Lucille Lortel: The Queen of Off Broadway

Since 1986, confirmed New York theatregoers have been aware of the Lucille Lortel Awards, which are presented annually to honour the best play and the best musical of the Off Broadway season. But who, these theatregoers may well ask, was Lucille Lortel? Why do these awards and an Off Broadway theatre bear her name? Lortel was born in 1900, descended from Eastern European Jews who emigrated to the United States in the late 19th century. Her immediate family lived on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, then moved uptown to the Bronx. There she was exposed to theatre, vaudeville, and dancing lessons, fell in love with the movies, decided to pursue an acting career, was accepted by the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and soon appeared on Broadway. But before too long, Lortel found that acting was not the career through which she could best express her talents and needs. By then she had married a man of some wealth, which enabled her to become a producer and a theatre owner, first of the White Barn in Westport, CT, and later Off Broadway of the Theatre de Lys. There, combining her intuitive knowledge of theatre, her taste for the off-beat, her charm and her risk-taking fearlessness, she became a leader of a burgeoning Off Broadway movement during the 1950s and 60s and one of the few women of her generation to be a significant player in the New York City theatre.