OP, you may want to consider two works, one a film, the other a play.
The film is PRINCE OF PLAYERS (1955) about the life of Edwin Booth, starring Richard Burton (if you don't know who he was, consider him the Edwin Booth of the 20th century) and written by Moss Hart (if you don't know who he was, look him up). John Wilkes Booth is played in the film by John Derek (he had a wife named Bo). The movie may teach you a great deal about Edwin Booth, including his struggles to not be hated for his brother's having assassinated the president.
The other is a play that not to o ong ago, and very appropriately, played the Booth Theatre, Jon Robin Baitz's OTHER DESERT CITIES. it concerns another show business family, this one fictional, with political scars similar to that of the Booths. The Wyeths have their own fateful issues concerning their past and the kind of guilt in politically motivated violence by association with a family member that distinguished the Booths.
Updated On: 3/22/18 at 05:06 AM