Horse Eats Hat | |
---|---|
Written by |
Edwin Denby Orson Welles Based on the play The Italian Straw Hat by Eugene Labiche and Marc-Michel |
Date premiered | September 26, 1936 |
Place premiered | Maxine Elliott Theatre, New York City |
Original language | English |
Genre | Farce |
Horse Eats Hat is a 1936 farce play co-written and directed by the 21-year-old Orson Welles, and presented under the auspices of the Federal Theatre Project. It was Welles's second WPA production, after his highly successful Voodoo Macbeth. The script, by both Edwin Denby and Welles, was an adaptation of the classic French farce The Italian Straw Hat, by Eugène Marin Labiche and Marc-Michel.
Starring Joseph Cotten, a mainstay of what would become known as the Mercury Theatre, the play premiered at the Maxine Elliott Theatre, New York City, on September 26, 1936, running until December 5, 1936.
Welles spoke to filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich about the production:
The farce Horse Eats Hat was the best of the Mercury shows — and, though successful, it divided the town. The press was mixed, yet it was always packed, and had an enormous following. Some people went to it every week as long as it ran."
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