Medical world on stage?

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Medical world on stage?

Posted: 1/31/06 at 7:02am

Something has been puzzling me and perhaps you folks can offer some insight.
It seems that TV is saturated with medical dramas/comedies/dramadies but there has been no live theater devoted to such topics. Perhaps the medical world just doesn't sell? Doesn't fit the "tone" of a musical? Perhaps it is that writers and lyricists are so far removed from the medical world that the background to write a good piece isn't there? Just curious. I am an ER doctor who would love to write/consult on a script regarding the field of medicine, especially as it gives a unique and really raw awareness of people, suffering, hilarity and all of the elements which could make a great piece of theater. Just curious as to your thoughts :)

re: Medical world on stage?

Posted: 1/31/06 at 9:16am

Actually, there was a stage play called "E/R" created by Chicago's Organic Theatre Company in the late 1970's. A comedy, it featured a large cast, some playing multiple roles, and depicted one night in the emergency room at a Chicago hospital. It was extremely sucessful, running over a year, and subsequently revived several times.

In the late 1980's, it was made into a sitcom starring Elliot Gould, Mary McDonnell, Conchata Farrell, Jason Alexander, and a young actor by the name of George Clooney. It lasted one season.

In the

re: Medical world on stage?

Posted: 1/31/06 at 9:22am

I guess the plays Wings, about a stroke victim....and Whose Life Is It Anyways?, first with Tom Conte and then Mary Tyler Moore sort of relate. Neither were musicals, however.

re: Medical world on stage?

Posted: 1/31/06 at 10:48am

Well, Sidney Kingley's MEN IN WHITE won the Pulitzer in 1934 and went on to be a film with Clark Gable about the moral quandries of a hot shot young surgeon

James Lapine's FRAN'S BED which ran at Playwright's Horizons last year, dealt with a woman in a coma and the impact of that on her family.

Arthur Kopit's WINGS explores the mind and imagination of a stroke victim

Dale Wasserman's ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST is set in a mental hospital.

Another Pulitzer prize winner Michael Cristopher's THE SHADOW BOX is set in a hospice for terminally ill cancer patients

"What a story........ everything but the bloodhounds snappin' at her rear end." -- Birdie [http://margochanning.broadwayworld.com/] "The Devil Be Hittin' Me" -- Whitney

re: Medical world on stage?

Posted: 1/31/06 at 11:56am

Don't forget John Patrick's THE HASTY HEART - set in a mobile military hospital, Peter Nichols' THE NATIONAL HEALTH, set in a British hospital, William Finn's musical A NEW BRAIN, mostly set in a hospital, and the Rodgers & Hammerstein musical ALLEGRO, in which the central character is a small town doctor who moves to a large city to work at a fancy hospital.

re: Medical world on stage?

Posted: 1/31/06 at 12:47pm

How about Wit, A New Brain, The Moonlight Room (?) or were you thinking only B'way.

re: Medical world on stage?

Posted: 1/31/06 at 12:51pm

Feeling Electric's workshops have had a strong medical influence, although they're more psychological than physical health.

Like a firework unexploded
Wanting life but never knowing how

re: Medical world on stage?

Posted: 1/31/06 at 12:57pm

ANGELS IN AMERICA (lots of it...)

re: Medical world on stage?

Posted: 1/31/06 at 1:13pm

The shows are out there.

A New Brain
Falsettos (Act 2 Falsettoland has hospital scenes and has a woman character who is a doctor)
Wit
Bad Habits by Terrence McNally

If anyone ever tells you that you put too much Parmesan cheese on your pasta, stop talking to them. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.

Updated On: 1/31/06 at 01:13 PM

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