Group Theatre (New York) - Demise and Later Influence

Demise and Later Influence

Despite its success and sweeping impact on the American theater landscape for many years to come, by 1940, impending war, the lure of fame and fortune in Hollywood, the lack of institutional funding and the friction of interpersonal relationships within the Group eventually led to its demise. In the spring of 1941, Elia Kazan and Bobby Lewis accompanied Harold Clurman as he turned the key on the Group offices for the last time.

After the war, in 1947, Robert Lewis, Elia Kazan, and Cheryl Crawford founded the Actors Studio, where the techniques inspired by Stanislavski and developed in the Group Theatre were refined. Under the leadership of Lee Strasberg, who later joined the Actors Studio and became its director in 1951, what is now referred to as The Method emerged as a lasting force in modern drama.

Institutionally, the Group influenced the Chelsea Theater Center, a later theater in New York (1960s and 1970s), born of idealism and destroyed by lack of funding and friction between its co-directors. Hal Prince invokes the Group in his foreword to the book, Chelsea on the Edge: The Adventures of an American Theater.

In the 1950s, many of the former members were called before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Those who appeared as "friendly" witnesses, such as Elia Kazan, Clifford Odets, and Lee J. Cobb, avoided the fate of their colleagues who refused to name Communist Party members and, as a result, were blacklisted.

The Group Theatre is described in Robert Lewis' Slings And Arrows, Theater in My Life, Harold Clurman's The Fervent Years, and Wendy Smith's authoritative history Real Life Drama.

The ReGroup Theatre, founded in 2010, has been republishing and re-staging the Group Theatre's Lost Plays. The first Volume of plays collects John Howard Lawson's Gentlewoman and Success Story and Claire & Paul Sifton's 1931-. They also held The Group Theatre's 80th Anniversary Tribute at Symphony Space on 10/10/11. They performed scenes from all 23 of The Group's plays and were joined on stage by such icons as Lois Smith, Frances Sternhagen and Wendy Smith, author of the book 'Real Life Drama.'