Orchestra students (play)

The play takes place in an apartment on the Upper East Side , Manhattan .

• Harold celebrates his birthday. He worries that he is losing his youth and claims that he no longer attracts young men.
• “Cowboy” is an attractive blond prostitute, one of Harold’s gifts.
• Alan McCarthy is an unexpected guest at the party. A married friend of Michael from college, who is trying to tell him about something, but does not dare to do this in the presence of the others. It is assumed that he had homosexual relationships in college, but his sexual orientation was never revealed, remaining on the interpretation of the audience.

At the party there are six close friends of Harold:

• Michael is Harold's sworn friend, party organizer, former Catholic and alcoholic. He is the catalyst for most of the drama in the play.
• Donald - Michael's boyfriend, who moved from the city to the Hamptons in order to distance himself from the homosexual "lifestyle."
• Bernard is an African American in love with a wealthy white guy in whose house his mother worked as a maid.
• Emory is a vibrant and effeminate interior decorator. His sense of humor annoys the rest.
• Larry is a fashion photographer who prefers several sexual partners.
• Hank is Larry's boyfriend, previously married to a woman with whom she is in the process of divorce. He is “like” heterosexual and disagrees with Larry on the issue of monogamy .

The culmination of the evening becomes a “game”, during which each of the men must call the person whom he loved and tell him about it. Michael, convinced that Alan, making a call, finally “ outdated ” himself, takes his phone from him and finds out that he called his wife. Spectators will never know what Alan wanted to tell Michael.

The play was written by American playwright . He worked as an assistant on the film “ Splendor in the Grass ” ", On the set of which I met actress Natalie Wood ^{[1] [2]} . Wood hired him to the position of his personal assistant ^[2] , giving free time to work on the play ^{[3] [4]} , and later inspired him to move to Hollywood ^[2] . According to writer , Wood was sympathetic to the Hollywood gay scene and financially supported Crowley. ^[5] Crowley worked as an assistant to Wood and her husband Robert Wagner for many years ^[2] .

The play takes from one of the replicas of the film "A Star Was Born " (1954) ^[6] . According to Crowley, his motivation for writing the play was not activism, but anger, which "partially concerned me and my career, as well as the attitude of society towards me and the laws of that time." He said that "he wanted everyone to know about the injustice to these characters." He also noted that “[he] was not an activist, then or now. I did not know what it was. I just wrote the truth ” ^[2] . In the documentary " Celluloid Cabinet, " Crowley said that "self-derogatory humor appeared because of low self-esteem from what was said about you in those days." The prototype of the character of Michael was his friend, who periodically made mocking remarks ^[2] .

1968 premiere

Agents shunned Crowley's proposed scenario. He found support in the form of playwright Edward Albee and producer , who was then the head of the New York City Playwright Union ^[7] . For the production, it was “almost impossible to find” actors who were ready to play gay characters ^[7] . Crowley’s college friend, actor , agreed to play the role of Frank, despite warnings from his agent (who herself was a lesbian) that this could ruin his career. Crowley could hardly find the producers and owners of theaters interested in the play ^[8] .

The premiere of the play took place on the off-Broadway stage on April 14, 1968 and ended on September 6, 1970 after 1001 performances. The director of the play was , and the roles were played by , , Leonard Frey , , , , , and . The play was one of the first works, in the center of the plot of which there were homosexuals ^[9] . In 1968, the production, originally planned for only five performances on a small off-Broadway stage, proved to be a great success and moved to a larger theater. Her shows also took place in London ^[10] . According to The New York Times , the actors of the production made a hole in the scenery in order to keep track of who occupied the best seats in the hall; during the first weeks, Jacqueline Kennedy , Marlene Dietrich , Groucho Marx , Rudolf Nureyev and New York Mayor John Lindsay were spotted on them ^[8] . Despite the success of the play, all gay actors after the premiere remained in the closet ^[8] . Between 1984 and 1993, five actors, as well as director Robert Moore and producer Richard Barr, died of AIDS ^[8] .

Off Brody revivals

The play was revived off-Broadway at the Lucille Lortel Theater in 1996 and lasted from August 6 to October 20 ^[11] .

The “Orchestrants” were staged by the transport company Theater Company in New York from February 2010 to March 14, 2010 under the direction of Jack Cummings III ^[12] .

In 2002, Crowley wrote a sequel to the play, “ Men of the Guys ", Which takes place 30 years after the events of the original play. The premiere of the production took place in San Francisco in 2002 under the direction of Ed Decker ^[7] , and was also shown in Los Angeles in 2003 ^[13] .

Broadway production

The premiere of the Broadway production, directed by Joe Mantello , took place on May 31, 2018 at the Booth Theater, after the preview shows that began on April 30. Performances ended on August 11, 2018. The producers were David Stone, Scott Rudin , Patrick Catullo, Aaron Glick and Ryan Murphy . The performance, timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the original premiere, was played by Matt Bomer , Jim Parsons , Zachary Quinto , Andrew Rennels , Charlie Carver , , Michael Benjamin Washington, ^[10 and So Watkins ^{[10] ] [14]} . All actors are openly gay ^[15] .

The play was adapted into a film of the same name , released in 1970. Its director was William Fridkin .

In April 2019, it was announced that director Joe Mantello, who directed the Broadway production, would also be engaged in its film adaptation. Its premiere will be held in 2020 at the Netflix service. The main roles will be performed by the same actors ^[16] .

The premiere of the play in 1968 shocked mainstream audiences. In 2002, journalist and critic Peter Filicia argued that the original production inspired the Stonewall riots and the LGBT movement ^[17] .

Awards and nominations

• Orchestrants on the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Orchestrants on the Internet Broadway Database