In honor of Banned Books Week, we're taking a look at ten books that made their way to the Broadway stage after鈥攁nd in some cases, during鈥攃hallenges to keep the books out of schools and libraries.
1. Fun Home, this year's Best Musical winner at the Tony Awards, started its life as a graphic memoir by . Due to its depictions of lesbian relationships, there have been efforts to keep the book out of classrooms and libraries as recently as this past August, , citing its "pornographic" content.
In April 2014, inspired the cast and creators of the musical adaptation of Fun Home to travel to Charleston for two special concert stagings of the production.
2. "The Grapes of Wrath" by is a beloved classic of American literature, but that hasn't protected the work from encountering calls for the book's banning. It was banned and burned in some locations almost immediately upon publication, even while simultaneously becoming a best-seller. The novel's fictitious account of the very real Dust Bowl had many upset with what they thought were unfair depictions of American life. The book remains on lists of the most-challenged books even today.
In 1990, made its debut as a Broadway play, adapted and directed by . It went on to become the Tony Award-winning Best Play of 1990, and Galati received a Tony for his direction as well.
3. 's "The Color Purple," like "Fun Home," has created controversy for its "sexual and social explicitness, and troubling ideas about race relations, man's relationship to God, African history, and human sexuality," as a high school in Oakland, CA put it in 1984. Despite this, the book has become one of the most lauded in literary history, winning the 1983 National Book Award for Fiction along with a Pulitzer.
It was adapted into a successful film in 1985, starring , and . Twenty years later, Broadway got a musical adaptation of with a book by and a score by , and . won a 2006 Best Actress in a Musical Tony Award for her performance as Celie. Next month, the first Broadway revival of the musical adaptation will arrive at the Bernard B. Jacobs theatre, starring , and , each making their Broadway debut.
4. Vladimir Nabokov's "Lolita" was controversial right from the start, and that's not any big surprise; the story concerns a 37-year-old professor who has a sexual relationship with his 12-year-old stepdaughter. Despite the controversial subject matter, "Lolita" achieved classic status fairly quickly.
The novel became a successful film, directed by Stanley Kubrick, in 1962. A Broadway musical adaptation was written by John Barry and (of Lerner and Loewe fame) entitled Lolita, My Love, but it closed in Boston during its pre-Broadway tour. In 1981, tried his hand at a Broadway play adaptation, titled , starring . It closed following a 12-performance run.
5. "Of Mice and Men," another Steinbeck classic, has faced at least 54 challenges since its publication in 1936 for allegedly "promoting euthanasia," "condoning racial slurs," "vulgar language" and being "anti-business," according to the American Library Association.
Nevertheless, appeared almost immediately on Broadway, opening in an adaptation written by Steinbeck himself in November 1937鈥攊t won the 1938 Drama Critics' Circle award for Best American Play. The stage adaptation was revived in 1974 in a production that starred and , and more recently in 2014 starring and .
6. 's "Native Son" was released in 1940. It tells the story of a 20-year-old African American man named Bigger Thomas who lives in Chicago's destitute South Side in the 1930s. Bigger ends up committing some pretty violent crimes, but Wright's novel depicts a systematic inevitability behind them. Its violence and language have kept it atop the lists of the most-challenged and banned books since its publication.
In 1941, became a Broadway play written by and Richard Wright. starred as Bigger Thomas. It was nominated for a New York Drama Critics' Circle award for Best American Play, but lost out to 's .
7. 's "" takes place in an Oregon psychiatric hospital, a response to profound changes in how psychiatry was being approached in America at the time of its writing, 1959. Though it is considered by many to be a classic鈥擳ime Magazine named it one of the "100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005"鈥攊t has also one of this country's most challenged and banned novels. According to the American Library Association, complaints have been made alleging that the novel "glorifies criminal activity" and promotes "secular humanism."
In November 1963, #One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest became a Broadway play, adapted by and starring . Though it had a relatively-short run of 82 performances, a revival of the stage adaptation was mounted in 2001 starring . That production fared somewhat better, winning the 2001 Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play.
8. You'd be hard pressed to find a better-loved American novel than "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," but the novel of live on the Mississippi has nevertheless been controversial since its initial release. It's frank depiction and discussion of racial issues has been interpreted by some as vulgar, an interpretation that continues to cause challenges against the book being taught in schools even today.
The novel has received many film adaptations over the years, but it first made an appearance on Broadway in 1985, in a musical adaptation titled Big River. Written by and , the musical was a big success, running 1,005 performances and winning seven 1985 Tony Awards including Best Musical. In 2003, a production that was originally produced by transferred to Broadway, winning a special Tony Honor for Excellence in the Theatre. Like their current production of , the production featured a mix of both deaf and hearing performers, all of whom used sign language throughout the performance.
9. "Flowers for Algernon," by , began in 1959 as a short story about a man and mouse who both have received experimental surgery to artificially increase their intelligence. Keyes expanded the story into a full novel in 1966. It has faced banning challenges frequently since then, usually in response to the novel's depiction of the main character's struggle to understand his sexual desires.
and adapted the novel into a musical in 1979, titled . It played London's West End and starred . It transferred to Broadway in 1980 with taking over the lead, but the production had a brief run of only 17 performances.
10. Several of 's books have faced banning over the years, such as "Carrie," originally published in 1974. According to the American Library Association, complaints about the novel's language and "satanic killing" sequence have been responsible for the book's successful banning at several libraries and schools over the years.
also became one of the most infamous Broadway musicals ever produced shortly after it premiered in 1988. The musical adaptation, written by , and , came to Broadway after a London production at . It starred , Linzi Hately, and and played a five-performance run at the Virginia Theatre. Despite its brief tenure on Broadway, the show became a cult-favorite amongst musical theatre fans. Over 20 years later, a revised version of the show returned to New York, playing Off-Broadway in a production by . This new version of the show recently opened in Los Angeles, where it is scheduled to run through Nov. 15.
(Logan Culwell is a musical theatre historian, 半岛体育's manager of research and curator of 半岛体育 Vault. Please visit .)
